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Training modules provided by the Social Innovation Academy

The Academy is the first fully online management training programme focusing exclusively on social innovation. We are co-funded by the Erasmus+ Programme of the European Union.

What is social innovation? In short, any innovation that is social in its ends or in its means, or simply any working, innovative solution to help address a pressing societal challenge e.g. climate change, social exclusion, mobility or health issues.

In practice, social innovations take form of social enterprises, corporate innovation projects, non-profits, public sector programs, grass-root movements or community initiatives. Social innovation has been gaining momentum around the globe, from Europe to United States, from Africa to Canada, and from Australia to South America.

By training social innovators of the future, the Academy aims to help the most pressing global challenges.

Our team led by Limitless® brings together partners of the highest calibre including Impact Hub, one of the largest network of impact changemakers in the world, Sinnergiak Social Innovation, one of the top social innovation institutes and the co-founder of Social Innovation Community, and the editor of Harvard Business Review in Poland, to name a few, supported by tens of organisational Friends.

Our goal: reach thousands of aspiring social innovators and help them gain the skills and knowledge required for their dreams to become a reality.

Watch the introductory presentation to find out:

  • what social innovation is, exactly
  • what social innovation is not
  • what you can gain from social innovation
  • a brief history of social innovation
  • the global outlook, trends and challenges
  • social innovation types, features and approaches
  • social innovation process (the social innovation spiral)
  • actors involved
  • forms of user involvement
  • social innovation drivers
  • … and what it all means for you!

The presentation is the place to start if you want to quickly learn the basics and get to speed.

Access it here.

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SEDETT Educational Resources for Social Enterprise Development

The SEDETT (Social Enterprise Development Education and Training Tools) project was funded by the EU through the ERASMUS+ strategic partnerships programme. It aimed to

  • Produce a capacity self-assessment tool for social enterprise practitioners to use for evaluating their organisational development.
  • Produce learning resources for educators and trainers to use when developing inter-active course materials on social enterprise development.
  • Provide examples of resources for educators, trainers and others to use as creative learning experiences for social enterprise organisational development.

The learning resources in SEDETT are structured to consist of a set of three learning modules that each have a written module text and an example of a training workshop that has been drawn from the module text.  The three modules are :-

  • Social enterprise, its concepts, forms and governance  (Module 1)
  • Leadership, human resources and operational management in social enterprise (Module 2)
  • Finance, revenue generation, networking and capacity assessment (Module 3)

The written text for each module is structured to provide an index listing each sub-unit of material within the module, the module aims and the approach taken to generate the material.

The core written material in the module texts reflect the real life experiences of the social enterprise actors interviewed from the case study organisations that contributed to the SEDETT project.

The core written material in each of the module texts can be used by educators and trainers to shape and form learning experiences that are appropriate to the level of learner and the type of course to be provided.

Also there are files that contain background descriptive information about the project case study organisations, social enterprise definitions, business models in-use and some country specific information on the governance of social enterprises. This written material is supplemented with short video clips of the social enterprise actors interviewed as part of the SEDETT project. This learning resource can be used to enhance course learning materials and create real life case study information. This base material is contained in files called,

  • Project Case Study Base Material and
  • Video clips

Please, visit the SEDETT website for all of the training and learning materials: https://www.sedett.eu/io2/

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SEDETT project contributed to expanding the availability of educational materials for social entrepreneurs

SEDETT project aims to develop a digitally enhanced blended learning set of S.E. development, education and training tools SEDETT that can be used by, social entrepreneurs to learn how to assess their capacity development needs (IO1), educators and trainers in HE/FE and VET to deliver formal and informal courses of education and training (IO2).  The materials produced will be open access and also include an e-tool that can be used by social entrepreneurs to identify creative education methodologies for use in their organisational development (IO3). Thus the target groups for this project are students/learners, teachers, partners institutions, other educational institutions, research centres, employers and their associations, unemployed youth, education, careers and youth advisory agencies and policy-makers, new social entrepreneurs, existing social enterprises & their employees seeking to up-skill and achieve life long learning.

Here is a link to multiple educational materials and other outputs for the social entrepreneurs produced within the SEDETT project:

https://www.sedett.eu/result-and-outcomes/

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Entrepreneurship Training and Mentoring Circle for Women

Entrepreneurship Training and Mentoring Circle for Women (ETMCW) is a concept delivered by European Activism Incubator. It is a year-long innovative, flexible training programme directed to Brussels – based women, who wish to launch a social or environmental impact business, a social enterprise or a non-profit project. The training has been designed to support a diverse group of women living and working in Brussels in becoming economically empowered through entrepreneurship. Its aim is to provide women with solid and actionable skills, which will increase their initiative’s likelihood of success.

The design of the training will allow its participants to focus specifically on their idea for an impact project that they bring to the table. The skills curriculum is strengthened by a strong ICT element, as today’s entrepreneurial success strongly relies on proficiency in digital skills. The curriculum also addresses systemic challenges encountered specifically by women and teaches specific leadership and professional skills needed to overcome them on the entrepreneurial journey.

Innovative, responsive and inclusive

ETMCW provides a set of directly actionable skills for women, specific to their project. The participants immediately apply the business or project development principles, concepts or tools explained by a tutor to the project they wish to launch.

The progress of each participant is monitored and the content of classes is adapted and tailor-made to the individual’s needs. This markedly differs from a majority of classroom and online-based business and entrepreneurship courses, which teach a variety of principles that may or may not be relevant to a specific project, context, background or situation.

The responsive design of ETMCW also means that the course can address many important aspects that hold women back in addition to their gender, such as race, origin and class, making the programme truly intersectional.

The course departs from the traditional top-down, classroom-based approach to education, applying instead a mix of teaching methodologies that are highly empowering. It is interactive and participative, and includes circle discussions that build on emergent collective knowledge, experience exchange and mutual support.

The concept has been developed from experiences gained through the Beginner Entrepreneur Mentoring Programme for Women, which provided solid insight into the needs of women with entrepreneurship aspirations.

 

More information can be found here: https://activismincubator.eu/training/etmc-women

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This publication has been prepared within INDIGISE project. The content of this publication is the sole responsibility of the project coordinator and may not always reflect the views of the European Commission or the National Agency.

 

 

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INDIGISE project – adjusting to and supporting youth on socialenterprisebsr.net

The lack of visibility, specialized training, support network and infrastructure, as well as limited access to finance are the main burdens that slow down the transition towards social economy and interfere social entrepreneurs for a larger scale social impact. And managing enterprise is even harder when one is only 20 years old or younger. Nevertheless, social entrepreneurship is getting more seen and valued thanks to the activity of youth leaders and support of educators, NGOs, specially designed legislative and CSR business support, social business networks, alternative financing and infrastructure, that allows modern youth to become successful in changing tomorrow. The access to the information on social business development practices and tools needs to be provided to the larger society groups, therefore special attention in new social-impact-oriented INDIGISE project will be put on youth social entrepreneurship empowerment.

The target audience of INDIGISE project are young people who seek a positive social or environmental changes in society, feel the need to create own business, but lack support of competencies and finance. Combining the experience of universities’, NGOs’ and business networks’ professionals, and operating with latest trends in education, INDIGISE project partners from Lithuania, Latvia, Poland and Norway will provide such support and promote youth social entrepreneurship in Baltic Sea Region by digital and informal education tools. As agreed during the first partnership Zoom meeting on May 6-7th, INDIGISE partners will:

  • deliver youth-oriented, innovative educational tools to develop the entrepreneurial competence in the field of social economy and engage youth within social entrepreneurship;
  • spread the idea of social entrepreneurship in the Nothern European Region within the youth sector;
  • provide the necessary competencies and support tools to enable young people to develop social business ideas;
  • promote the concept of social entrepreneurship and support Baltic Sea Region social enterprise start-ups by maintaining an Open Education Resource platform www.socialenterprisebsr.net;
  • encourage young people in innovative and creative thinking, collaboration and risk uptake via InnoCamps, organized in Norway and Lithuania;
  • provide InnoCamp Methodology Handbook – step-by-step replicable and transferable tool for youth, schools, NGOs, educators etc.;
  • promote good practices among local and international partners to achieve sustainable and collaborative social business support within the youth sector.

During the meeting, which was initially planned to happen in Riga, Latvia, but was moved to online setting, partners have discussed planned activities, implementation processes, project management and tools, which will be used to maximise the impact of the project.

The first Intellectual Output (IO1) will focus on improvement of existing knowledge and networking platform www.socialenterprisebsr.net, which was first launched in 2014 as a part of Erasmus+ project “Social entrepreneurship development in Baltic Sea region”. Since then, all BSR countries has contributed to promotion of social entrepreneurship.

INDIGISE aims to improve the platform by adjusting it to the younger entrepreneurs, aged 16-30, and offering relevant Open Educational Resource (OER) information on social business support mechanisms and tools, promoting young social entrepreneurs, equipping with relevant educational materials and networking services.

As an IO2, special guidelines for youth centers and youth organizations will be developed on “How to stimulate social entrepreneurship via informal learning methods incl. gamification methods”. A number of stakeholder organisations working with youth will be engaged, incl. project associated partners – Junior Achievement Norway, National Youth Council (Latvia), Baltic Sea NGO Network (Poland).

InnoCamp Methodology Handbook will be designed within the partnership as IO3 to support onsite and online education of young people, including 2 InnoCamp training events, which will take place in 2021 in Norway and Lithuania.

To deliver the knowledge generated by INDIGISE, 4 Forums will be organised in Poland, Lithuania, Norway and Latvia, gaining participants from the youth sector to promote the guidelines, InnoCamp Methodology handbook and OER platform.

Project partners:received_2563814793867341

Associated partners:

  • Junior Achievement Norway,
  • National Youth Council (Latvia),
  • Baltic Sea NGO Network (Poland).

Project duration: April 2020 – March 2022

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The content of this publication is sole responsibility of the project coordinator and may not always reflect the views of the European Commission or the National Agency.

 

Photo (c): Laura Verza

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The world’s school for social enterprise

Have you ever heard of Social Enterprise Institute, The world’s school for social enterprise?

They provide inspiration, e-learning (100+ online courses), coaching and tools to social entrepreneurs. The support they offer is all available online and on-demand. The content is foundational, working best for startup and early stage social entrepreneurs (0-5 years) or for inexperienced leaders in established social enterprises. And they’re now supporting social entrepreneurs in around 60 countries.

INSPIRATION

They’ve got a documentary film – The Social Shift, which we use to inspire young and aspiring social entrepreneurs. This is accompanied by our growing Social Shifters video series. They’ve packaged this along with learning to support student changemakers and social start-up teams in around 170 universities around the world.

LEARNING

They’ve a wide variety of foundational courses that are short, practical, and designed for busy social entrepreneurs. All courses are available on-demand and on-the-go.There are around 40 courses contained in the following programs:

– Steps to Startup Launchpad

– Impact Practice
– Investment Readiness
– Marketing
– Tendering for Contracts

SUPPORT

They’re building a supportive global community of social entrepreneurs, and offering an all-access ‘Social Shifters’ membership pass to inspiring stories, webinars, tools, featured courses, and resources.

What are you waiting for, sign up today!

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A toolkit for social business advisors

This toolkit is for social business advisors or potential business advisors to improve the quality of the consulting and reach the additional value of consulting session. This toolkit is adapted to the social business advisors specially and contains 8 advisory techniques for groups of social entrepreneurs.

It presents alternative advisory techniques and guidance, that when successfully implemented in real life environments, help to support business advisors in providing effective consulting sessions to social enterprises.

The direct target group of the project are the business advisors, whilst the indirect target group are all potential or existing social entrepreneurs and local societies, stakeholders, chambers and policy makers.

The toolkit and other materials were devised by SESBA project. SESBA (Social Enterprise Skills for Business Advisers) is an EU funded project under Erasmus+ strategic partnerships, aimed at

  • enhancing the profile of business advisors in order to better respond to the field of social entrepreneurship.
  • developing new training practices and consulting techniques
  • cultivating new practical advisory skills by business advisors in order to be able to encourage attributes of social entrepreneurship.

The consortium of a project was made up of seven partners from Greece, Italy, Malta, Bulgaria, Estonia and Ireland. The coordinator is Olympic Training & Consulting LTD from Greece. Militos Consulting is the Greek partner, Programa Integra is the Italian partner, Acrosslimits is the Maltese partner, Agricultural University of Plovdiv is the Bulgarian partner, QUIN-Estonia is the Estonian Partner and Limeric Institute of Technology is the Irish Partner.

 

This toolkit is available for free on the project website in five (5) languages (EN, BG, ES, EL, and IT).

Direct link to the toolkit:  http://sesbaproject.eu/images/sesbaproject/files/SESBA_O3_Techniques_toolkit_FINAL_soseditsf.pdf.