Philanthropy is at its best when it is founded on entrepreneurial zest--think of social challenges as an opportunity to create large, profitable enterprises.
Philanthropy is not about giving money but about solving problems. While well-meaning, the idea of writing a check and calling it "philanthropy" is extremely short-sighted and unfortunately, extremely pervasive.
Instead, philanthropist should think like an entrepreneur and think of social challenges as an opportunity to create large enterprises. It’s really easy to create a $1 billion company--you just have to solve a $10 billion problem. Most of these large $10 to $100 billion problems happen to be social problems. That’s why I think that some of the largest opportunity exist for an entrepreneur in solving humanity’s grand challenges.
Article arguing that we need to think BIG...