In this three-minute interview with Global X, Dhattatreya Hosagrahar, CEO of the Institute of Integrated Resource Management in India explains why he is helping the indigenous tribal people of Assam: "I had an accident in 2002..."

He also describes his success metrics: "Our team members, who work day and night for the organization."

Watch this short interview then read the Unitus case study.

While traveling in the Philippines, Global X had a chance to talk to Harsha Moily, CEO of MokshaYug Access (MYA), a microfinance institution based in Karnataka that has close to 100 employees and US$2 million in loans.

MYA goes beyond microlending. Harsha Moily's philosophy is that microfinance should always include a wide range of financial services and other offerings for the poor. His advice: "Focus on the needs of the customer!"

Which is why MYA offers goat, cow and buffalo insurance: the death of an animal can have catastrophic consequences, as a source of income disappears and farmers can't pay back their loan. MYA needs to provide risk mitigation.

Why is Harsha Moily doing what he is doing, asked Global X? His response: "I can't be a spectator to what's happening India. I need to be a player."

Watch this three-minute interview then read the Unitus case study.

While in the Philippines, Global X had a chance to interview Vincent Perlas, President, CEO and Chairman of the Board of Lifebank Rural Bank, a microfinance institution that helps marginalized women in rural areas get out of poverty. See the Unitus case study to better understand the challenges he is facing and the solutions he is bringing.

Vincent Perlas, a medical doctor by training, was quite dissatisfied with medical practice and entered the field of microfinance to "use the power of finance to move lives of people, to be of service to them. And I knew that traditional banking would not have helped those who really needed help."

The visits in the field keeps him moving, especially the stories of lives that have been changed. He remembers a woman with physical disability (she can't easily express herself) who received a first loan of 4,000 pesos/US$80 to open a convenience store. She has done so well that she has extended her operations in the pig meat industry, transportation business and ready to wear garments. She now owns a huge house with all the appliances, send her children to school. She even asked her husband to quit his job to work for her!

Vincent Perlas has three ingredients to success:

1. Spirit
As a social entrepreneur, you have to be persistent, even (or especially) when things don't work well: "When you are in hell, you go on. We had the will to move forward."

2. Methodology
Vincent Perlas learned from another institution based in Bangladesh, but adapted the business model to the local context. Lifebank grew quickly "thanks to the right methodology, the proper approach, and simplified, cost-effective standardized model."

3. Gas to grow
Unitus opened many doors for Lifebank by helping them get international rating, which in turn helped them get funding very quickly.

Vincent Perlas has a piece of advice for fellow social entrepreneurs: "Face the challenges! There is light at the end of the tunnel."

Global X has had many chats with Muhammad Yunus, but most of the time when the 2006 Nobel Peace Prize laureate was talking to other interesting people, such as Peter Gabriel, Pamela Hartigan, Vera Cordeiro, Rachel Payne, Sakena Yacoobi or Albina Ruiz.

Global X even met his daughter Monica Yunus, a soprano with the Metropolitan Opera in New York who sang in French just for him (and a few thousand other people): a piece from Gounod's Roméo et Juliette. Her French was very good, thought Global X at that time.

At last, a few weeks ago, Global X had a chance to sit down with the Professor to have a little chat. Just the two of them (and a movie crew).

Global X, for once, was mesmerized and actually became speechless. Listen to Professor Yunus as he tells the story of the first US$27 loan in a village of Bangladesh, the loan that launched the microfinance movement. Watch him as he recalls how surprised he was that it took so little money to free village women from modern-day slavery, humiliation and torture.

Global X was recently in the Philippines, where he attended the Unitus Leadership Summit. He sat with CS Ghosh, founder and CEO of Bandhan, the Kolkata-based microfinance institution which ranked second in the Forbes' list of the world’s Top 50 MFI’s. You may want to read the Unitus case study here to understand the challenges and the solutions.

In this short (four minutes) interview, CS Ghosh tells Global X why he launched a social venture to help the poor in India and gives advice to fellow social entrepreneurs.

Three words: “Focus, focus, focus!”