After spending several days with teachers, police officers, community organisations and older learners all involved in our work in Romania in May, I came away with a simple conviction. When it comes to social impact, we spend a lot of time talking about strategy, innovation and scale. But the difference is rarely strategy. It is how that strategy is delivered, adapted and sustained on the ground. And that starts with people.
One phrase stayed with me throughout the visit: Local adaptation is not a nice-to-have. It is everything.
We often talk about scaling solutions. Yet what I saw repeatedly was that no two communities are the same. In one school that is part of our local Skills Upload Jr programme, students had access to individual devices. In another, teachers worked with a single smart screen at the front of the classroom. Digital infrastructure, confidence levels and learning environments varied significantly, sometimes between schools only a few kilometres apart.
At a rural school serving a highly vulnerable community, I met a teacher named Mihaela. She was using digital tools to connect history, mathematics and critical thinking in ways that made learning feel relevant and engaging for her students. What struck me was that the technology itself was not the most important part of the story. Mihaela was. Her creativity, her understanding of her students and her ability to adapt available tools to their reality were what made the difference.
For businesses investing in social impact, there is an important lesson here. Scale does not require uniformity. In fact, some of the most successful programmes create frameworks that can be adapted locally while remaining true to a common purpose.
A second lesson was about partnership.
Across the social impact sector, we often talk about partnerships. But too often, partnership is treated as a funding relationship. The most effective partnerships I encountered in Romania felt very different. They were built on trust, shared goals and a willingness to respond together when circumstances changed.
One example came through our collaboration with Save the Children Romania. Together, we are supporting children and young people with digital skills and digital wellbeing education. During the visit, I met young peer ambassadors who volunteer their time to support younger children navigating online spaces safely and confidently.
What impressed me most was not simply the programme itself. It was the fact that these young people understood the challenges their peers face because they experience them every day. They were not passive recipients of support. They were active contributors to change.
I saw the same principle in our collaboration with the Romanian National Police. Officers spoke openly about a growing challenge: connectivity is expanding faster than digital confidence. More people are online than ever before, but many lack the skills and knowledge needed to navigate digital spaces safely.
What stood out was their response. Rather than focusing solely on enforcement, they are investing heavily in prevention and education, working alongside partners to engage communities directly and build resilience before harm occurs. That approach feels particularly relevant at a time when many social challenges are becoming increasingly interconnected and complex.
The third lesson was perhaps the most important: Communities evolve. And programmes must evolve with them.
During the visit, I spent time with participants in their sixties, seventies and beyond who were taking part in HiDigital, our local digital skills training for elderly. One participant proudly showed me how they were using artificial intelligence tools to design posters for a school reunion. It was something they would not have imagined doing independently only a few weeks earlier. The confidence they had gained was remarkable.
But alongside these positive stories, delivery partners were identifying new and emerging needs within their communities. Increasingly, access to housing, legal advice, employment opportunities and public services requires a level of digital confidence that many elderly people still lack. In response, conversations are already shifting towards how existing programmes can evolve to help address these barriers.
For me, this reinforced an important truth. Social impact is not only about implementing a programme exactly as it was originally designed. It is about listening. Learning. And adapting.
So what does this mean for business? I believe there are three lessons worth considering.
First, design for adaptation, not replication.
Second, invest in partnerships built on trust rather than transactions.
Third, create programmes that are capable of evolving as the needs of communities change.
These principles apply well beyond digital inclusion and digital education. They are just as relevant to employability, health, financial inclusion and many other social challenges.
As businesses increasingly seek to contribute to positive social impact, perhaps the most important question is not, “How do we scale faster?”
It is, “How do we stay close enough to the communities we serve to keep learning what they actually need?”
Because ultimately, lasting social impact is not built through technology alone. It is built through people, partnerships and the willingness to evolve.
Discussion Question for Business Fights Poverty Community?
How does your organisation balance the need for scale with the flexibility required to meet local community needs?
