Succeeding at the Bottom-of-the-Pyramid: Overcoming Internal Obstacles in Multi-national Corporations to New Social Venture Creation

Hybrid organizational forms often rely on the initiative or collaboration of corporate actors, yet the role of these actors is rarely examined in detail. This paper examines corporate social entrepreneurship, which refers to the initiative of corporate actors to establish new, independent social ventures in the double pursuit of financial objectives and wider societal objectives. Through an empirical study, we investigate the strategies and practices that corporate social entrepreneurs employ to build radically new social ventures outside their firm. More specifically, we examine a successful initiative to build a social impact venture at the interface of a multi-national corporation and a hybrid organization that is operating on the Bottom-of-the-Pyramid market. Our study identifies how corporate social entrepreneurs dynamically use framing and organizational anchoring strategies to build internal support and external legitimacy for a radically new social venture initiative. Our findings point to the challenges, opportunities, and strategies associated with straddling global events and internal corporate priorities when engaging in corporate social entrepreneurship.