We champion eldership in the social innovation community - amplifying the voices of elder social entrepreneurs as they share insights on succession and transition, leadership, money and wellbeing.

Learning from those experiences, social innovators can navigate lessons already learned and focus on creating greater sustainable impact.

What We Do:

We serve social innovation community through our webinars, workshops, Insight platform and more.

Insight

A bank of wisdom for social entrepreneurs by social entrepreneurs, covering vital topics from succession and transition to leadership, money and wellbeing. Through articles, podcast episodes and webinar recordings we share the wisdom of elders of the social innovation community (experienced social entrepreneurs of any age), learning about the common opportunities and pitfalls of being a social innovator. Become a member to receive emails highlighting content every month.

Webinars

We run webinars on vital, but often overlooked, topics including succession planning, board management, financial sustainability and hero culture within social innovation - to name just a few. Check out our previous webinars on our Insight platform.

Friendship Bench

We are proud to partner with Friendship Bench Zimbabwe to provide a Friendship Bench for social entrepreneurs at some of the key conferences in the calendar (Ashoka ChangeMakers Summit 2024 and Skoll World Forum 2025 and 2026). It’s an opportunity for social innovators to seek advice and support from elders of our community. They can bring any issues or opportunities they want to discuss, from succession planning to money worries, leadership opportunities to wellbeing concerns. Anything that is on their mind. Read our Friendship Bench SWF 2025 Report on the experiences of the volunteers and visitors.

Events

We hold live gatherings / workshops during key conferences - these have included the Skoll World Forum, Ashoka events, the Decelerator Conference 2025 and more. Look out for news of our next sessions by following us on our LinkedIn.

Mentoring

A special mentoring service will be offered to social entrepreneurs in 2026. In the meantime, if you are interested in making an enquiry please contact katelynne@elderscouncil.net

Our Team

“We are creating a global network which is friendly and open where we can share our wisdom and move forward.”

CEO Chris Underhill MBE.

Founder of Thrive, BasicNeeds, citiesRISE and Mentor Services.

Chris Underhill MBE is a social entrepreneur, professional mentor and a global expert on mental health delivery.
In 1978 he started his first social enterprise. This is called Thrive and it is the UK organisation that uses gardening to bring about change in the lives of those living with disabilities or ill health. In 1985 he founded Action on Disability and Development (ADD) that works with disabled people in developing countries. In 1995 he was invited to be the CEO of the Intermediate Technology Development Group, now known as Practical Action and in 2000 he went on to found BasicNeeds the mental health charity working in developing countries which he retired from in 2016. Currently he is building his mentoring practice Mentor Services.
Chris is a Senior Ashoka Fellow, and a recipient of the Skoll Award for Social Entrepreneurship and of the Schwab Foundation award for Social Entrepreneurship. In 2000 he was honoured by HRH the Queen with an MBE for services to disability and development.

“Social innovators create such an important, positive impact. I love that we can support them and share the insights within this community, furthering the missions of future generations.”

Operations Director - Katelynne Kirk

Katelynne has been with the Elders Council for Social Entrepreneurs almost since its beginning. She has helped build the membership, developed their communications and built the Insight website.
Katelynne has worked in various roles within the charity sector including as Campaign, Communications and Admin Assistant for Jubilee Scotland and International Network Coordinator for the Homeless World Cup Foundation, leading on their Cities Ending Homelessness initiative.
She began her career as graphic designer with a love of causes and brands making a positive difference.

Our Board

Chair - Andrea Coleman.

Co-founder of Riders for Health and Two Wheels for Life.

Mel Young.

Co-founder and President of the Homeless World Cup Foundation.

Head & shoulders image of Therese smiling at the camera. She is wearing a turquoise dress with a red, brown, gold & yellow pattern and a matching head scarf. She is wearing a gold, red and dark & light green patterned scarf around her neck.

Therese Drammeh

Riders For Health.

Co-founded by Chris Underhill, Andrea Coleman and Mel Young.

Read Our Story

Head and shoulders portrait image of Cecilia looking straight at the camera. She has dark hair in a bob style. She is wearing glasses with black frames, a patterned top, a pink suit jacket and pearl stud earrings.

Global Advisory Board.

Cecilia Flores - Oebanda

Voice of the Free.

Head and shoulders portrait image of Kathryn smiling straight at the camera. She is wearing a white top, beaded and silver necklaces, large yellow, blue, black and red earrings and a yellow head scarf. Her long light brown hair is in thin dreadlocks

Kathryn Hall-Trujillo

Birthing Project USA: The Underground Railroad for New Life.

Head and shoulders portrait image of Attila looking straight at the camera. He is wearing a dark blue suit jacket, a light pink, off-white shirt and glasses which have dark grey frames. He has short black and grey hair and a short black & grey beard

Attila v. Unruh

TEAM U.

Head and shoulders portrait image of Marc smiling straight at the camera. He is wearing a dark blue jumper, a checked shirt and glasses which have dark brown frames. He has grey hair and a short grey beard.

Marc Freedman

CoGenerate.

Head & shoulders image of Mark smiling at the camera. He is wearing a dark blue suit jacket and a light blue shirt. He has short dark hair and is wearing glasses with thin metal frames.

Mark Cheng

Social Innovation Circle.

Head & shoulders image of Agnes smiling at the camera. She has long dark and grey hair and is wearing a red, orange, light and dark green zip up top.

Ágnes Geréb

Founder, Alternatal Foundation.

Head & shoulders image of Timothy smiling at the camera. He has dark and grey hair and is wearing a dark grey suit jacket and a salmon coloured shirt.

Timothy Ma

Senior Citizen Home Safety Association (SCHSA).

Head & shoulders image of Neelam smiling at the camera. She has black and grey hair and is wearing earrings and a pink, gold and dark blue sari.

Neelam Chhiber

Industree Foundation.

Impact.

Eldership is an important issue. By highlighting the continued value and contribution of elder social entrepreneurs we intend to increase the personal wellbeing of the individual and strengthen the sector. By sharing hard-won wisdom we will make a contribution to the overall sustainability of the sector for social entrepreneurs of all ages.

Our first responsibility is to offer support to the elders in the social innovation community. Each elder, who is a member, should feel that they have had their concerns listened to and where possible, acted upon.

Our second responsibility is to the wider social innovation community. Wisdom is not something we dump on people from on high but instead it flows from our mutual understanding of what the common challenges of being a social innovator feel like and what can be done to support the individual and organisation through them. The Elders Council for Social Entrepreneurs is about genuine insights, not pomposity.

Taken together, these two responsibilities, will deepen our impact and make individual social entrepreneurs more resilient as they grow older while improving the sustainability of the sector through an increased understanding of exit strategies.

Furthering Impact.

‘Small Groups’ of the Elders Council for Social Entrepreneurs can be formed. If you are interested in forming a Small Group then please contact info@elderscouncil.net