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Paul Seabright on the Supply of Shirts…

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If there were any single person in overall charge of the task of supplying shirts to the world’s population, the complexity of the challenge facing them would call to mind the predicament of a general fighting a war. One can imagine an incoming president of the United States being presented with a report entitled The World’s Need for Shirts, trembling at its contents, and immediately setting up a Presidential Task Force. The United Nations would hold conferences on ways to enhance international cooperation in shirt-making, and there would be arguments over whether the United Nations or the United States should take the lead. The pope and the archbishop of Canterbury would issue calls for everyone to pull together to ensure that the world’s needs were met, and committees of bishops and pop stars would periodically remind us that a shirt on one’s back is a human right. The humanitarian organization Couturiers sans Frontières would airlift supplies to sartorially challenged regions of the world. Experts would be commissioned to examine the wisdom of making collars in Brazil for shirts made in Malaysia for re-export to Brazil. More experts would suggest that by cutting back on the wasteful variety of frivolous styles it would be possible to make dramatic improvements in the total number of shirts produced. Factories which had achieved the most spectacular increases in their output would be given awards, and their directors would be interviewed respectfully on television. Activist groups would protest that “shirts” is a sexist and racist category and propose gender- and culture-neutral terms covering blouses, tunics, cholis, kurtas, barongs, and the myriad other items that the world’s citizens wear above the waist. The columns of newspapers would resound with arguments over priorities and needs. In the cacophony I wonder whether I would still have been able to buy my shirt.

Taken from: http://www.amazon.co.uk/Company-Strangers-Natural-History-Economic/dp/0691146462

 

BSE – Before Social Enterprise

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Mike in the days before social enterpriseHard to imagine I know, but I was remembering with some old friends the time ‘BSE’, Before Social Enterprise.

I used to work in what was called a ‘Community Home with Education’, similar to an ‘Approved School’.  A residential home for young men with emotional and behavioural ‘difficulties’.  When they reached 16 they would have to leave the home and make their own way in the world.  For many, the next step, after a short spell in the community, would be prison.

However we worked hard to give them the best chance that we could, and this often meant trying to find them work, trying to find employers who would give them a chance.  And, surprisingly it wasn’t as hard as you might think.  Despite their dubious CVs and frequently a complete lack of qualifications, we could usually find an employer who would give them a chance.  These were not ‘social enterprises’ set up specifically to provide vocational training and development for the needy.  They were good old ‘for profit’ businesses who were more than willing to do their bit.  This was the time BSE.

And I don’t think things are that much different now.

While we have a small number of social enterprises specifically setting out to help particular groups with a step on the employment ladder, I reckon that for every one of these there are probably a hundred or so for profits that work with the same client group.  Restaurants and kitchens that employ people struggling with addictions or to stay out of prison.  Building companies employing ex-offenders.   Football clubs giving players with drink driving convictions, anger management problems and occasional inclinations to racist abuse a second chance.

I wonder what impact the rise of the specialist social enterprise might have on the willingness of mainstream for profits to ‘do their bit’. They don’t get the rate rebates, soft loans, grants, PR or additional support of their social enterprise counterparts, so why should they push the boat out.

Or will they all become ‘social enterprises’ and reap the same rewards?

 

Some forgotten truths about enterprise…

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  • Poverty is not about scarcity – it is not that there is not enough – but that it is not shared
  • The challenge is to give more people the power that they need to play a positive and powerful role in markets; This means accessible and relevant processes to develop individual capabilities and power
  • Markets will always have a place in our society but not everything can be bought and sold.  Care for example is an emotional relationship that cannot be bought and sold.
  • Development is a measure of the extent to which individuals have the capabilities to live the life that they choose.  It has little to do with standard economic measures such as GDP.
  • Helping people to recognise choices and increase the breadth of choices available to them should be a key objective of development.
  • Developing the capability and power of individuals provides a key to both development and freedom
  • Development must be relevant to lives, contexts, and aspirations
  • Development is about more than the alleviation of problems – stamping out anti social behaviour, teenage pregnancies, poor housing and so on.
  • It is about helping people to become effective architects in shaping their own lives
  • We need practices that value individual identity; avoid lumping people into “communities” they may not want to be part of, and promote a person’s freedom to make her own choices.  Promoting identification with ‘community’ risks segregation and violence between communities
  • Society must take a serious interest in the overall capabilities that someone has to lead the sort of life they want to lead, and organise itself to support the development and practice of those capabilities
  • We should primarily develop an emphasis on individuals as members of the human race rather than as members of ethnic groups, religions or other ‘communities’.  Humanity matters.
  • We need to make the delivery of public education, more equitable, more efficient and more accessible

If we took this stuff seriously what kind of enterprise development activities would a LEP commission?

Management and the Start Up

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I work with businesses and organisations at all stages of the life-cycle. Pre-starts, start-ups and mature businesses.

I often see management DNA develop in the start-up phase and it is seldom a pretty site. Habits and relationships are set early and become very difficult to shake off. This is largely because of the mindset of the original founder of the business:

  • This is their baby;
  • They know how they want it to develop;
  • They have exacting standards.

Consequently their management style can be brusque, directive, bruising and ultimately damaging to the long term growth of the business.

Ideally I get to work with a business pre-start and ensure that the entrepreneurs builds their management team BEFORE the business plan is developed. This way all members of the team can own the plan and a more open and collaborative management DNA can be established from the start.

However this is pretty rare.

More usually I am working with an owner manager who has already established a pretty controlling management style. Helping them to see a different way of running the business is tough enough.

Coaching them to make it happen is even tougher.

Often it takes a real shock to the business and the entrepreneur to make them realise that something has to change.  This ‘shock’ can be bankruptcy, divorce or a significant health issue.

But sometimes that is what it takes before the need to change is fully recognised.

Spock Logic or McCoy Compassion – where should we start?

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What should we do when we are asked to help someone develop their project, and we really don’t like what we see?

Top to bottom, wall to wall the project just seems to be full of problems.  To our eye it seem poorly conceived, badly executed and almost pre-destined to fail.

Where should we start?

Well the classic ‘expert’ approach is to diagnose the problems and put them on the table.  We confront them with the reality of the situation as WE see it.  If our relationship is strong enough and our credibility is robust they might just take it on board.  But more often than not what we get is denial, and shown the door.

Because this is a person who has taken their very best shot, using the resources they have available to make something happen. It is as if they had shown us a photo of their children and we respond by rattling through a list of their obvious deficiencies ‘bad skin’, ‘overweight’, ‘terrible dress sense’ and ‘awful smile’.  We might be trying to help, but….

…this IS their baby….

So, when someone shows us their idea and asks us to help, and we see it as full of flaws where should we start?

By pointing out ‘the obvious’ or rolling up our sleeves and helping?

What will really help?

Spock’s logic or McCoy’s compassion?