The systems change accelerator co-created by Ashoka Globalizer and IKEA Social Entrepreneurship
If deeply analyzing your work and developing a systems change strategy with a diverse team of executives and strategy consultants interests you—and you can commit approximately 3-4 hours per week over 18 weeks from September 2027 to February 2028—we would encourage you to consider participating in the program.
Ashoka System Change Experts facilitating the process to help Fellows and their Thought Partners to reflect on the problem, the systems and mindsets that contribute to them, and identify the most strategic changes that need to happen in the system.
Advisory Support from Thought Partners
Work with a team of 3-4 Thought Partners (executives and consultants) from different walks of life who will ask questions, support and accompany you in further developing your systems change strategy. They will also help with working out an organizational and implementation plan for the strategy.
Engaging the team with Strategy Thinking
The process encourages Ashoka Fellows to involve their team members in the strategy development process, often inviting them to also participate in the program. Other Fellows decide to parallelly set up meetings with their teams to go through the exercises together and integrate strategy conversations into their processes.
Peer Learning with fellow Social Entrepreneurs
Join peer learning circles with other Ashoka Fellows who are employing effective solutions to critical global problems. These circles provide the opportunity to learn and share diverse topics of interest, including new narratives, and to explore collaborations.
Strengthening the Strategy at the Summit
Present the systems change strategy at the Summit and have one-on-one conversations with 4-6 high-level Strategy Thought Partners from multiple sectors (corporate, public, multilateral, foundations, academic and civil society organizations) who can help you strengthen your strategy, share resources and offer connections.
Support with Scoping & Experimenting an aspect of the Strategy (optional)
Scoping the resources, budget and expertise needed to implement an aspect of the outlined strategy, and experiment with the help of experts from the business world.
This program is a great re-alignment of our core goals, to really figure out how we can change the system and to make it more concrete. This process has been a huge benefit for me, as a leader and changemaker, and has had a positive impact on my team members who participated in the program…
Melissa Malzkuhn
Founder and CEO, Motion Light Lab, United States
Our work has always focused on systemic change and impact. What the Globalizer did for our project was to create the space, discipline, and approach to introduce new perspectives and significantly accelerate outcomes.
Brent Kopperson
Founder and CEO, Windfall Ecology Center, Canada
Becoming a Globalizer Fellow has given me access to resources and connections far beyond my expectations. Much more importantly, though, I now see myself and my project in a completely new light: I’m not just building an organization, I’m building a movement.
Thorkil Sonne
Founder & Chairman, Specialisterne, Denmark
Globalizer has pushed me to think even more broadly about the impact I can have as a social entrepreneur. I am challenged to think beyond the success of my organization to really think about success of the social mission in a more transcendent way.
Katherine Lucey
Founder & CEO, Solar Sister, Uganda
None other than me knows how challenging and result oriented the Globalizer is. It not only pushes to pass through rigorous grilling sessions but also it actually opens up vistas of knowledge. After Globalizer, I have totally changed Bhungroo scaling up proposition.
Biplab Paul
Director, Naireeta Services, India
The Globalizer program is a much needed experience for social entrepreneurs who have gained traction in their work. It is a truly helpful exercise for those who are actually scaling and those who are looking to scale creating long lasting impact.
Abu Musuuza
Co-founder & CEO, Village Energy, Uganda
Impact Stories of the Alumni Social Entrepreneurs
Read about the strategies and impact of some of the past participants here. These are stories of social entrepreneurs who participated in the program to re-think their strategies with support from Thought Partners across sectors.
Active Fellows from all over the world, with English proficiency to communicate and have discussions about strategy.
We encourage you to apply if you have enough organizational support and stability that allows you to think about strategy AND if you are ready to scale or already scaling your systems change approach.
Our Program
Over the past four decades, Ashoka has developed its Fellowship to include over 3700 individuals in more than 90 countries – the world’s largest network of social entrepreneurs.
Through a rigorous internal selection process, the Ashoka Globalizer identifies the Fellows within this network with the greatest potential for catalyzing global systems change. The Ashoka Globalizer Program is an 18-week accelerator that encourages Social Entrepreneurs working on addressing different complex challenges to focus on their vision for systemic change, by activating the brightest minds from the business world as co-leaders for a world in which systems change is possible.
An Everyone A Changemaker World
These social entrepreneurs are challenged to further refine their leading social innovations, in order to have the most efficient, longest-lasting systemic impact.
Rather than merely expanding operations, through the Globalizer process, they consider how to open up access to their ideas and engage others as changemakers to improve broken systems.
Timeline
Selection phase
February - May 2027
Stage 1
Confirmation
June 2027
Stage 2
Launch
September 2027
Stage 3
Strategy Phase
September 2027 - January 2028
Stage 4
In person Summit
February 2027
Stage 5
Scoping & Experimentation Phase (Optional)
February - December 2028
Stage 6
Here is an outline of the program design:
📌 Phase 1: Developing the System Change Story
Using a range of systems change tools and methodologies, Ashoka Systems Change Experts work with the Fellows to analyze the problem they aim to tackle, identify the systemic conditions that keep it in place, set goals to change it and outline a systems change strategy. During this phase, each Fellow is paired up with a group of 3-4 external Thought Partners who get to develop a shared understanding of the big problem, the Fellow’s work, and Ashoka’s system thinking and the Everyone a Changemaker perspective.
⚡ Phase 2: Building the Organizational Strategy
Equipped with a systemic goal and some key milestones for how to get there, the Thought Partners accompany the Fellows, applying their skills and expertise to develop an organizational strategy to achieve their specific targeted systems change goal.
✨ Summit
Ashoka Fellows present their strategies to Strategy Thought Partners- high-level entrepreneurs, executives and experts from companies, international organizations, foundations, and NGOs that will engage in one-on-one conversations to help social entrepreneurs strengthen their strategies and share ideas and connections to help implement them.
📍 Phase 3: Scoping & Experimentation (optional)
The Ashoka Fellows have the option to continue for an additional 8 months focusing on a specific aspect of their refined systems change strategy and experimenting with the help of experts from the business world.
Apply to be part of the Dela program 7th edition
If the time commitment works for you, and you are interested in being considered to participate in the upcoming Globalizer to work on developing your systems change strategy, please email [email protected], and we will be in touch as soon as possible to review possibilities.
WE CANNOT GUARANTEE SPOTS FOR ANYONE YET, as we need to juggle many factors and criteria like Partner interest, area of impact and so on, but we do look forward to exploring if there is a way to engage you in this round.
Intrigued?
If you want to learn more about the program, we have prepared a short video with our methodology, frequently asked questions, and more.
Our Impact
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Social Entrepreneurs have participated in 34 strategy accelerators run by the Ashoka Globalizer team since 2010. 86% of Fellows have improved their strategy to scale their impact.
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Business advisors and consultants engaged, including: impact investors, academics, philanthropists, policymakers, executives, among others.
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of pro-bono consulting, with 50 partners engaged and 200+ executives engaged as senior advisors.
Our Approach
Social Innovation Projects aim to reach system and frame change with their social innovations.
Scaling is not just about serving more and more people via one’s own organization, but about influencing many others to promote and adopt the new model. In this way, the idea is no longer dependent upon one Social Innovation Project or one organization, but can continue to grow through and with others, until it becomes the new norm in society.
Systems change often requires indirect as well as direct impact.
It takes many changemakers to change a System...
The world is rapidly changing and sometimes not in the right direction. To be able to make sure the world develops for the good of all, Ashoka supports changemakers and encourages everyone to be one. These Social Innovation Projects are selected for their potential to change systems to tackle specific social problems.
However, in order to do so, they need allies –Thought Partners who are willing to connect and unlock their own changemaking potential and explore what it takes to change a system and improve social conditions.
Learn more about and put into practice our methodology by taking the Ashoka Systems Change Masterclass!
