The Skoll Foundation’s strategy evolution over the past two years has led to a broadened aperture that extends beyond social entrepreneurs to intrapreneurs, system orchestrators, and multi-actor coalitions driving change in innovative ways.
This shift presented an opportunity to reimagine the Skoll Award. We’re excited to announce that the Skoll Award for Social Entrepreneurship will now become the Skoll Award for Social Innovation, a change that reflects the foundation’s refreshed strategy and its commitment to supporting a diverse range of social innovators. The Skoll Award at its best has always been a spotlight, and we’re excited to catalyze greater impact by shining that spotlight on those working in innovative ways to address some of our most intractable social challenges.
The Skoll Award is evolving not just in name but also in substance: in addition to the $1.5 million in unrestricted funding provided to Award recipients, we now offer an additional $750,000 in flexible support for Awardees to make subgrants to key partners, as well as to extend their capacity in areas like monitoring and evaluation or communications. This is in keeping with our belief that those driving the change should determine how best to allocate resources to advance their impact.
Meanwhile, we are working to deepen our commitment to equity by exploring regional convenings that highlight Awardees’ work in their own backyards. As we source and select candidates for the Award, we remain committed to the belief that those closest to the problem are best placed to lead the change. If the Award is a spotlight, it is most powerful when shone on innovators, issues, and intersections that have too often been in the dark.
With our strategy shift, five priority issue areas came into focus: pandemics and health systems strengthening, effective governance, inclusive economies, racial justice, and climate change. The Foundation makes ongoing grants within these areas, and the reimagined Skoll Award will accelerate impact within and across these priorities by highlighting social entrepreneurs and innovators at the leading edge of systems change.
Given these shifts, the 2022 Skoll Awards selection process looked different from years past. We leveraged our pipeline and existing portfolio within the above issue areas, resulting in a more focused pool of 150 aligned organizations at the start of the year, as opposed to the 700+ we began with in previous cycles.
After an initial criteria screen, we narrowed down to a shortlist of 27 organizations, of which we then invited 10 to apply and conducted entirely virtual due diligence on a slate of seven finalists. We invite you to click here to see the organizations in our portfolio, which formed the basis of our candidate pool.
As we moved through the selection process this year, we paid special attention to the impact the Award—as opposed to a traditional grant or investment—could catalyze for the social innovators, communities, and systems they hope to change. The result is one of the most dynamic Awardee cohorts in our Foundation’s history. We cannot wait for you to learn more about these organizations at the Virtual Skoll World Forum on April 6-8, 2022.
We continue to explore ways to make our pipeline and process more transparent while respecting social innovators and their organizations’ time. For now, whether you are a social innovator, a funder, a scaler, or an enthusiastic student of social change, we’d be eager to hear from you at Skoll.org/connect or in the comments below.
For all the above, please share your thoughts in our open referral form. We can’t guarantee a response in every case, but we can assure you that our team will review the information you share, and we will reach out if we see an opportunity to continue the conversation. Thank you for your contribution to our network and for the role you play in creating a sustainable world of peace and prosperity for all.
