Julie Mcever
Julie is an associate at Local Partnerships - an organisation providing the public sector with commercial expertise. Julie is responsible for co-managing, alongside The Social Investment Business, the Department of Health's £100m Social Enterprise Investment Fund
There is no universal framework: Each new organisation needs to define its own methods to enable its employees and management to grow into their new roles as owners/members. It is recommended that boards have diverse representation and experience to help in this regard. It should not be underestimated how external expertise can help shape these new organisations as they mature.
Where can people go for more information?: There is a mutuals information service line that was recently launched by Local Partnerships, Coops UK and Employees Ownership Association for people to call or email for information on support. If there is an interest or query around social enterprise in the health and social care sector or right to request specifically, they can contact Local Partnerships for more help as we are working on this every day.
Annie Tunnicliffe
Annie is abusiness development adviser for The Social Investment Business. Annie provides advice and support to social enterprises and other non-profit organisations applying for loan funding.
Social enterprises must be able to compete and win contracts on merit: There could be a risk of collapses after three to five years when initial contracts end. However after that length of time, the organisations will need to sink or swim like any other independent organisation. Of course I would like to see support available for all not-for-profit organisations and I agree that sometimes it is helpful if the support is sensitive to their particular form, for example employee owned. However with the spin outs, I would worry the issue could be that they never get out of the comfort zone of the initial contract until it is too late and the survivor instincts are just never sufficiently developed. It will take special leadership to plan and deliver the necessary culture changes.
Spin outs need help to plan the business and adjust to the culture change: One idea might be that some spin outs could benefit from someone from outside the parent organisation being seconded in (possibly an interim) to lead the spin-out through the transition phase. I can't think of a job name for this person. Talent developer? Culture changer? The person would ideally help them in being focused on the mission statement or the logo and get some energy in to the business plan and the cash flow. From our experience at The Social Investment Business, this kind of business support can really help these organisations to get on the right track.
Geof Cox
Geof has been involved in social enterprise for more than 30 years and is now a freelance social enterprise developer working throughout Europe and Eurasia
Keep control of your assets: There are many ways of mitigating the risk of externalised assets passing into the wrong hands – such as the use of an asset-locked structure like a community interest company - though none of them can be guaranteed to absolutely negate the risk. Perhaps the simplest solution though is not to transfer any assets. This was my approach for instance when I advised on the externalisation of a number of instrumental music teaching services in the mid-to-late,1990s – all of which I believe are still doing well. I was following the lead set by the Greenwich Leisure externalisation in 1993, in which Greenwich Council retained ownership of the leisure centres but leased them to a new employee-run Leisure Trust.
Start with the social problem you want to solve, not the government agenda: The key to being a successful entrepreneur is to know what need you are meeting from the customers point of view, and the key to being a successful social entrepreneur is to understand the social problem you are setting out to address from the point of view of those who experience the problem. If you start from this point, rather than from the government's agenda, you can build something worthwhile.
Matt Jarratt
Matt is membership and communications manager at Social Enterprise London. Matt recently authored Transitions, the guide for public sector workers keen to establish a social enterprise.
We need true entrepreneurs to help deliver successful ventures: No social enterprise has ever established successfully without an entrepreneur or group of entrepreneurs at its heart believing in it and making it happen. There is a risk that in the anxiety of councils to generate mutuals, that they begin defensively and reluctantly - a recipe for failure.
For this reason it's crucial that emerging social entrepreneurs are supported by organisations who well understand the culture of achieving positive social change through business. In short, it's not enough to simply establish the systems for spin out, there must also be considered support for the people who are going to make it happen.
Mutuals need support from councils and beyond: For me it's clear - an organisation which has social benefit at its core is distinct from one which has private profit as its driving force. In my experience 'stealth privatisation' and hijacking of the social enterprise model isn't quite as big an issue as some fear. I'm not saying it doesn't happen, just that it's quite obvious when it does, and it isn't a reason to put us off the development of new mutuals.
Providing there is suitable support, and that councils don't abandon mutuals once they've established. Our focus needs to be on creating organisations which deliver the best possible social outcomes for the person using the service, rather than what governance structure they take.
Carole Leslie
Carole is policy director of the Employee Ownership Association, the voice of organisations owned by their employees in the UK.
Proper thought has to be given to how these enterprises will win and retain business: I have a concern that cost will become a major factor in the award of public sector contracts, and this will be at the expense of value delivered.
I know several excellent employee owned organisations who work in the care sector. They are anchored in their community, have superb employee relations (in a sector where this isn't always the case) and all have excellent reputations with their service users and their private and public sector customers. Yet the tendering process favours cheapest cost and we have seen national players come in, offering minimal wages and conditions, win the contracts and be unable to supply. No one benefits from this kind of outcome.
Timothy Curtis
Timothy is a social entrepreneur, social and community development lecturer.
Invest in your suppliers and supply chain: The contracting process is outdated and very inefficient. It loads all the risk on to the suppliers and therefore the suppliers charge that risk back to the NHS - so it could work out more expensive on the whole. What is needed is a supply-chain management initiative like the one in the oil industry about a decade ago. The oil industry realised that it needed really good efficient suppliers and invested in them to get them up and running and help them become efficient, rather than dividing them and ruling them through short-term competitive tendering. Another example, could be the form of contract management that BAA used for the construction of Terminal 5. By accepting all the risks of the contract, they were able to select suppliers on quality, not cost, and get the project delivered more cheaply than contracting out the risk.
