Lean Impact by Ann Mei Chang
Two sentence summary
Ann Mei Chang takes the Lean Startup approach that’s been a bible for many successful start ups and applies it to delivering impact. Drawing on her experiences in Silicon Valley, USAID and beyond she shares a wealth of practical advice on how to “think big … start small … relentlessly seek impact”.
Three things I took from the book
1. BE CAREFUL WHEN YOUR INNOVATION IMPACTS PEOPLE
I learnt this leading on innovation at Cancer Research UK and it was helpful to see it reinforced here. When you’re developing an app to sell clothing, you can experiment with different features and approaches rapidly and easily. Not so with impact-focused projects.
Ethically there are some things you just can’t test in the way many digital start companies do. Where your innovation involves vulnerable people and tough social challenges, you have to think really carefully about how you test assumptions and conduct experiments.
2. INVOLVE THE PEOPLE CLOSE TO THE PROBLEM
For too long, rich, (usually) white, (usually) men in the Global North have been coming up with solutions to problems being faced by the Global South, or to problems being faced by disadvantaged communities in their own countries. Often these solutions aren’t suitable and don’t deliver the impact they could.
We must involve the people who are close to the problem. They understand the context and often have brilliant ideas for how to tackle the problem - they just need help removing barriers, implementing ideas and scaling solutions.
3. EXISTING FUNDING APPROACHES AREN’T HELPFUL
Funding for charities and other impact-focused organisations is often set up in a way that doesn’t encourage a test-and-learn iterative approach. It requires that you have a long term plan upfront … and that you stick to it, even if you realise you could deliver more impact by taking a different approach. This is changing but is still a big issue.
Three questions it prompted
1. HOW CAN THIS BE APPLIED TO BUSINESSES?
The focus of this book is not-for-profits. But I think there’s a huge opportunity for impact-led businesses to apply Lean Impact techniques to ensure that what they’re doing is genuinely making a difference, and constantly becoming more effective.
2. HOW CAN BUSINESSES CHANGE THE FUNDING THEY PROVIDE?
Many impact-led businesses provide funding to other organisations delivering impact programmes such as charities. There’s a huge opportunity for them to be innovative in how they do this and not repeat some of the problems presented by more traditional grant funders.
3. WHAT IF WE FOCUS ON FINDING ENGINES OF GROWTH?
Too often, growth in impact is linear. In contrast, tech start ups are good at identifying “engines of growth” that enable hockey stick growth.
There are big problems in the world and we need solutions at scale. What if we could take this “engines of growth” approach and enable exponential growth in impact to the sort of scale that many charities are unable to achieve.