6 things for social enterprises to think about!
Tuesday 1st July 2014 was an important day for me.
Over the last 4 or so years I have been building up a network of social enterprises in Nottingham.. and it was time for me to leave. I’d done my bit. So I’ve given it away. It has become a social enterprise in its own right and is being led by Debbie Clarke, with a strong board and strong plans for the future.
Life is changing for me and I’m not in Nottingham as much- the magnetic pull of the capital city has proved too much.
So Tuesday 1st July was my last First Tuesday. And I took the opportunity to say a few things. Some of them a bit ranty. Some of them observations. Some of them unpopular. But all of them from the heart.
Here’s the first 3…..
See what you think!
1. There are fewer social enterprises than you think!
I do a lot of work in the community sector. (I hesitate to call it the voluntary sector as it has become increasingly professionalised. But.. ) I love the way services develop from human need and that people find a way to serve others.
However, I am concerned that social enterprise is seen as a panacea for all the community sector's funding problems (and there are many of those). The rush for charities to become social enterprises is a bit scary. Especially as most people don’t know what one is! *
Some “professional conference speakers” have made a fortune out of speaking about definition. Indeed a good meeting of social entrepreneurs is not complete without a discussion about definition. (Drives me crazy! Let’s just get on eh!)
Anyway… I digress… I’m still scared that social enterprise is seen as a panacea.
I’m also concerned that people use the term because they do a wee bit of trading.
I love the quote from Liam Black — a bit of a social enterprise hero of mine- who said,
And there’s not as many of us around as people like to think. The number of organisations who truly have a fully entrepreneurial mindset are not as many as you are likely to be told by people like SE UK.
I’m not being critical. I love lots of our charities. They do amazing things, often serving people that our society have neglected. and it’s OK for them not to be social enterprises.
Just let’s be real about it. Go to a conference like OxfordJam and see what I mean.
2. Find your (inner) social entrepreneur and set them free (ish)
If you lead an organisation — like a local charity- and want to be a social enterprise, then find your social entrepreneurs and set them free.
So what does one look like…..
This is based on some research I read years ago about the anatomy of a social entrepreneur. I’ve used it for a wee while now as it makes sense to me.
I won’t unpack it in this post- you’ll have to wait a bit for that**
Suffice it to say, have a look around your organisation and see if there’s anyone for whom those characteristics resonate with you.
Once you have found them. Encourage them. And set them free to develop new ideas or push a social enterprise idea forward. Give them some boundaries. How much can you afford to lose if the idea doesn’t work? What is an absolute no-no? That kind of thing. A set them free!
No doubt they’ll infuriate you. Maybe even drive you a wee bit crazy. They probably won’t fill in all the paperwork the way your HR department want them to. Their idea of meeting minutes will undoubtedly be lacking.
But they will bring an energy to the idea’s development that others won’t. And your organisation will be better off- even if it is just for the lessons learned!
3. Take Opportunities
What do these 4 companies have in common?
The answer my friends is they have caused me the biggest frustrations in the last few years.
Not the companies themselves. They have been amazing. They have wanted to work closely with Nottingham’s social enterprises in different ways.
Wates offered Nottingham social enterprises the opportunity to run their on-site canteen for 6 months. Yup… that’s 6 months of making money. 6 months of experience in the food trade for those who have been long term unemployed (or whatever you’re social mission is!). 6 months to prove to a national (yup, national) building company that you’ve got the cajones to provide a stunning service, not be afraid to make a profit AND do some good. (kind of like the whole point we exist eh?)
I won’t go through them all as I can feel my blood pressure rise as I type. But they all presented fantastic opportunities to pitch ideas and develop new services AND guess what mum*** ??
No-one (that’s ZERO, NIL, BUGGER ALL) took these wonderful companies up on it. They were in newsletters. On Twitter. Facebook. Mentioned at meetings and in conversations. In fact, I even mentioned a couple of them FACE TO FACE with local so called social enterprises. And not one took up the opportunity.
Now, in reality, I don’t know if Boots or John Lewis would’ve have taken up any ideas that were pitched. But you had the chance. And you didn’t take it.
Sad…. just bloody sad. And enormously disappointing. I reckon one of those organisations, if not 2, will end up being a competitor.
And that’s a disaster for the sector, as they are more securely funded and can leverage in additional investment more easily. But.. what can I say….
“You can take a horse to water…… “ springs to mind.
Bet you can’t wait for Part 2 eh?
*just for the record…. my definition of a social enterprise is a business with a social mission that doesn’t share its profits with shareholders. Feel free to argue away. I know the social enterprise world is changing and the government talk about social business, but let’s leave that for another post!
**Bet you can’t wait eh Mum! *** I’m assuming the only person making it this far will be my mum!
