Samasource

Samasource
Motto Give Work.
Founded 2008
Founder Leila Janah
Location
Area served
 Haiti, India, Kenya, and Uganda
Method Impact sourcing
Mission To build a groundbreaking social business that dramatically reduces poverty through digital work for a significant number of people.
Website www.samasource.org

Samasource is one of three social ventures under the nonprofit organization Sama Group. Its mission is to alleviate worldwide poverty by connecting unemployed people in impoverished countries to digital work.[1] One of the first organizations to engage in impact sourcing,[2] Samasource uses an internet-based model called “microwork” to break down large-scale digital projects from clients into smaller tasks for workers to complete. These workers are trained in basic computer skills and paid a fair wage (as determined by the Fair Wage Guide) for their labor.[3]

Samasource has offices in San Francisco, California and Nairobi, Kenya. The organization currently partners with 10 delivery centers across Haiti, India, Kenya, and Uganda, and has previously paid workers in Pakistan, Ghana, and South Africa.[4] As of March 2015, Samasource has improved the lives of 6,527 workers and 20,161 dependents in these countries.

The prefix “Sama” is a Sanskrit word, meaning “equal”. Janah has stated that her organization’s name “refers to leveling the playing field.”[5]

Business model

Samasource’s proprietary technology platform, the SamaHub, breaks down complex data projects from large companies into small tasks that can be completed by women and youth in developing countries with basic English skills after a few weeks of training at delivery centers with which Samasource partners.[6] These delivery centers are required to follow Samasource’s social impact guidelines, which include reinvesting at least 40% of revenue in training, salaries, and community programs, and hiring workers who were previously earning less than the local poverty line.[2] Samasource and in-country partners collaborate on the recruiting process, which targets women and youth without formal work experience who are earning below a local living wage.[4]

The Samahub technology features a five-step quality assurance mechanism that continually gauges the success of each individual worker. Workers are not, however, in direct competition with one another as they are in crowdsourcing models.[7] Samasource’s staff also makes a point of understanding the skills native to each region so that it can channel projects to centers best equipped to handle them.[3]

Samasource currently offers five categories of digital services to its customers, including content moderation, digital transcription, and machine learning.[8] Its clients have included Google, Ebay, Intuit, LinkedIn, and Microsoft.[4]

Impact

Samasource measures its impact by capturing longitudinal data on each of its workers, as well by conducting household surveys, wage audits, and interviews with workers after they complete Samasource employment.[9]

The Samasource website identifies two key metrics:

1. Total workers paid and trained

2. The change in income per worker

As of March 2015, Samaschool[10] has improved the lives of 6,527 workers and 20,161 dependents. The program currently employs more than 600 workers across India, Kenya, Uganda, Haiti, and Ghana,newyork .[11]

Samasource’s data further suggests that the benefits of a living wage reach far beyond financial implications. An impact report published by the organization in 2013 claims that 76% of their workers reported improvement in overall physical health, and several others were more willing to “engage with their communities…this effect is even more pronounced for women.”[9]

Third-party studies that have been conducted on Samasource’s model have reached similar conclusions. A student from the London School of Economics and Political Science found that workers training on the Samahub in rural India improved their problem-solving abilities, their social intelligence, their confidence, and their political perspective. When several workers staged a protest against what they felt were unfair managerial practices at their delivery center, they cited the empowering nature of their new jobs as an inspiration.[12]

Samaschool

In 2013, Sama Group launched a pilot program in northern California called SamaUSA (now Samaschool), designed to give low-income community college students digital skills with which they can earn a living. The model focuses on training students to perform digital work competitively, to prepare them for success on online work sites like oDesk and Elance. Leila Janah first introduced SamaUSA in a 2011 TechCrunch article[13] which attracted controversy for its assertion that Americans could compete with African and Asian workers who can afford to take assignments that pay lower fees.

Samahope

Samahope [14] is a crowdfunding platform that directly funds doctors who provide life-changing medical treatments for women and children in poor communities. Samahope lets donors fund doctors around the globe so they can treat more patients suffering from treatable medical conditions like birth injuries, birth defects, burns, blindness, and trauma-based injuries. Leila Janah introduced Samahope in 2013 and it gained widespread recognition for the Honor Your Mom campaign.[15] Samahope enables a new community of donors and change makers to come together to fund these life-saving treatments for a few dollars at a time.

History

Entrepreneur Leila Janah founded Samasource (now Sama Group) in 2008.[16] Janah’s father sensitized her to the issue of poverty from an early age,[17] and she became interested in global development while teaching English and creative writing in rural Ghana through a high school scholarship.[18] Seeing her students’ ambition combined with the rise in global literacy and access to technology during that time provided the initial inspiration for Samasource.[19]

After completing a degree in African Development Studies from Harvard University, Janah worked as a consultant at Katzenbach Partners (now Booz & Company) and at the World Bank.[20] She quickly became disillusioned, however, by the lack of insight she perceived from World Bank officials into the needs of those the organization was attempting to move out of poverty.[21] While working with multiple clients in the outsourcing sector and nonprofit world, Janah developed the business plan for Samasource.[22]

The organization received its initial funding from the International Business in Development Challenge and the Stanford Social Enterprise Challenge in 2008, and has received additional funding from grantors including The MasterCard Foundation, the Mulago Foundation, the Peery Foundation and Google.org. The organization has since grown into a team and board with backgrounds in distributed work, economic development, and outsourcing.[23]

External Reviews and Accolades

Samasource has received numerous awards and grants, including the 2012 Secretary’s Innovation Award for the Empowerment of Women and Girls[24] and the 2012 TechFellows Award for Disruptive Innovation.[25] The organization was also part of POPTech’s 2010 Class of Social Innovation Fellows.[26]

Leila Janah, founder and CEO of Sama Group, was named one of the 50 people who will change the world by WIRED,[27] and one of the 100 most creative people in business by Fast Company.[28] Janah is a frequent speaker and writer on social entrepreneurship,[29] outsourcing,[30] crowdsourcing,[31][32] and digital work.[19][33] She is the recipient of a 2011 World Technology Award,[34] a Social Enterprise Alliance Award,[35] and a Club de Madrid award.[36]

References

  1. ↑ Our Mission, Samasource.org. Retrieved 2013-04-04.
  2. 1 2 Bornstein, David (November 3, 2011). Workers of the World Employed. New York Times. Retrieved 2013-04-04.
  3. 1 2 Gino, Francesca; Staats, Bradley R. "The Microwork Solution". Harvard Business Review. December 2012.
  4. 1 2 3 Samasource Press Kit. Retrieved 2013-04-04.
  5. ↑ Cookson, Peter W; Iscol, Jill. Hearts on Fire (2011). New York: Random House. 2011. pp60. ISBN 0812984307
  6. ↑ How We Work, Samasource.org. Retrieved 2013-04-04.
  7. ↑ Gino, Francesca; Staats, Bradley R. "Samasource: Give Work, Not Aid". Harvard Business School. February 12, 2012.
  8. ↑ Services, Samasource.org. Retrieved 2013-04-04.
  9. 1 2 Samasource Impact Report 2012. Retrieved 2013-04-04.
  10. ↑ a
  11. ↑ "Impact Dashboard" (PDF).
  12. ↑ Sharanappa, Sandesh & Janah, Leila. "Microwork for Macro-gains: Evaluating the Social Impact of ICT-based Job Creation in Rural India." London School of Economics and Political Science.
  13. ↑ "How Online Work Can Save America", Techcrunch. Leila Janah. Retrieved 2013-04-04.
  14. ↑
  15. ↑ "With #HonorYourMom, Samahope Wants To Fund Medical Treatments For Women In Need Around The World", Techcrunch
  16. ↑ "Meet Our Founder - Sama Group".
  17. ↑ Cookson & Iscol. pp57.
  18. ↑ Cookson & Iscol. pp58.
  19. 1 2 "Ending Poverty in the Digital Age", TED Talk by Leila Janah, January 2010. Retrieved 2013-04-04.
  20. ↑ Dolan, Kerry A (June 8th, 2011). "Samasource Taps Silicon Valley To Create Jobs For Poor People", Forbes. Retrieved 2013-04-04.
  21. ↑ Bhattacharjee, RB (December, 2009). "Mr. and Mrs. Smith". Hypermarket.
  22. ↑ Rice, Andy (August 3rd, 2010). "Samasource, a cyber solution to global poverty". Daily Maverick. Retrieved 2013-04-04.
  23. ↑ Samasource Crunchbase Profile. Retrieved 2013-04-04.
  24. ↑ "Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton to Announce the Winners of the first Innovation Award for the Empowerment of Women and Girls", State.gov. March 7, 2012. Retrieved 2013-04-04.
  25. ↑ Constine, Josh. "The Winners Of This Year’s $100,000 TechFellow Awards Are…". Techcrunch.com. February 22, 2012. Retrieved 2013-04-04.
  26. ↑ "PopTech Presents 2010 Class of Social Innovation Fellows". Poptech.org. September 9, 2010. Retrieved 2013-04-04.
  27. ↑ Scheffler, Daniel. "Leila Janah's 'microwork' - power to many". SF Gate. December 30, 2012. Retrieved 2013-04-04.
  28. ↑ "The 100 Most Creative People in Business 2011". Fast Company. May 16, 2011. Retrieved 2013-04-04.
  29. ↑ Janah, Leila "The Bottom Lines of Many Businesses". Techcrunch.com. July 18, 2010. Retrieved 2013-04-04.
  30. ↑ Janah, Leila. "Rethinking Outsourcing". Skoll World Forum. May 19, 2009. Retrieved 2013-04-04.
  31. ↑ Janah, Leila. "Tech For and By Africa". Techcrunch.com. August 14, 2010. Retrieved 2013-04-04.
  32. ↑ Thompson, Dean. "Speaker Series: Changing the World through Crowdsourcing". Linkedin Blog. October 20, 2011. Retrieved 2013-04-04.
  33. ↑ Janah, Leila. "Computer Based Work is Providing More than a Paycheck". Skoll World Forum. November 30, 2011.
  34. ↑ Branch, Heather. "ISP Speaker Series - Leila Janah. Yale Law School, Heather Branch's Blog. September 18, 2012. Retrieved 2013-04-04.
  35. ↑ Melwani, Lavina. "Leila Janah's Samasource: A World of Equals". Lassi with Lavina. December 20, 2012. Retrieved 2013-04-04.
  36. ↑ "Club De Madrid 2012 Young Leadership Award goes to Leila Janah". Club Madrid.org. December 19, 2012. Retrieved 2013-04-04.
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