In 2008 SCEDU was awarded a Capacity Builders 3 year grant via its Social Enterprise Programme. The programme ended this year after supporting the Continuous Professional Development (CPD) of social enterprise business advisors from Yorkshire and Humber. The final year of the programme was opened up to social entrepreneurs around the region too.

Programme Overview

Nationally the Capacity Builders programme was working alongside local and national providers, delivery partners and government agencies with the aim of strengthening the quality of support available to third sector organisations.

Priorities

SCEDU established the CPD programme to create a stronger supply chain of mentors and coaches (business advisors) to ensure skilled and experienced advisors were available regionally.

What SCEDU achieved with the CPD programme

In 2009 a series of six full-day CPD specialist workshops were delivered in the region, these included:

• Health and Social Enterprise
• Community Share Issues
• Integrating Social Enterprise with the National Curriculum
• Consumer Co-ops
• Winning Business from the Public Sector
• Social Return on Investment

The workshops were accessed by 15 of the regions social enterprise business advisors, representing 8 of the regions social enterprise support agencies. These advisors have built up a personal portfolio of knowledge from each of the workshops.

Advisor CPD Learning Days

As part of year two of the programme, SCEDU also ran two learning visits for advisors to see other successful social enterprises in action. The learning visits gave advisors chance to question and learn from the host about how they started, have grown and now maintain their services.
Learning visit one was to the Goodwin Centre in Hull where advisors met with the CEO for a question and answer session and visited the various projects created by the trust.
Learning visit two took place at The Glassroom in Leeds at Cockburn High School. The advisors were given opportunity to speak with staff involved in the enterprise and see many of the items the pupils make. Advisors were introduced to all aspects of the enterprise to understand how they operated within a school environment.

Learning and Success

SCEDU made its CPD programme available FREE to hundreds of social enterprises and entrepreneurs around the Yorkshire and Humber region in the final year.

A total of 13 different workshops were delivered across 7 different subjects in the final year. A total of 35 different organisations were represented and 7 entrepreneurs and a total of 53 individuals attended a minimum of one workshop within the programme.

Feedback from the whole workshop programme was
69% of all attendees thought the workshop they attended was VERY USEFUL
18% thought it was QUITE USEFUL and
13% thought it was USEFUL

Additional comments from attendees showed that they valued the opportunity to attend the workshops free of charge and found the opportunity to network with like minded individuals very stimulating.

SCEDU would like to thank everyone that participated in the workshops during the last three years and wishes them all the very best for the future success of their enterprise