social enterprise

My name is Lily Yu, the 2010 Summer Intern of the Social Enterprise Yorkshire and Humber and I will be working at SEYH until the 19^th August. Coming from Hong Kong, a place where social enterprises are not widely recognized and implemented, the concept of social enterprises thus becomes quite new and unique to me. My stay in UK so far had me in awe through the omnipresence of social enterprises and its impacts that it has had in local communities. In Hong Kong, most business operate through similar goals of maximizing shareholders’ profits, acquiring other competitors in order to take the leading place in their sector, and trying to build and expand their business through different industries. However, here at Leeds, I can see that the focus on the concept of ‘business’ is quite different. Social Enterprises do not only contribute their profits back to the community in the long run, but they also contribute by running the business in hopes of benefiting the needs of people in the society. For example, people would sell milk to schools and pay a portion of profits to local farmers, employ people with disabilities and long-term unemployed, and educate children on healthy eating issues.

I am looking forward to gaining a more in-depth understanding of social enterprises through working at SEYH. I wish to not only be able to further understand and adapt to the good faith of individuals whom run social enterprises, but also to provide any assistance that I can to the SEYH organization. In the end, I hope to be able to bring what I have learned and experienced with social enterprises back to Hong Kong, spreading its importance and emphasizing its need in Hong Kong society today.

You can get in touch with me at This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it

Lily

As readers of this occasional blog are aware my personal choices often reflect my professional commitment to the sector. My holiday to Jersey is no different and I have found a few local social enterprises to grace on my holiday. Jersey is well known for its financial services sector, low taxation and until recently, loose regulation of competition. This is not normally the type of environment that social enterprise thrives but the Island has some significant Social Enterprises. I am staying at Les Ormes self catering and leisure resort the resort is not owned by some offshore financier or short sold to a hedge fund but is owned by the Bosdet Foundation. In September 1989 the late George Bisson  handed over the Quennevais Camp site (now Les Ormes) and the surrounding properties to a Foundation (The Bosdet Foundation), which had as its principal aim to help people in need in Jersey through the development of the Les Ormes leisure facility.

Today, it is the profits generated from the Les Ormes Leisure Complex and the rental income on the rental and self catering properties that generate the charitable funds for the Bosdet Foundation. The objective is to increase the funds available over the coming years with the development of further self catering.

The complex is impressive with excellent accommodation, a swimming pool, gym, football centre, tennis courts and a Golf Course! It is used by local schools for swimming lessons and by the Channel Islands LTA to train tennis players and Heather Watson from the Channel Islands is the world’s best junior female tennis player.

I have also restricted most of my shopping activities to the Channel Islands Co-operative Society which is an independent co-operative society owned by its members, the co-operative shoppers of the Channel Islands. The society scale is impressive with 108,000 members about half the Islands population and a turnover of £150 million, there only seem to be 2 big supermarkets on Jersey and it is a testament to the strength of co-operatives that they have managed to grow to this size somewhere like the Channel Islands. The society is supplied by the Co-operative Group and the producers who are part of Genuine Jersey which is a non-profit association which provides a charter mark for genuine Jersey products and aims to: reduce food miles, encourage seasonal food, support local agriculture and preserving the environment. It’s not quite the transition movement but reflects a move towards sustainability and resilience within the Islands and supporting local producers.

I visited one of the Genuine Jersey producers, La Mare Wine Estate, which produced excellent wine and has only been open since 1972; it also produces preserves, chocolates and has impressive environmental credentials. The thought that struck me though is that the UK wine industry is going through a real growth phase and the La Mare model would make an excellent social enterprise generating profits for the community as well as environmental and workforce development. So who fancies it the UKs first Social Enterprise Winery!

Dobrinka Valkova works for the Workshop for Civic Initiatives in Sofia, Bulgaria and shadowed SEYH staff for a week on an exchange organised by EUCLID, here is a record of her experiences:

On my first day at SEYH I was met at my hotel by Ian Adderley, the Information and Membership Officer at SEYH. (The hotel, The Etap Hotel is quite nice! It uses space hyper-efficiently with one room providing all the functionality needed. It reminds me of a bed-and-breakfast. The service was good, it was clean and the staff were very-very polite!).

First good point for Leeds!

We set off from the hotel walking toward the office. On the way Ian clarified some useful bits of information regarding UK legislature and the structure of the local authorities around the county, as well as a brief outline on what was planned for my week at SEYH.
I was told the office was situated in a building called: “Angel’s Wing”- which is a lovely name, especially to an ear fond of the word ‘angel’. When I arrived I saw the huge golden angel sculptures hanging from the top of the neighbouring building, behind a huge glassed entrance, what an impressively angelic!

That start got better!

The first organisation I met there while shadowing Alex Sobel, SEYH's General Manager was the Grow Organisation. With all of its units called ‘something-&-Grow’ they have made a trademark out of their skill and knowledge to create work for people from vulnerable groups (generally described as "long-term unemployed"). Since its start as a grassroots initiative in 2006 it has grown in many other towns and cities in different regions, starting with the grass cutting Mow & Grow, Recycle & Grow, HR & Grow one and others. A very impressive initiative presented well by its CEO Trevor Lynn.

I was also introduced to the concept of Re-Work (social enterprise for re-use of office furniture) and the Chapeltown Development Trust. I should mention that although social enterprise exists as term in the public space in Bulgaria, it has a very limited practice there. Therefore asking questions, sometimes weird ones, was inevitable. I asked questions such as "What is a development trust, how is it structured and how does it function" - and I was happy to have Alex and Ian around to answer them. Thanks guys for your patience!
Next day we had a trip to Sheffield - really not far from Leeds, in beautiful sunny weather with dramatic clouds specific to Britain. SEYH had to arrange for some work to be done with Viewpoint - and I had the chance to meet some people. A meeting to remember :) We went to Viewpoint - a lovely idea for arranging work for unemployed, mainly blind people, to undertake surveys and research work. The idea was initiated by Mark Powell and later on went independent, now existing sustainably on its own. Marvellous!
I'd love something like this to be done in my environment... I have worked with blind people for an arts project I started in 2006 and I have passion to tackle the injustice presented by their perceived incompatibility with the labour market. With such enterprises the personal dignity grows higher and higher - their equality as well.

I then met Busters coffee – another project initiated by Mark Powell. Created to help people with learning disabilities, it employs training and management staff, employees who grind fair-trade coffee and a driver - to deliver the ground coffee to the clients. As simple as that. Simple is beautiful. I had the chance to chat a little with Mark, who had to drive soon after we spoke to deliver the orders to the clients that day. A lovely touch of social enterprise history that was :)

We also paid a visit to the massively ambitious Riverside project. I will probably miss some bits of the whole picture, but here it is briefly. Riverside is a social enterprise pub that has a three years plan for renovation of the building to host more initiatives and better serve the needs of its founders - a theatre company. There is not much money in theatre and in order to undertake theatre one needs to have secured funding. So here's how they have made it: the pub functions firstly as a pub, soon to include a kitchen as well. There is a 'shoebox' studio on the upper floor - that is already dancing and other classes. A new theatre studio will to be built as well - suitable for celebrations, weddings, concerts, theatre performances, etc... The basement will get transformed into a brewery - not only producing beer but also running safe drinking educational classes. The riverside which now looks quite polluted, will be cleaned up and transformed with a wooden deck to extend the pub space and the exit from the basement outside. Good luck to the ambitious initiative and fingers crossed that itit happens successfully.

Other organisations I met were the printing cooperative Footprint and the St. Vincents Support Centre. I also heard about a social enterprise hotel in Barton who delivers services to people with cancer - including reiki, massage and general rehabilitation.

So, finally, here I am, back home, refreshed and rejuvenated, with angel's spark in my eye, going to conquer the world as a contemporary leader through a social enterprise. What exactly is unknown yet - the future is about to be uncovered.
 
Good job, guys!