Filed under: Big Society, Post Office, Social Enterprise | Tags: Big Society, Post Office, Social Enterprise
Back in London. I saw this piece of fresh Eine street-art across from the head office of my old client, the Post Office. Apposite… Change is coming, alright: the coalition plans to turn the Post Office into a John Lewis-style mutual – owned by employees. They say this is “Big Society in action”.
This week I’m meeting some people from the Big Society Network, so I’ve been doing some digging. And I dug up some questions.
- Can it be de-politicized? The Big Society is inextricably linked with David Cameron. It won’t take root unless it’s embraced across the political (and non-political) spectrum. Yet many people see it simply as lipstick on the pig of a small state ideology.
- Starting from scratch? There are already plenty of community organizers across the UK. National volunteer bodies like CSV and vinspire have been conspicuously quiet, and in some cases have had funding pulled. How can Big Society build on their good work?
- Big society, big brands? Interesting that Big Society Network is part funded by Asda Foundation. I wrote a previous post about the role of corporates like Tesco and Starbucks in local communities. Is this part of the plan?
- A “Big Society Bank”? This will be established with funds from dormant accounts – estimated start off with around 100m. This will be run by the Cooperative Bank – but who gets to decide where the money goes? And how?
- An “iPhone for Social Apps’? That’s how the Network describes its ambition. What about existing application spaces, like Gumtree? Or even the good ol’ Post Office, which has more branches than all the banks put together, in the heart of local communities?
And perhaps the biggest question:
- Big Society, or Our Society? As Julian Dobson points out, Big Society is a government story. It has a minister, Nick Hurd, and a suite of rooms next to Downing Street. How does it get genuine, unscripted participation?
At it’s broadest level, Big Society is a dream come true: community empowerment, local activism, social enterprise, building capacity, debating the line between citizen, civil society and state. As Mandelson recently said:
“We need to be state reformers rather than state retrenchers. We will have to find more of our solutions from within the communities that make our society. Insofar as that prescription corresponds to what David Cameron calls the Big Society then I think he is onto a good idea”.
But it’s all in the detail and the politics. Is the Big Society “prescription” for real? Or does it amount to being given a pedicure whilst having your leg amputated?
Filed under: Africa, Nike Foundation, Social Enterprise | Tags: Africa, Nike Foundation, Social Enterprise
The end of my first week in Ethiopia. Strange how the words “I’m with the Nike Foundation” does wonders for your popularity in one of the world’s most poverty-stricken countries. But not with everyone: yesterday I was introduced to a local entrepreneur who was less than impressed.
I googled Bethlehem Tilahun Alemu before the meeting – turns out she’s got a lot going on: just back from addressing the Clinton Global Initiative, and enthusiastic profiles in The Guardian, CNN, and Huffington Post.
Bethlehem founded the brand soleRebels – a proper social enterprise. They make shoes out of old tires, and sell them through retailers like Urban Outfitters and Amazon. It’s about creating jobs, training, and paying school fees in the local community. A real Africa success story: “We want to be the Timberland of Africa,” she tells me.
So why were Bethlehem and her brother Brook so circumspect about talking to the Nike Foundation? In her own words:
So many foundations. Gates, Clinton, Nike, so many. I don’t see any change. The same problems, the same diseases. We don’t support this. What we support is business – working to change our own lives, creating jobs. That will change the picture. We have ideas, we have materials, we have our hands. We can penetrate markets, sell our own brands, support families in Ethiopia, through our own work. That’s the way.
Her brother Brook picks this up:
The foundations, the aid agencies, they all make big assumptions. They assume they know what’s best. But people know how to solve their own problems. They know what they need. Give people the opportunity to work!
And they’re right of course: already I’ve met dozens of aid programs – all run by hard-working, well-meaning individuals, and all making (slow) progress. But I can’t help feeling that it’s people like Bethlehem and Brook that will really make the difference.
So I asked them, what would they do? Here I am, working on the Girl Effect initiative, trying to figure out how to empower girls living in poverty. What would they do?
“Invest in Sole Rebels!”, says Bethlehem, with a broad smile. Brook adds, “We need work, not charity. We’ll grow our business, we’ll train girls, we’ll send them to school, then give them jobs”. So, I’m meeting them next week, and we’re going to write a proposal together. Global footwear brand, anyone…?
Image from Dawn.
Filed under: Corporate Citizenship, Pepsi, Social Enterprise, Uncategorized | Tags: Apple, Cooperative, Corporate Citizenship, John Lewis, Microsoft, Nike, Ocado, Pepsi, Post Office
John Grant made an interesting comment a couple of weeks ago, in a talk to launch his book Co-opportunity. He said: “the line between ‘for-profit’ and ‘not-for-profit’ is being blurred. People are going, well, it’s either doing good or it’s not doing good”.
It makes sense. Profit is not longer a dirty word for consumers. The question has shifted from “is this company making too much profit” to “is it making the world a better place?”. Nobody blinked when Apple announced their most recent results – an astonishing gross margin of 40.9%. Why? Because it feels like Apple enriches the world we live in.
In the UK, there are plenty of brands that people are happy to see commercially thriving: John Lewis, Post Office, Ocado, Cooperative. And there are plenty of brands that get slammed for making profits; the utilities and the banks. The difference? People think the former are making a positive social contribution.
Profit, or not for profit…? The question reminds me of Bill Gates’ famous “Creative Capitalism” speech at Davos. He said, “as I see it, there are two great forces of human nature: self-interest, and caring for others”. History has been largely been a struggle between these two forces; Gates’ wants to bring them together into a force for change.
That was in 2008. Since then, the vision of St. Gates is slowly becoming a reality. At mega-corp level, the likes of Nike, Microsoft and Pepsi are increasingly engaged in pro-social ventures (see earlier post), with initiatives like Girl Hub, Unlimited Potential and Refresh Everything. Early days, but a far cry from sweat shops and Britney Spears.
Then there’s the boom in social enterprise – a sector that deliberately blurs the line between profit and not-for-profit. Interesting to see the tug-of-war over social enterprise in the current UK election, with Labour’s proposed Social Investment Bank, and the Conservatives’ Big Society Network.
It’s a beautifully mixed-up picture: big corporates adopting some NGO-like behaviours, not-for-profits adopting the methods of market capitalism. But what’s it all got to do with us?
Last week I was invited to speak at the annual away-day of corporate communications firm Brunswick. They’re the leader in their field: managing corporate reputation, investor and press relations. I had a pretty simple theme: there was a time when big corporates could manage their key relationships in convenient silos – investors, employees, governments, regulators, consumers, customers – but that doesn’t work any more. Big corporates need to think about managing heir relationships to society as a whole.
This seemed to get a pretty positive reaction. I think people liked the challenge: society as a whole doesn’t care if companies make profit; all that matters is that a company makes a positive impact. Maybe our clients will like the challenge too.
Image from Psalm.
Filed under: Education, Innovation, Microdonations, Mother, Social Enterprise, Social Exclusion, Uncategorized, Youth | Tags: Innovation, Microdonations, Mother, Social Enterprise, Social Exclusion, Youth
We held the latest of our UnLtd brand clinics at Mother this week. They’re always energized sessions – a couple of social enterprises really grabbed us.
One was the Hip Hop Shakespeare Company, set up by rapper Akala to work with disengaged young people, getting them excited about words and rhyming. Another was MOTIV, which works in schools to incentivize kids to turn up – like the Million project, but teaching the value of attendance at the same time as rewarding them.
Social enterprise keeps on booming. Micro-funding sites continue growing, such as Pledge Bank in the UK and Kickstarter in the US. Gordon Brown has been talking about this for a while now. Last week saw David Cameron sign up to No More Business As Usual, which has some interesting facts:
- Social enterprises contribute £24 billion to the economy.
- They’re twice as confident of future growth as traditional small and medium enterprises.
- Since the economic downturn began, 56% have increased their turnover.
But the real value is in the work they do – addressing social exclusion, fighting health inequalities, revitalizing local sports, inspiring kids to go to school. The optimism and imagination in some of these enterprises is exceptional. In our current economy of malaise, we should be paying attention.
I’ve been invited along to a Westminster “policy seminar” on this subject – the blurb reads “social entrepreneurs can be part of a new partnership between citizen and state and, given the right support, they have the potential to be a major force for social and economic good in this country”. Who’s going to say no to that…
Image from njohnson0920.
Filed under: Advertising, Mother, Social Enterprise | Tags: Advertising, Mother, Social Enterprise
It’s good to get out of your bubble – whether that’s the cozy environs of Shoreditch House or the corporate towers of Canary Wharf. It must be fun working at Ogilvy’s “pop-up agency”, set up for the good people of Brixton. It’s called the Idea Shop:
“…we are offering our services free of charge to small businesses, community projects, arts groups, and other organisations and individuals in the Lambeth area. The Idea Shop team – all volunteers from Ogilvy Group UK – can advise on advertising, marketing, PR, digital, social media, strategy, direct marketing, branding, design and copywriting.”
Most of us spend most of our time dealing with (relatively) big budgets and big organizations. It’s great to work with people running small businesses- it’s a different perspective, and hopefully valuable for them. At Mother we run quarterly “Brand Clinics” with UnLtd, a kind of venture capital fund working with social entrepreneurs. We also ran advice sessions at last years SHINE conference for social entrepreneurs, and we’ve been invited back this year. We’ve met some great people doing this, and everyone enjoys working on it.
The Idea Shop is only open for a few days (being a pop-up agency). It would be nice to see more of this kind of thing – agencies reaching out into the community and finding new outlets for creative thinking.
Image by Max Colson
