Social enterprise awards: big companies step in to provide support (External Post – Guardian Social Enterprise Network)

Rose Marley, co-founder of youth social enterprise Motiv, is very happy to be one of the 126 social enterprises through to the second round of the Deloitte Social Innovation Pioneers Programme.

Her venture, founded in 2005, gives rewards to school pupils to encourage attendance and has been very successful. But she is now at a crossroads and is hoping Deloitte will help Motiv move forward.

“There have been so many changes across the education sector over the past couple of years. We are looking for strategic input to enable us to gain greater financial stability and social impact long-term,” she says.

“The Deloitte scheme is exactly the kind of support we’d benefit from right now, and it seems like a genuine and fair exchange of value. Applying was straightforward.”

Big private financial companies such as Deloitte, Santander, Lloyds and Ernst & Young have all opened social enterprise development schemes in recent months. Both Santander and Deloitte say they’ve had around 300 applicants, and Santander will get more when the scheme goes nationwide in June.

Many in social enterprise are glad of a new source of support, a little funding and the potential to get known people in the private sector world.

But what impact will these new awards and programmes have?

Most provide mentoring, advice on business development, networking, and sometimes cash and in exchange they get good PR, access to new clients in a fast-growing sector and insights into how that sector does business.

Several support agencies such as Social Enterprise UK and UnLtd, which are running some of the sessions on the schemes, think social enterprises should take this chance to further their own message and see what can be gained.

“Not only does it help some social ventures directly, it raises the game overall, and brings social conscience into the commercial sector in a much more dynamic and compelling way than simply donating cash or time would do,” says Cliff Prior, chief executive of UnLtd, the foundation for social entrepreneurs.

Yet some social entrepreneurs aren’t satisfied with what’s on offer from these programmes.

“Are they getting social enterprises into their supply chain, in the way Wates is, for example? Or is it just mentoring to within an inch of your life?” says Sara McGinley, deputy chief executive of Social Firms UK.

“Our members want business. They could also do with some free services; what about a free CD on taxation, as a basic example? They need something simple that doesn’t involve them filling in countless application forms and going on more beauty parades where ‘young and sexy’ social businesses always get picked.”

Social entrepreneur Craig Dearden Phillips, who runs Stepping Out , agrees. He was asked by one company to apply for their awards, but refused. “People [who win the awards] seem to get bit of mentoring and a few set pieces. Some free services would be a lot more helpful,” he says.

A handful of social entrepreneurs also told us they’d been hotly pursued by some of the companies but had turned down their offer. Dave Dawes, of preponline, an e-learning social enterprise for nurses refused Goldman Sachs, and he says several of his peers also refused. But several hundred social entrepreneurs will be going on these schemes this year alone.

What might the effects be of these new awards programmes? Prior says UnLtd is encouraging privates to be really specific and to consider joint call-outs. “There is a risk that a large number of overlapping schemes could be confusing and result in too much time spent applying for quite similar awards to the neglect of running the social venture,” he warns.

One commentator on the popular Beanbags and Bullsh!t blog suggests that corporates might even support social enterprises to grow and then take them over and turn them into private businesses. His comments are part of a provocative discussion on this topic at the blog led by David Floyd, founder of Social Spider. Floyd suggests the awards could mean the types of social enterprises coming through in the next 10 years could be fundamentally different to their predecessors because they’ll be guided by input from corporates. Another possible consequence, he adds, could be “growing numbers of social enterprises that actually break even or better by selling goods or services.”

The awards and programmes

Santander Social Enterprise Development Awards

The prize money on offer ranges from ??15,000, ??30,000 or ??50,000, depending on turnover. Alongside the money, winners can access a package of support from mentoring, business advice, bespoke university training courses, paid interns and help to assess community impact. The pilot phase ends in March 2012 and the Awards will be launched nationally in June.

Robin Foale, managing director of Santander Business Banking: “The Awards have been created as part of Santander’s commitment to supporting small businesses in the UK. The social enterprises we spoke to when we were developing the awards gave us a clear message: there was a lack of support to help established businesses in their next stage of growth.  Through SEDA our aim is to help social enterprises looking to expand to realise their goals, and at the same time support local economic development and job creation.”

Deloitte Social Innovation Pioneers programme

Delopitte says that it will shortly announce  up to 50 social businesses that demonstrate strong growth potential to be part of its new annual programme. According to Deloitte, the winners will receive a bespoke package of support including access to a specially selected Deloitte support team to manage their growth plan;  the opportunity to participate in skills workshops and  networking opportunities, support in finding investment and a possible chance to become a supplier to Deloitte.

Bob Thust, Head of Corporate Responsibility at Deloitte, says “The response to Pioneers has been fantastic and we’re very excited about the calibre of the businesses that have applied.  We believe we can help the Pioneers realise their potential, thorough using our expertise and networks, and by developing joint partnerships that add real value to both organisations

Lloyds/School for Social Entrepreneurs

According to Lloyds, each year, over the next five years, 100 start-up and developing social entrepreneurs will be able to secure a place with the School for Social Entrepreneurs through the Lloyds Banking Group Social Entrepreneurs Programme. Lloyds says that, launching in April 2012, the programme will create an enduring legacy across the UK by building the confidence, skills and networks of 500 local people working to address a social need and regenerate their l
ocal communities. Lloyds believes that social enterprise is set to play an increasingly important role in the economy, and it says that social entrepreneurs will be given a place on SSE’s action-learning focused Start-Up or Scale-Up learning programmes and access to grants of between ??4,000 and ??25,000.

To find out more visit here or to register your interest email Alexa Kellow

Ernst & Young Accelerate scheme

Starting last month, up to 300 young business leaders and social entrepreneurs ??? recommended by UnLtd, Striding Out and others ??? will participate in 14 workshops in London over five months. Devised in consultation with entrepreneurs, the sessions will cover various aspects of developing a business, including social return on investment.

Iain Wilkie, partner at Ernst & Young says “Ernst & Young has a long standing relationship with entrepreneurs.  Accelerate is an opportunity for us to provide practical support to the future engines of the economy and for us to make the difference to them.  Through the workshops, we hope to help young business leaders and social entrepreneurs to grow and develop their businesses and employees by providing a quality of support and advice that they may not otherwise have had access to.” &nbsp.

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via socialenterprise.guardian.co.uk

Small Fish and Blue Chips: Shining a light on how social entrepreneurs can deal with big business

Yesterday saw the Shine Unconference for Social Entrepreneurs.  I hosted a panel (Small Fish and Blue Chips) on how and why social entrepreneurs and corporates can work together.  Joining me were Richard Tyrie (founder of Jobs Go Public and The Good People), David Barrie (co-founder of The People’s Supermarket amongst many others), Bob Thust (Head of CR at Deloitte) and Nick Temple (Director of Business and Enterprise at Social Enterprise UK). 

They are a group of people from very different backgrounds and with varied experience but a shared viewpoint in this regard – that the gap between social businesses and big businesses can be closed.  Turns out they have different views on how it can be done, which led to some lively debate…

I’ve only just met Bob but from what I’ve seen so far, his views are pretty close to many I’ve expressed in previous posts here.  Deloitte seem to be taking a very bold position in the CR market and are doing some great things specifically with social entrepreneurs, not least the Pioneers Programme.  I loved that Bob said any good CSR team should act not as a means to an end in itself but as a conduit or gateway for social ventures to reach the rest of the business.  He went further, saying that CR professionals should be in the business of doing themselves out of a job.  Deloitte, of course, act as a gateway to many, many more companies.  As Bob said, the real prize isn’t getting in Deloitte’s supply chains, but getting in Deloitte’s clients’ supply chains.  This brokering role for CSR teams fascinates me.  We at UnLtd, increasingly see our role as being around connections: providing access to finance, support, networks and customers. But I’ve said for some time that , to really achieve this, we need people alongside us who have credibility and networks in the corporate world that we don’t have.

Richard Tyrie always impresses me when he stresses the importance of ‘weak tie theory’ in these discussions (in summary “weak social ties..are responsible for the majority of the embeddedness and structure of social networks in society as well as the transmission of information through these networks. Specifically, more novel information flows to individuals through weak rather than strong ties.”).  Richard’s view (one I share) is that ‘weak ties’ between individuals in the corporate and social sectors need to be in place before any meaningful organisational connections can thrive on a serious level.   This approach is, again, something I’m keen to build on with UnLtd Ventures – focusing on our role in building relationships on an individual level, on the basis that these will organically grow into something much stronger.

I was also pleased to hear Richard reinforce his view that we always need to talk about the financial value of social impact created – more than ever when talking to corporates.  In his words, “until I buy food for my kids with social capital” we need to talk money.  As I’ve argued before here, I believe the CSR world does itself a disservice by giving the impression that corporates are driven by anything other than profit.   Success, for me, will be when social businesses and big businesses can sit down and have ‘adult-to-adult’ conversations about how this relationship is going to make both of them more money.

David Barrie is a serial social entrepreneur and a brilliant, creative thinker and innovator.  His views on this subject seem to be that corporates can strengthen his work as an individual, provide immediate infrastructure, resources and key skills around his visions.   He wants full incubation or adoption even within a corporate environment.  I can certainly see the benefit of this, but care needs to be taken.  I think its important that social ventures build their own robust organisations without completely relying on ‘outsiders’ who may walk away at any time.  

David’s secret double life is as a highly successful TV producer.  He drew interesting parallels with the creative industries, where the major commissioners invest (in the widest sense of the word) in production companies in their supply chain.  This may be ‘grant’-like investments in infrastructure, access to their back-office resources, incubation, staff secondments (in both directions), guarantees of long-term contracts and ultimately equity investments / acquisitions.  A compelling vision for a future social innovation marketplace.

As for Nick… well it’s great to have him in the centre of the action at Social Enterprise UK.  He’s exactly the sort of pragmatic, unifying force needed right now to galvanise disparate parts of the sector who all-too-often focus on splitting hairs on technicalities.   Without a united front we’ve no chance of being taken seriously by the corporate world.  They will look on bemused at our bickering and get on with the job at hand without us….

The panel was a blink-and-you’ll-miss it 45 minutes.  But I hope the conversations we started can continue for some time to come…And even, who turns… turn into action!