Get a brief insight into how IMAGO Global Grassroots works with grassroots organizations and social entrepreneurs to scale the impact of their innovations. We work collaboratively to develop growth capacity within organizations that work working with disenfranchised populations around the world. We strive to help organizations remain true to their values while increasing the impact and reach of the proven solutions that they develop and implement.

1. 2017
SCALING INNOVATIONS AT
THE BASE OF THE PYRAMID

2. “Poverty is also about not
being able to change the world
around you. This is why the
process of co-creation through
questions to help find solutions
is really powerful. There's a big
change in mindset where the
poor are not people to be
handed expertise, formulas,
money, but they become the
real change makers.”
~ Isabel Guerrero
Co-founder IMAGO Global
Grassroots

3. Top-down projects are ineffective at driving
difficult changes at the community levels
How do we motivate this teacher
towards better performance?
How do we stop this family
from open defecation?
Photo courtesy: 1. The World Bank blog, 2. UCAN India, 3. DW Blogs
How do we connect these rural
artisans with urban markets?

4. Many grassroots organizations are addressing
these “wicked development problems” locally
Solar Sister – building a women-
led sales network to bring clean
energy technology to rural AfricaSEWA- a trade union in India
working towards making poor, self-
employed women become
economically and socially self-
employed
El Sistema – a music program
creating a safe environment for
youth at risk

5. But they remain small, unable to scale their
reach and impact
The missing
middle in
development
represents the
dearth of mid-sized
community-led
organizations that
can take impact to
scale. It also
signifies the
information
asymmetry that
hinders the end to
end flow of
financial and
technical
resources in global
development
sector.
Government, Aid
Agencies, Donors
and Foundations
Missing Middle
Local NGOs, Grassroots Organizations and
Social Enterprises
- Rich in local knowledge,
innovation and
community buy-in
- Stuck at a low resource
and capacity level and
unable to capitalize
external opportunities
- Rich in
financial
resources and
technical
capacity
- Fail to reach
the poorest

6. Three factors contribute to the prevalence of the
missing middle in development
The missing
middle is a result
of the barriers to
scaling up
pathways for
grassroots
organization and
enterprises at the
base of the
pyramid. These
barriers are due to
the interaction
between three
factors: market
failures;
government
failures; and
organizational
weaknesses.
MarketFailures
• Lack of
information on
what works
• Information
Asymmetry
for Financing
• Impatient Capital
GovernmentFailures
• Lack of Physical
Infrastructure
Provision
• Restrictive
Regulations
• Impatient Politics
OrganizationalFailures
• Organizational
systems don't
scale
• Leadership
doesn't scale
• Human Resource
systems don't
scale
• Uncertainty
about whether
results will scale
• Operations don't
scale

7. Introducing IMAGO Global Grassroots
 IMAGO Global Grassroots is a non-profit, founded in 2014, that
is committed to working with grassroots organizations and
social enterprises around the world to enhance their strengths,
build their capacity, and scale up their impact in a way that
respects their unique context, attributes and evolution.

8. IMAGO’s Vision & Goals
OUR VISION
IMAGO
envisions a
world in which
the innovations
and solutions
developed at the
grassroots can
reach global
scale
Our Goals:
Innovations from
the base of the
pyramid inform
broader trends in
international
development
• Addressing the “missing
middle,” the underpopulated
space between successful
localized grassroots and
traditional development
actors
Organizations at
base of the
pyramid have
financial support
for long-term
sustainability
• Providing strategic support,
planning and
implementation to help
them become funding or
investment ready and build
a viable business model
Grassroots
organizations
and social
enterprises gain
the capacity to
scale up and
reach more
people
• Empowering these
organizations to expand
their reach, directly
improving the lives of many
more beneficiaries

9. What we do
IMAGO helps
clients develop
and scale up their
Base of Pyramid
initiatives via
three major types
of services
Industry landscape
analysis
Macro constraints
diagnostic
Organizational
scan
Systems
assessment
Scale-up strategy
Theory of change
formulation
Lean solution
development
Business model
strategy
Third-party
engagement
planning
Strategy
development
Organizational
alignment
Leadership and
team development
for Scaling-up
Research support
Data systems
design and
development
support
Learning
capacity
building

10. The IMAGO Way
-High-touch relationship:
•Maintaining high-touch engagement and building long-term
relationships with the local community and organization
leaders to co-create systems and strategies aligned with
their core values
-Multi-disciplinary expertise:
•Combining deep expertise in human and organizational
psychology with innovative design thinking methodologies
that reveals the untapped potential of the organization
-Affordable Services:
•Serving an under-served market at affordable rates
for those organizations that often don't have access
to traditional management support services
-System integration:
•Coordinating across multiple sectors and levels to bridge
high-potential grassroots organizations with the right
resources found at the top of international development
system hierarchy

11. IMAGO Leadership
Isabel Guerrero
Co-founder, IMAGO
- Senior Lecturer, MIT Sloan School of
Management and Adjunct Lecturer, Harvard
Kennedy School
-Former Vice President South Asia, The World
Bank
Zachary Green
Co-founder, IMAGO
- Professor of Practice and the Associate Director,
Leadership Institute, University of San Diego
- Executive Leadership Coach (e.g. The World
Bank, CIA, IDB, NGLTF)
Michael Walton
Economics and strategy, IMAGO
-Senior Lecturer, Harvard Kennedy School
- Senior Visiting Fellow, Centre for Policy
Research, Delhi
- Former global Director for Poverty Reduction, The
World Bank

12. IMAGO Board Members
Nisha Agrawal,
CEO of Oxfam India
Patricia
Armendariz,
CEO of Financiera
Sustentable and Board
member of Banorte
Shaida Badiee,
Managing Director of
Open Data Watch
Naoko Ishii,
CEO of the Global
Environment Facility
Ngozi Okonojo
Iweala,
Former Minister of
Finance, Foreign Affairs
in Nigeria
Praful Patel,
Board Member of
Association for Social
Advancement, Former
World Bank Regional Vice-
President for South Asia
John Wilton,
Senior Advisor for higher
education at McKinsey &
Company, Board Member
for Goldman School of
Public Policy at UC Berkley
Kerry Yang,
second year PhD
candidate in Financial
Economics at Columbia
University, with a focus
on credit and banking
systems
Joseph Stiglitz
Recipient of the Nobel
Prize in Economics (2001),
co-chair of the Committee
on Global Thought at
Columbia U. and chair of
U. of Manchester's Brooks
World Poverty Institute

13. TechnicalAdaptiveGlob. BoP S AsiaLatAm Africa
Approach Geographical footprint
US
Expertise/focus
Soc.
innov.
Multidisc/sect.
Only few firms
have genuine
focus on the
global BoP
Everyone claims
to do
“innovation”;
cannot
distinguish real
LatAm seems
less crowded
than S. Asia or
Africa – possibly
due to the
Social sector leaders are
dominated primarily by
former strategy
consultants; limited
adaptive/multi-
Core expertise/focus
of incumbent
consulting firms (int’l
development or
strategy firms) lies
Observation
s
Social
sector
leaders
Young
boutiques
Mature
dev.
consulting
Mid-sized
players
Strategy
consulting
Consulting industry
competitive
landscape
IMAGO fills an unmet market need

14. IMAGO’s Success is reflected in its impact on partners’
development and the growing client portfolio
Testimonial:
“..IMAGO really
helped us to see
our future in a
different way . . . I
saw that the
impact was there
in every day of my
work.”
~Jyoti Macwan,
SEWA General
Secretary
IMAGO’s work is benefiting over 4 million people across the world

15. Rural Distribution Network (Rudi)Success
Story
Rural Distribution Network (Rudi) is a social enterprise initiated by SEWA (The Self-Employed Women’s
Association, which represents women working in the informal sector and is one of the largest trade unions
in India). Rudi provides direct market access for small and marginal farmers and employment for
thousands of women in rural India.
Before
 Ceiling of 32 thousand dollars sale
from 2008-2012
IMAGO intervention
 Business diagnosis and translation
 Identification of fundamental
misalignments
 Leadership coaching
 COO : TORs and delegation of
authority
 Mindset shift (from organizers to
entrepreneurs)
Now
 Increase in sale
 RUDI app that solves logistic
challenges
 RUDI Dashboard

16. The SEWA Manager Ni School (SMS) was founded in 2005 to address the institutional needs of the growing number of
laborers and rural women within the organization. Based in Ahmedabad, SMS has trained thousands of women
community and business leaders. SMS serves as a managerial capacity building institution that promotes economic self-
sustainability by training grassroots managers.
SEWA Management School (SMS)Success
Story
Before
 SEWA Management School (SMS) training all
members on:
 Basic skills required by SEWA programs
 Low priority within SEWA’s institution building effort
 Lack of leadership/vision
IMAGO intervention
 Training of trainers
 Module development
 Leadership training
Now
 SMS running with cascade training to all levels of
SEWA
 Proposal for WOW/DFID with IMAGO on training
13,000 women in Rajasthan, Assam and Sri Lanka

17. Contribute to a revolution in the international development
space that recognizes the potential grassroots
organizations and social enterprises and supports their
scale-up efforts so their grassroots solutions and help
people around the world.
IMAGO’s The Long-term Vision

18. IMAGO strives to become a thought leader in BoP innovation by
harnessing the diversity of its capabilities & network
Work alongside
frontier BoP innovators
Advise institutional clients
on their BoP initiatives
Continue to work at a subsidized
rate with promising BoP
organizations innovating at the
frontier (e.g., grassroots, small social
enterprises) providing the foundation
for learnings and knowledge network.
Provide advisory services for
BoP innovation initiatives of
established institutions (e.g.,
foundations, multilateral orgs,
governments)
Build cross-cutting
knowledge base &
network
Lead multidisciplinary and multisectoral research
partnerships to generate, synthesize,
institutionalize, and share deep, practical insights
around innovating at the BoP (“MIT Media Lab” for
BoP innovations)
Needs grant funding to cover cost (“public good” Needs to be financially

19. IMAGO’s organizational needs to achieve
vision
Capital for
organizational
growth in size
and capacity
Sustainabili
ty Fundraising to
serve many
more
grassroots
clients at below
market price
Greater
reach
IMAGO’s success will open the door for many other organizations to do similar work at the Base of
the Pyramid

20. THANKS FOR YOUR TIME!
Go to our website: http://imagogg.org/
Contact us at info@imagogg.org