Urban Forum has FREE places available on the following half-day seminar on Getting to Grips with Social Finance. 21st June 2012 in Wakefield Social Investment? Community Finance? Charity Bonds? Crowdfunding? What does it all mean and what does it have to do with us? In these times of austerity, public service transformation and changes to voluntary and community sector funding, there is a greater emphasis on new forms of financing social action through social investment. In a nutshell it's about using money to achieve both social outcomes or ‘returns', as well as financial ones. These seminars, organised with local and national partners, will: Provide an overview of social investment and community finance Share some practical examples of how new funding models can be used Discuss practical implications for community organisations Enable participants to explore how to assess whether social finance can work for them Signpost to available sources of support CLICK HERE TO FIND OUT MORE AND BOOK YOUR FREE PLACE http://www.urbanforum.org.uk/our-events/getting-to-grips-with-social-finance The Getting to Grips with Social Finance workshop programme is being supported by the Santander … [Read more...]
Inward Investment – What’s the problem?
Inward investment - the short cut to a prosperous and fair city where all of our communities can flourish? But, what exactly is it? It is the process where an investor believes that this is the best place to put their money to get a secure and sufficient return. They may invest by setting up a factory or, more likely these days, an office or call centre. And most cities employ specialist teams to attract inward investment - to present the best case for their city or region as an investment proposition. But it can go further than this. We may be able to offer specific incentives to investors to bring their money and their jobs to our city. We may provide them with low or no-cost infrastructure, or other benefits such as an enterprise zone where they may enjoy high speed broadband, simplified planning requirements and reduced business rates. So inward investment becomes a highly competitive, and sometimes very expensive process to get those scarce investors to being their money to our city. Inward investment teams are under pressure to deliver, and the dynamic gets interesting as sassy 'investors' play country off against country, region against region, city against city and even … [Read more...]
A Way Forward for Communities?
There is no doubt in my mind that community based and bottom up approaches to enterprise support like those pioneered by Ernesto Sirolli and subsequently developed and transformed by projects like Bizz Fizz and on a much more modest scale Elsie, provide significant clues to the emergence of truly sustainable and enterprising communities. But instead we get celebrity entrepreneurs and academics delivering masterclass after masterclass after enterprise competition on a seemingly endless treadmill driven by incoherent policy and the increasingly desperate search for those Holy Grails of 'narrow' economic development - the quick win and the high-growth start-up. It must be time for us to develop a focus on long term, community building approaches to sustainable development that embraces the economy, culture and social cohesion as an inseparable trinity. These things cannot be pursued successfully as separate entities managed by different silos. They are all part of the same process of 'development'. We need to develop affordable processes that engage the whole community in nurturing the development of those willing to act boldly and helping more of its members to see that bold action will often reap … [Read more...]
Product, Price, Place and Promotion – lessons for the entrepreneur from a virtuoso violinist
What happens when you take a £3m violin, a virtuoso violinist and a platform for them to perform? Well, the answer is - it all depends. If the platform is the mass transport system of Washington DC or the Concert Hall with tickets going at $100 and more. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=myq8upzJDJc At least two lessons to reflect on here: The first is pretty prosaic and pertains to that classic of the 4 Ps of Marketing: Product, Price, Place and Promotion. You have to get all four right. A brilliant product is nowhere near enough. The second is more metaphysical and probably best captured by Weingarten: “If we can’t take the time out of our lives to stay a moment and listen to one of the best musicians on Earth play some of the best music ever written; if the surge of modern life so overpowers us that we are deaf and blind to something like that — then what else are we missing?” … [Read more...]
The business of human endeavour…
For a long time now I have had real concerns about the focus of policy makers, and the projects that they spawn, on 'enterprise' and 'entrepreneurship' as being just too business oriented. It is as if the only fields of human endeavour that matter are commerce of some kind. Making money or fixing societies ills. This is especially un-nerving when you see it played out in our primary schools as 6 year olds are encouraged to wear badges that proclaim them be a 'Sales Director', an 'Operations Manager' or a 'Brand Executive'. Yuk! What about all of those other great fields of human endeavour? Climbing mountains, making art, having fun, playing sport, writing, cooking and so on. What if we encouraged our 6 year olds to wear badges that proclaimed them to be 'Footballer in Training', 'Ballet Dancer under Construction', 'Surgeon to Be' or 'The Next Michael McIntyre'? OK, so perhaps we don't need another Michael McIntyre.... but you get my point? Because what really matters is not exposing more people to the world of business and entrepreneurship. It is to get them imagining possible futures, and learning how best to navigate towards them. It is about developing people with a sense of agency and influence … [Read more...]
