Stimulating Social Enterprise Development
Wessex Partnerships is working with a range of delivery partners to inspire local social enterprise development through application of 10 years of best practice, involving excellent people and worthwhile resources.
We have all seen the social enterprise sector fast becoming a legitimate and growing business model for the 21st century. The delivery of a high quality service, with all the profit being invested back into the community, is a model that will become increasingly impossible to ignore.
The Challenge
There’s a vast wealth of advice and support available to new businesses; but, Social Entrepreneurs have different needs, expectations and challenges. More often than not these social innovators do not come from a business background and consequently struggle to find the right kind of support. The type of support available influences decisions that can have lasting, potentially detrimental, effects upon both the business and the individuals involved.
A key challenge for social enterprises is to develop their own strategy and devising a credible approach to both private and public sector organizations to secure and deliver profitable and ethical business. Other key issues include:
- Funding shortfalls, which affect the ability for social enterprises to overcome the initial hurdles associated with business start-up
- The need for existing social enterprises to identifying and developing income generating products and services
- Lack of knowledge to conduct feasibility studies into new projects and developments, proposed enterprise ideas and specific product development ideas.
- Lack of in-house professional skills, such as strategic planning and forecasting, which restrict the ability to meet the growing demand for services
- The need for more efficient internal systems in areas such as finance, marketing, operations and HR
- Clarifying and demonstrating a triple bottom line impact which can be the difference between securing or losing funding
- Insufficient capacity to devote to the development of funding applications for new business opportunities.
Budding or growing social entrepreneurs will receive hands-on help to develop their confidence, skills and success in developing their ideas and flower into a successful social enterprise.
Our service offers early stage, high growth or high risk Social Enterprises who need support to deliver their business or project ideas and concepts. This service provides the following:
- Business and social assessment of the social enterprise
- Help with preparation of a structured business growth strategy
- Help with drafting a medium term business plan
- A step-by-step plan of how to reach medium-long term targets
- Bid writing support for grant funding and public sector contracts
- Identification of the financial and business support available at specific intervals
- Clarification of the management skills and business achievements needed at each interval
- Providing ongoing business management and organisational support
Social Enterprise Support Service explained
SESS is a collaboration agreement between a social entrepreneur and a group of individuals / organisations. These experts bring complementary skills and crucially add credibility to the social entrepreneur, who moves from being an individual to being a key member of the team.
Clearly not all social enterprise projects will be appropriate for support through SESS. The selection process will be rigorous and only ideas thought to have significant business potential get approved.
Our Social Enterprise Support Service will draws on the skills of expert assessors who are totally independent of the social enterprise. They will consider all aspect of the business of the social enterprise and also undertake a ‘social assessment’ linked to very real milestones such as the winning of initial orders and the success of the services / products in the marketplace of choice. Each stage has, in effect, its own checks and balances.
Fee Structure
For more information on how we can work together to provide specialist advice and guidance for social and community enterprises moving into sustainable commercial markets, contact us today.
