By , Nina Zipkin
Published August 12, 2016
For many entrepreneurs, it isn’t enough to only solve one problem -- they want to change the world. And when launching a business, a social mission embedded in the company’s DNA can be a selling point for customers, investors and prospective employees.
But it’s one thing to just state your mission, and another to be able to realize it. To that end, a recent study from Halycon Incubator and Capital One identified some key factors that help socially-minded business owners succeed.
Related: When Should Entrepreneurs Pursue a Social Good?
The researchers found the there are four integral pieces needed to create a social enterprise with longevity: access to all types of funding, a high quality of life in the location where the business is based, a government regulatory system that is helpful and receptive to the idea and a strong bench of employees, mentors and advisors.
In surveying 388 social entrepreneurs around the country, Washington, D.C. is ranked as the number-one U.S. city for social enterprise, followed by San Francisco, Austin, Texas, Boston and Seattle.
Related: Social Entrepreneurship Has Unexpected Benefits for the Bottom Line
Forty-seven percent of the participants said that they selected a city to start their business because they were already living there. But the researchers also found a link between the quality of life of the locale and the caliber of employee and mentors available, noting that areas that were home to a lot of universities -- such as northern California and the Boston area -- often met both of those criteria.
https://www.foxnews.com/us/here-are-the-best-cities-to-run-a-socially-conscious-startup