Cheryl Kernot began her career as a teacher, a role she'll resume in September when the first students of the University of NSW's graduate certificate in social impact file through the doors.

Kernot is an associate professor and the director of teaching and learning at the university's Centre for Social Impact, a job she began in September after almost six years in England.

Her focus and passion nowadays is social entrepreneurship using conventional business models to deliver social returns such as alleviating poverty or improving the environment.

"The world is talking about social value-creation, not just financial value-creation," says Kernot, 60, who believes the global financial crisis has highlighted the need for a more creative capitalism that emphasises social benefit.

In some ways, it's still about "keeping the bastards honest" the famous catchcry from her days in politics.

She recently listened to a speech by Jeff Skoll, a pioneer in social innovation and the first president of eBay, who said the global financial crisis could well be to social entrepreneurship what the discovery of DNA was to the theory of natural selection.

Kernot agrees but believes additional factors are at play. She says today's students are demanding social entrepreneurship courses a focus that often stems from an interest in environmental sustainability. "Social is the new green," she says, adding that the University of Adelaide and Griffith University are also offering new courses in the area. (Her course is jointly offered by UNSW, the University of Melbourne and Swinburne University of Technology.)

It's a satisfying career reinvention for Kernot, who couldn't find work in Australia after losing her federal ALP seat of Dickson (in Brisbane) in 2001.

She'd been a politician for 11 years, first as an Australian Democrats senator for Queensland (including leading the party from 1993 to 1997), then as an ALP shadow minister after she defected to the Labor Party in 1997.

In 2002, political journalist Laurie Oakes disclosed that Kernot had had a five-year extramarital affair with the ALP's Gareth Evans. Kernot left Australia to work first at Oxford University's Skoll Centre for Social Entrepreneurship, then at London's School for Social Entrepreneurs.

"It's very hard for politicians to carve out a life after politics," she says. "And women aren't as good at preparing their exit path as men. I had hoped there would have been a place in Australia where I could put to good use my experience."

Kernot also notes that, even now, we focus on one senior female politician as the hope for all Australian women.

"Doing that puts women on pedestals and that's very unhealthy," she says, adding that she had felt the weight of expectation.

As for her controversial switch to the ALP, Kernot is matter-of-fact in her reasons. "You make all sorts of judgment calls and you take the consequences," she says. "But in politics, the consequences are a lot more public and you find yourself in an environment where because you're another person competing for a ministerial position ... that upsets a lot of people."

Now she is busy designing courses and making speeches on social impact. "Some weeks I have the feeling that I'm back in a previous life without the luxury of personal staff," she says. "It's very full-on but very satisfying."

The big questions

Biggest break Having a first-rate state school education with memorable female teachers who taught me to think and lift my horizons beyond a smallish provincial town. This gave me the confidence to be the only student from my year to leave home for university study.

Biggest achievement Being the first politician to advocate (unpaid) parental leave before the Industrial Relations Commission, in 1996.

Biggest regret Nothing I haven't learnt from.

Best investment The support and mentoring I give to my "adopted" Ugandan daughter (a former street child and student of mine in London) so she can continue to work with street children in Kampala. She brings hope and education to their lives.

Worst investment My first car, a VW, which I bought in haste. I under-estimated the cost of roadworthiness.

Attitude to money It's never been a motivation for any career or life decision. Since our home was burnt down in the '90s by a neighbour with a brain tumour, I've been consciously less materialistic. I try to be generous.

Personal philosophy Recognise the dignity and capacity to contribute in every fellow human (until they prove you wrong). And forgive, if you can.