Improving the lives of 10 million older adults by 2020 © 2015 National Council on Aging 1 

Creating Sustainable Solutions to Social 

Problems Through Social Enterprise: a 

Conversation with the ACL Business Acumen 

Group 

 

August 13, 2015 

Jay Greenberg, Sc.D. 

Chief Executive Officer

NCOA Services, LLC 
Improving the lives of 10 million older adults by 2020 © 2015 National Council on Aging 2 

Agenda 

 Thoughts about Social Enterprise (SE) 

 Thoughts about business planning and services 

 Thoughts about selling and sales process 

 Discussion
Improving the lives of 10 million older adults by 2020 © 2015 National Council on Aging 3 

 

Thoughts about Social Enterprise 
Improving the lives of 10 million older adults by 2020 © 2015 National Council on Aging 4 

Paradigm Shift Needed 

...the network needs to move from grants 

based to service based enterprise. Who 

will pay for our services? 

(From Assistant Secretary Greenlee’s July 14, 2015 N4A Conference - key 

note.) 
Improving the lives of 10 million older adults by 2020 © 2015 National Council on Aging 5 

Why Social Enterprise? 

 Social enterprise provides a framework for the network to 

achieve social impact in the context of a business 

environment. 

 It is a model for moving from a grants based world to a 

services for sale world that can enhance, rather than 

compromise, an organization’s ability to achieve social 

mission. 
Improving the lives of 10 million older adults by 2020 © 2015 National Council on Aging 6 

Muhammad Yunus’s 7 Characteristics of a 

Social Enterprise 

 The business objective is to overcome problems that threaten people and 

society – not to maximize profits 

 Societal needs are addressed through the profit generating products and 

services themselves 

 The endeavor is self-sustaining 

 Think stakeholders, not shareholders 

 Actions taken are environmentally and socially conscious 

 The workforce gets market wages with better than standard working conditions 

 It is done with joy! 

 
Improving the lives of 10 million older adults by 2020 © 2015 National Council on Aging 7 

NCOA’s Definition of Social Enterprise 

 Social Enterprises are organizations or partnerships that create 

and implement market-driven, self-sustaining solutions to social 

problems. 

 A social enterprise must be accountable to stakeholders that have 

a fiduciary responsibility to fulfill a social mission and not merely a 

fiduciary responsibility to shareholders. 

 NCOA requires our SE partners to meet standards of excellence 

and when appropriate fidelity standards. 
Improving the lives of 10 million older adults by 2020 © 2015 National Council on Aging 8 

NCOA Social Enterprises 

 Canary Health (Formerly DPS Health) - the partnership offers payers a suite of online 

evidence based programs designed to improve self-management skills and help people with 

lifestyle changes. The suite is targeted to the emergent risk population. The Stanford 

Online self management workshops and Canary’s CDC recognized Diabetes Prevention 

Program are part of the suite. 

 My Medicare Matters (MMM) – a partnership with Aon Retiree Exchanges to provide 

scalable Medicare education and enrollment assistance . We provide decision support 

tools that help our visitors determine when to enroll in Medicare, what type of Medicare 

might be right, and who to contact to get individual support or continue the enrollment 

process. Quality is governed by NCOA’s Standards of Excellence developed by our National 

Advisory Board, 

 Fannie Mae – NCOA works with servicers of Fannie Mae loans to assist HECM borrowers in 

default through Tax and Insurance Counseling. NCOA counselors assist borrowers with 

budgeting, creating an action plan, connecting to SHIPs and NCOA Benefits Enrollment 

Centers (BECs). NCOA works with the client’s loan servicer on a possible repayment plan. 
Improving the lives of 10 million older adults by 2020 © 2015 National Council on Aging 9 

Thoughts about Business Planning 
Improving the lives of 10 million older adults by 2020 © 2015 National Council on Aging 10

Business Planning Questions

 Sell service(s) to the end purchaser or sell to a partner that 

bundles/aggregates and sells to end purchaser? 

 If Selling to end purchaser: 

 Does my organization have a broad enough offering for that 

type or purchaser? 

 Is our service scalable enough to meet the needs of that 

purchaser (community locations, internet, mobile, etc.) 

 Who are our competitors and how do we stack up against them? 

 What are our sustainable competitive advantages? 
Improving the lives of 10 million older adults by 2020 © 2015 National Council on Aging 11

Business Planning Questions (Cont.)

 What are our metrics of success? 

 What volume is feasible? 

 What price is feasible? 

 What are our fixed and variable costs?

 How big does business need to be to sustain and thrive? 

 How much capital will we need to get to breakeven? 

 Where will we get the capital? Can we “bootstrap” it?
Improving the lives of 10 million older adults by 2020 © 2015 National Council on Aging 12

What Sorts of Customers Should We Focus On? 

 Regional/National multi-line health plans? 

 Local health plans? 

 MA only health plans? 

 ACO’s?

 Medical Homes? 

 Hospitals/health systems? 

 Medicaid? 

 Other? 
Improving the lives of 10 million older adults by 2020 © 2015 National Council on Aging 13

Not Just the Market Segment But the Door 

 Most Companies will have more than one door you can go through. 

 Health Plan: community benefits, medical management, 

marketing, care integration, etc 

 The door you go through could determine: 

 The best price point 

 The size of the sale 

 The sales cycle 

 Who you are competing against 

 Whether you can be a “one trick pony”

 What you should be selling 

 No wrong door 

 You could find or create an internal champion 
Improving the lives of 10 million older adults by 2020 © 2015 National Council on Aging 14

What Are You Selling? 

“We Manufacture Lipstick but we sell hope” 

(Attributed to a former Revlon CEO) 

 What you manufacture is about you. 

 What you sell is about your customer: 

 Halo effect of partnership? 

 Satisfy community benefits requirements 

 Health outcomes? 

 Reduced hemoglobin A1c? 

 Lower medical care utilization? 

 Stars ratings 

 Member loyalty? 

It is hard to set the right price or make the right “pitch” if you don’t 

know what you are selling. 
Improving the lives of 10 million older adults by 2020 © 2015 National Council on Aging 15

Some Thoughts About Developing Sales Flow 

 Just do It! - but don’t practice on the “big fish”

 Initially likely to be “top of house selling”

 Goal should be to learn from each pitch 

 Assume multiple meetings and have a goal for each 

 Begin to figure out how to “qualify leads”

 At some point make it someone’s only day job 

 Manage sales by process 
Improving the lives of 10 million older adults by 2020 © 2015 National Council on Aging 16

Some Examples of Messages 

Tailored to Particular Types of 

Customers 
Improving the lives of 10 million older adults by 2020 © 2015 National Council on Aging 17

ROI is More Than Reductions in Health Care 

Cost 

Average Annual Days Lost by Workers with Chronic Conditions

2.3

3.9

6.8

2.3

4.8

10.5

0

2

4

6

8

10

12

No Chronic Condition One Chronic Condition More Than One Chronic

Condition

Ages 20-39

Ages 40-64

More than One 

Chronic 

Condition 

30+% of the American workforce

Source: The Health Status of the United States Workforce: Findings from the National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey (NHANES) 1999-

2002 and the National Health Interview Survey (NHIS) 2005. Pfizer Inc. 2006 
Improving th 18

Making It Easy for Physicians to “Prescribe” 

Self Management via HIT 

e lives of 10 million older adults by 2020 © 2015 National Council on Aging 

Identify patients 

appropriate for 

workshop/program 

Scrub claims data and 

other HIT (EMR, HEDIS, 

PQRI) 

Physician/Health Plan 

sends patient an evite to enroll 

Patient consents and 

enrolls online 

Baseline patient data 

gathered and stored 

Program completed 

and information 

stored 

Notification to 

physician/Health Plan 

on completion 

 (with patient consent) 

Electronic follow-up to 

patient along with e-vite 

to other programming 
Improving the lives of 10 million older adults by 2020 © 2015 National Council on Aging 19

Getting beneficiaries the 

assistance that is right for them 

Engage, Educate, 

Activate 

Aon Retiree Exchanges 
Improving the lives of 10 million older adults by 2020 © 2015 National Council on Aging 20

Three Answers 

With a qualified lead there are always three answers but only two 

should be acceptable: 

 Yes 

 No

 Not now 
Improving the lives of 10 million older adults by 2020 © 2015 National Council on Aging 21

Discussion 
Improving the lives of 10 million older adults by 2020 © 2015 National Council on Aging 22

Jay Greenberg, Sc.D. 

Chief Executive Officer 

NCOA Services, LLC 

Jay.greenberg@ncoa.org

(C) 310-733-6279