Me and Bono

Well – OK, pro Bono, rather than U2's Bono, but I found myself wondering recently, just how much free support do I actually give?

I've always been very open about saying I'm happy to have an initial chat/lunch/beer with anyone who like to ask me to, without obligation – just 'cos I think that's how the world should work. But I don't keep track of how much time I spend doing this, and I'm suddenly aware that its probably increasing - there seem to be a growing number of people in different sector bodies who 'pass my name on' to various groups and people (I was tempted to list the sector bodies they work for, but might be a tad delicate if I did....), and I'm happy for them to continue do so.

But very few of these lead to any fee earning work, and although that's not the reason I do it, being self-employed I have to try and drum up enough work to keep the bills paid somehow.

But I digress – I do pro bono for a lot of people and I don't track it.

Should I?
But if I did, what would it show? The only reason I measure or record anything I do is because I think it generates useful management information, and anything I record about myself I tend to be pretty open about in sharing what they show (see previous posts about my social accounts and why I do this ). As a freelancer, what useful management information would I be generating by recording how much of my time is spent doing pro bono stuff and openly reporting this (other than to gratify my ego).

This is not a hypothetical question – it’s something I really am trying to work out. I'd appreciate any comments you'd like to share with me, either by reply to this post or by direct email adrian_ashton2@yahoo.co.uk.

Which financial language do you speak?

do you talk in terms of 'full cost recovery' like much of the third sector (i.e. making sure that you don't lose money on activities you deliver) or use the more traditional and private business understood 'profit and loss' (which shows where you spent you money in relation to delivering your activities and running the organisation overall).

It matters because of the worlds in which we exist increasingly inter-mix: speaking with procurement officers, they're used to private businesses so you need to use P&L - terms their accountants will understand. Similarly, if you're seeking loans, then lenders speak P&L as well.

My concern is that as a sector we constantly seem to be calling for a level playing field, to be treated on equal terms as every other type of organisation and group, and yet we then create our own special languages that don't match the systems and practices of the wider world.

Perhaps it time to stop being so precious about why we're special and get on with showing it in ways which anyone can understand by using their languages?

If we're to be a movement, we need to stop listening to our leaders...

Time and again, there's a rallying call that talks of social enterprise as a 'movement'. And that's fine, but surely the way that a movement is created, sustained and ultimately succeeds, is through it being made up of numerous small initiatives – all of which are concerned primarily with impacting on their immediate community.

But... it seems increasingly that the social enterprise policy and priority being set is for 'scaling up': making existing enterprises bigger. But surely such a 'scaling up' risks the enterprise losing touch and becoming a faceless giant such as Tesco or McDonalds – they both started out very small, rooted in their immediate communities, but as they've grown, they've become increasingly distant and unresponsive to local communities. And as they've grown, they also appear to have increasingly struggled to retain credibility and trust from their customers on ethical issues...(see Tescopoly and McLibel)

Surely we need more, not less, local small initiatives, each of which recognise their role and contribution to this wider movement, but retain their unique identity and distinctiveness in their communities. And that should be the priority for growing our movement, not force growing a handful of individual enterprises.

And where questions of scale are raised on economic terms (generating economies of scale, the ability to reach larger numbers of people), we should be looking to better collaborate between ourselves – and perhaps even look to our history for models of how this can be done: the co-operative movement grew from a vast number of small, individual, local co-operative societies who created a shared supply chain (the Co-operative Wholesale Society) to balance this tension between scale, movement and local impact.

So – if we're a movement, we should be focusing on seeing more small social enterprises emerging, not trying to find who can be grown to become the next Tesco...

Co-ops are ‘punching below their weight’...

So said Dame Pauline Green, chair of the International Co-operative Alliance, at the excellent Futures North event recently.

The co-operative economy is equal to the 10th biggest economy of any country, it employs more people than all the private multinational companies combined, it wasn’t hit by the collapse of the financial markets, its led reforms and legislation that have changed the world so that commerce is conducted for the better, it serves more than half the people on the planet, (link here

and here for more)... And I agree with her.

The default position for any enterprise in the UK is for it to be privately owned: “be your own boss, make as much money as you can/like” – the education system and the media in the UK is set up to actively discourage the co-operative business model: the heroic entrepreneur is celebrated above that of the community or those who have taken shared responsibility and supported each other as a community of entrepreneurs; (want proof? – name 3 private entrepreneurs, pretty easy; now name 3 co-operative entrepreneurs...)

As such, we’re not taken seriously – and given our size in the global economy, it’s easy to see why Pauline is as frustrated as she is.

And the solution is actually pretty straightforward: all co-ops need to do is to show off more. Take every opportunity presented to get in the media, ask to speak at local schools and colleges, infiltrate business networks, educate your customers and suppliers... these things don’t have to be expensive or time consuming.

And maybe, given that as a movement we already measure our co-operative difference and impact through the CESPIs toolkit, we should add another measure – ‘what has your co-op done this year to promote co-ops’ as a way to challenge and encourage us to take more self-responsibility (a defining co-op value), and not simply rely on others to take the initiative so that we can start to punch our weight and contribute to a greater and faster impact in the changing of our economies and communities for the better.

What Shakespeare can teach us about social enterprise – better ‘to be’ or simply ‘to do’?

Many charities and local authorities are now running services and activities under the banner of ‘social enterprise’ to contribute to their sustainability (both as services and organisations).

This perhaps helps to explain why there’s such confusion about what social enterprise is: some organisations presenting their structure and form as the basis for their identity, while others present their actions as their basis.

But... if it means that communities are benefiting through these ‘branded’ trading activities by groups not structured as social enterprises, then how far should we feel ‘protective’ over our identity? After all, there’s a compelling and logical argument along the lines of “as long as they job’s getting done and supporting people is at the focus of what we do, what does it matter how the organisation is structured...” however, taken to its conclusion this argument surely takes us down the path of the end justifying the means (something the Prince of Demark wrestled with famously in Hamlet).

Muhammad Yunus has waded into this historical debate with his refreshed definition of a ‘social business’ (broadly speaking - that as long as you’re primarily benefitting people in need then you ‘tick the box’). But there’s surely a risk with such loose definitions that many privately owned businesses will start to add to their ‘green-wash’ with ‘social-wash’, and that charities will further muddy the waters by having an ongoing reliance on grants and subsidies while presenting what they do as ‘social enterprise’.

Social enterprise is surely about being a sustainable business that’s rooted in the open marketplace and which exists to principally benefit those in need; it shouldn’t matter who’s in its employ or on its board – these things are fixed and immutable. Otherwise, as officers change, markets, customers, and society become confused by different peoples’ values changing the focus and purpose of what that organisation does and how it does it.

But confusion aside, that social enterprise has challenged and inspired such a growing change in common business practices amongst private businesses and charities is surely an impressive achievement and something we can take pride in?

in praise of the local library - could it save us all?

With the cuts and reductions in the amounts of resource available to local enterprise agencies, community group networks, other local infrastructure bodies, etc; we’re seeing the amount of support available to start-up groups, enterprises (both social and private), charities and so on rapidly diminishing...

But this is at a time when there’s universal recognition of the increasing need for them to be supported, and for them to gain the knowledge that they need to not only be sustainable, but also prosper...

I wonder then if I can suggest that rather than bemoan the state of things, that instead we go to our local library.

Take my local library in Todmorden – it has shelves of books and CD-ROMs on different aspects of setting up and managing an enterprise or other group (covering everything from import/export to employment law, marketing to book-keeping and everything in-between), a copy of the Grant Making Trusts Directory (reference only) and the national Voluntary Sector Agencies Directory, free internet access, a coffee machine, late night opening... its surely therefore also an obvious focal point for groups seeking support – they could maybe make use of the big tables to meet together around? (And just to ‘complete this virtuous circle’, Todmorden library was originally gifted to the town by a social enterprise – the local Co-operative Society).

Of course, some of you may be unsure how to navigate these vast unchartered shelves of knowledge and tools where everything is logged using secret coded numbers – fear not, for there are always librarians on hand: kind souls who take pity on the uninitiated and will help you to find what you most need.

Our cousins over the pond in the US are already starting to think in these terms, looking at libraries afresh as to the role they can play in supporting not only how we aquire the skills we need in the 21st century, but also the business community.

So... when was the last time you visited your local library?

just because everyone seems to be at it doesn't mean you should...

So – mentoring. Everyone seems to be at it these days: Unltd Connect are running a national scheme, there’s the Mowgli Foundation if you prefer something a bit more international, and Social Enterprise North West are running a programme that will accredit your mentor in the process!

But is mentoring worth it?

Undoubtedly yes – the chance to share some of a mentee’s infectious enthusiasm and the chance for mentors to help to short-cut processes and learning, and sometimes even save a venture from failure by sharing hard-earned lessons elsewhere can only be a good thing.

But it comes at a cost. As mentors, we need to be able to keep paying the bills and mentoring doesn’t usually pay well (if at all) in terms of cash. As mentees – don’t forget you’ve also got an enterprise to keep running and developing: don’t neglect your own customers; your mentors might be more enjoyable company, but we don’t actually pay you any money…

As for me – I still prefer my own model of mentoring: “beer mentoring”