Our Future Priorities

Our future priorities

A significant opportunity exists to develop a thriving social enterprise movement in Australia through a cooperative and collaborative network involving all levels of government, business, philanthropy and community sectors.

 A thriving social enterprise sector will occur by:

• increasing awareness of the benefits of social enterprise

• improving social enterprise access to markets

• increasing the finance available to social enterprise

• increasing the capability of social enterprises and their operators, and

• encouraging more effective coordination across the sector.

Specifically, Social Traders will pursue the following initiatives and projects in 2009-2010 to achieve our strategic goals.

Awareness of the benefits

• disseminate findings from the FASES research project to key stakeholders in 2010

• undertake research to identify key success factors for the development of robust social enterprises

• partner with others to convene an annual national social enterprise conference

• continue to develop the Social Traders website as a dynamic go-to site for social enterprise in Australia

• work with others to develop an effective social impact measurement framework

• invest in social enterprise impact measurement, and

• produce an e-newsletter to generate discussion and share local, national and international social enterprise news and developments.

Access to markets

• undertake a national pilot project on good practice models and processes of social procurement as a basis for facilitating market opportunities across all sectors, and

• partner with others to develop a social enterprise purchasing portal to facilitate the sourcing of goods and services from social enterprises.

Access to finance

• establish a social enterprise development fund that will integrate training, planning, impact measurement and finance, and

• explore the development of an investment fund to support social enterprise.

Increase capability

• establish a social enterprise training course (and seek accreditation) that develops the capability of practitioners, consultants and those interested in knowing more about social enterprise

• provide a front-door navigation role providing advice, information and resources for individuals and organisations interested in developing social enterprises

• provide support services to targeted social enterprises, and

• develop tailored tools and resources to assist organisations to develop and run social enterprises.

Improve coordination

• coordinate input from other organisations to inform social enterprise strategy and policy across government

• explore opportunities to establish an alliance between organisations to enable a more coordinated approach to social enterprise activity in Australia, and

• collaborate with other social enterprise development organisations internationally to share experience and good practice.