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Role Models Matter in Enterprise

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I was struck by a couple of Olympic stories this morning.

The first was the withdrawal from the hurdles of China’s track superstar Liu. One of the Chinese newsreaders was in tears as she announced his withdrawal from the 110m hurdles. When as`ed why, when they had already won 35 gold medals this particular withdrawal was such a tragedy one Chinese Spectator said:

‘When you see that Liu is winning it makes us believe that we can do anything’

And then Michael Johnson was talking about why Jamaica had done so well in the sprint events. He said:

‘When people around you start to do well you believe that you can do well too.’

This is true of athletes but is also true of entrepreneurs.  It just takes one local person to succeed to persuade dozens of others that they too could make something happen.

The secret is to get the first local success and then to get the message out into the local community.  The spreading of the message is just as important to developing and enterprise culture as is helping the first entrepreneur – but rarely does this part of the work get the focus or the attention it demands.

When an RDA Outplaces

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So the LDA are seeking outplacement services to support a ‘rightsizing’ that is taking place.  Now you would think that for an organisation charged with supporting enterprise they might take an enterprising approach to this opportunity.

So what do they seek to commission?

“Outplacement Support: In order to ensure staff potentially affected by these changes are well supported, we want to have in place a package of outplacement support for them.
The Opportunity:
We need a supplier who would be able to offer a package that may include the following;

  • Developing and running group workshops covering CV development, job search strategies and interview preparation;
  • One to one coaching and support;
  • Other tools/approaches that could usefully support displaced staff.”

CVs, job searches and interview preparation.  So none of the LDA staff ought to be encouraged to have a look at self employment or entrepreneurship then!

They are happy to promote enterprise for others but less enthusiastic about it as a way forward for the people that they are casting off.

Looks to me like they are putting together an unimaginative figleaf of outplacement support that does not even reflect RDA policy towards encouraging enteprise!

Hey Ho!

Enterprise and Entrepreneurship: The Passion, Beauty and Pain

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So the Olympics come around again and our television screens, newspapers and browsers are filled with images of passion, beauty and pain.

Perhaps nowhere more so than in the Gymnastics Hall where hours of painful practice over many years are put to the test in few seconds of immense pressure. Everything is put on the line. For some it ends in the euphoria of success. For others it ends in the heartbreak of failure.

Gymnastics can provide a metaphor for enterprise and entrepreneurship providing lessons for those of us who run businesses and those who try to help us.

Gymnasts and Entrepreneurs:

  • go into the process knowing that success is far from guaranteed
  • are committed to hours of hard work and sacrifice – to earn the chance of success
  • risk injury and loss – physical, mental and emotional as well as financial
  • understand that their career could be cut short – it is all about managing risk
  • know that the road to success is a long one – full of highs and lows – and that they had better enjoy the journey because the destination is not guaranteed
  • anticipate failures and disappointments using them to learn and move on
  • develop skills, passions and strengths over many years before they are ready to compete

Coaches and Advisers:

  • understand that it is not their life or career that is on the line – it is not their success or failure that matters but that of the gymnast or entrepreneur
  • help them to understand the risks and rewards that might lie in any chosen course of action – as well as the price that might have to be paid
  • pick them up when they fall helping them to learn and move on
  • help them to recognise if a plan is not working out and choose the right time to pursue a different path
  • never under-estimate the potential of people to do amazing things
  • keep dreams alive even through the darkest times
  • know that it is reckless to encourage people to try things before they are equipped for success – they test and develop passion, skill, energy and commitment to make sure that the risks of a new endeavour are acceptable
  • help to test things out with a minimum of exposure to risk so that lessons can be learned safely
  • help to break down seemingly impossible challenges into a manageable sequence of achievable steps and goals

I know this film inspired me. I hope it does the same for you!

[Youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RLv12ZnRCqY]

Ripples from the Zambezi – Introduction

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Sirolli introduces his book as the results of years or practice in the art of economic development through person centred development or facilitation.

He describes the growth of Enterprise Facilitation™ through word of mouth advertising and client testimonials.

He describes how current interest in entrepreneurship has made the work of spreading his methodology more straightforward. As more women join the enterprise market and more people become interested in flexible and home working through self employment the market place for Enterprise Facilitation™ in just about any community seems to be a growing one.

A Diverse Client Base

Clients come from a wide range of backgrounds and one of the founding principals of the methodology seems to be that help is available for anyone living or working in the community. Building social systems that ensure that a diverse client base is:

A) Recruited, and

B) Provided with a high quality and relevant service, is perhaps a key Sirolli lesson.

He describes the client base as “in the market right now looking not just for employment but also for a way to make a living without compromising their need for dignity”.

How does this description fit clients for your enterprise services?

What about people who are not ‘in the market’ but who already make a living through benefits and/or the gray economy?

What options do they have ‘to make a living without compromising their need for dignity’?

Indigenous Growth

Sirolli also claims that ‘civic leaders are accepting much more readily the notion of indigenous growth’.

What does he mean by the concept of ‘indigenous growth’?

How does it contrast with other approaches – such as:

  • business attraction/inward investment or
  • developing social infrastructure to attract the ‘creative classes’?

Sustainability and Human Scale

Sirolli also makes the point that 1000 home based business in a community ‘cannot even be seen’ while a factory employing a 1000 people will ‘change the physical landscape, even the air a community breathes’.

How is this a compelling reason for person centred economic development and indigenous growth?

Ubiquity of Passion, Intelligence, Self-motivation and Energy

This is one of the founding assumptions of Enterprise Facilitation™. That in every community there is the passion, intelligence, self motivation and energy to plant the seeds of economic development.

Many of the communities targeted by economic development programmes appear to have lower levels of passion, intelligence, self motivation and energy than their more prosperous neighbours.

Why else might levels of ‘enterprise’ be so low?

Are these human qualities somehow missing from economically failing communities – or have they just gone underground?

What are the mechanisms that cause some people from these communities to hide or apparently lose their passion, intelligence, self-motivation and energy?

What can be done that might help them to re-connect with these qualities?

You can can comment on any part of Ripples from the Zambezi by joining the Enterprise Reading Group.

Arts, Crafts and Enterprise

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I recently spent a day touring some of the enterprise development projects being supported by LEGI (in whole or in part) in Leeds.

The variety in the physical spaces that we visited was incredible:

  • an old warehouse that had been converted to shared work spaces rented by the hour by aspiring artists (screen printing, wood working, jewelry making etc)
  • two ex middle schools that have been refurbished and are about to opened as mixed use incubator/work spaces with restaurants, bars, gyms etc
  • a brand new modular building with funky furniture and desk space in one area and what looked to the untrained eye like a very well planned and equipped building training environment on the other
  • and a couple of generic office spaces that have been rented in the community to provide drop in space for potential entrepreneurs and administrative bases for outreach workers.

What struck me on the day was how some of these places seemed to ‘fit’ with the local community that they were situated in – and for whom one could see a demand. Indeed they seemed to have evolved as a natural consequence of local peoples passion, skills and interest (in jewellery making, screen printing, etc).

In contrast some of the others appeared to be quite out of context with the immediate environment (you know how you recognise the ‘new build funded by the public purse’ in the middle of a run down estate) with funky furniture and expensive fittings that on on the one hand send a clear message of valuing local people (YOU DO DESERVE THIS) but may provide easy targets and ammunition for the cynics as well as making them quite intimidating to some local residents.

Underlying each of the projects there is a strategy based on a set of assumptions about how enterprise development will work in the locality and with a certain target group.

I personally believe that much more work remains to be done to clarify these assumptions and strategies so that they can play an effective part in project development.

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