I'm considering of starting a social enterprise. I believe that as service provision this initiative has it's place in the UK, however I'm stuck as to how to make it work as social enterprise and not a charity.

The project involves setting up Mental Health Support Groups across the UK. Each group has a facilitaor and is this person is usally a user. The group is run by users for users. The idea behind is is to reduce social exclusion and promote recovery by raising awareness of conditions and treatements.

As a support group of this nature would I be in aposition to apprach the PCT for contract working locally?

Any other suggestions or ideas would be gratefully recieved.

I already run the London Mental health Support Group - It's been of great help to people.

thank you in advance

Check out Learning from practice entry on this site
Can a sheltered work scheme transform into a social firm ?

at http://www.networks.nhs.uk/db/commi...mental%20health

A dissertation now available on-line provides an interesting exploration of social enterprise in healthcare.

Mark Bertram's paper, published earlier this year, explores two points:


Can an existing NHS sheltered work project be successfully transformed into a Social Firm operated by service users?

To what extent can such a transformed service be self-sufficient and profitable?

The sheltered work project in question is Carpet Cleaning Care which, currently, is still part of the NHS Trust in which it was created. The paper considers some interesting issues that arose during the journey of considering Social Firm development and Mark is happy to share the learnings with others in the arena of vocational rehabilitation for people with mental health problems and conversion of sheltered work projects.

There are a number of examples of employment activities becoming viable Social Firms - see for example the NPS, Travel Matters and Pack-IT case studies here:
http://www.socialfirms.co.uk/index.php/Section5.html
- also a number of research papers - for example Employment Creation In Social Enterprises, A Public Authority Perspective - here:
http://resources.socialfirms.co.uk/resources.php?cat=2
Nutan's problem is slightly different however - it's one of whether there is a business model for this kind of user group.
My own work on social enterprise business models for free services can be accessed via:
http://www.geofcox.info/index.php?q...e_For_Free_Page
See also:
http://www.geofcox.info/?q=Organisational_Visioning

I I happened to have discovered Richard Cowling, it might be interesting to examine his efforts. Richard may be found on Facebook and UnLtd networks where he offers a lot more information.

http://mesomoco.org.uk/

Hello again Geof, I tuned into the link above about open source as one of the earliest decisions made by P-CEDs founder was to publish a social business model on the web. The word social wasn't mentioned at the time, far too provocative for US consumption.

Sachs as you know is a Harvard man and when we took the concept of profit for purpose business to Russia in 1999, Harvard were associated with the collapse of Russia's economy and the failure of trickle down development. A suggestion was made, to try another way.

This became the Tomsk initiative and microfiance bank, a project running from 2000-2005 which pioneered the moral collateral model of micrifinance in Russia, leading to the Russian Microfinance Center being established in 2002.

With Harvard presumably not keen to endorse it and Putin painting the resurgence of Russia, it wasn't something many wanted to talk about. That carries forward even today.

Jeff

I think that one of the key challenges is how to establish a business model and understand where the surpluses/profits will come from, otherwise you may as well set up as a charity.

The EPOCH model (http://www.entreprenurses.net/blog/blog007.php) has been useful with a number of social entrepreneurs in working out potential income streams as well as the usual NHS sources (e.g. PCTs, Practice Based Commissioners, etc).

Let me know if you need a hand working through it.