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Looking for a last minute gift for your uncle who has everything? Feel kinda bad about the massive amounts of waste that holiday shopping creates every year? Dont really feel like going to the mall yet again? Want to make one more charitable donation this year? (Santa will appreciate itand its tax deductible).

Well do we have the innovation for youthe charity gift card. The gift certificates are premised on store branded gift cards or stored value cash cards (themselves a disruptive innovation), except the recipient of the gift is able to donate the value to the charity of their choice over the web.

A year ago we reported on our founder Clayton Christensens notion of catalytic innovation, which is disruptive innovation applied in the social sphere. Whereas a disruptive innovation transforms a commercial space by redefining the relevant plane of competition and thereby breaking down barriers to consumption for a significant customer set, a catalytic innovation transforms the ability to respond to a social need by targeting and overcoming the barriers that prevent that need from being met. Just as the fundamental unit of analysis needed to hone in on an innovation in the commercial sphere is the job to be done the essential task that a customer is looking to accomplish catalytic innovations occur when a clever business model enables the satisfaction of important jobs to be done in the social sphere.

The charity gift card fits this model to a T, illustrating the catalytic force of innovation in the social sphere and the power of business model innovation to unlock new market growth in all sorts of settings. By providing an easily accessible, convenient, and useful new way to give charity, the charity gift card will expand the overall amount of money donated.

So what jobs to be done does the charity gift card address? Think of all the bad and semi-useless presents we buy over the course of our lives. Around Christmas time we give out sweaters that will never get worn and knickknacks that will fill up drawers and landfills. So many of us would rather give and receive a certificate that enables us to donate a certain amount of money to a favorite charity.

The gift cards also fill a void in corporate or semi-formal gifting. When a colleague loses a family member we might send flowers, but wouldn't it be more meaningful to send a charity gift card, to be donated in memory of the departed?

Of course, everyone likes giving charity and everyone agrees that its a good idea. But the cleverness of the charity gift card model lies in the linkage between gift giving an often unsatisfying and frustrating experience and charity. Your gift is guaranteed to be appreciated on certain levels; it feels good to give, and it feels good to get, because ultimately it does good. Our charities and the causes they serve are the biggest winners.

See: CharityChoice Gift Cards