Action learning through real examples
The Finance Hub has commissioned the DTA to undertake a project which aims to help third sector organisations, especially community groups, understand how they can grow and diversify income, by helping them explore trading activities to generate new income streams.
The DTA developed a pilot action learning set to enable more informed decision-making about trading, thereby enabling more third sector organisations to survive and thrive in a rapidly changing context.
The participants came from voluntary & community organisations who wanted to consider trading and their advisers who want to improve the support they offer. Both groups aimed to become more confident and skilled in assessing the viability and sustainability of earned income options.
Who participated
- National, regional and local VCS infrastructure organisations
- CVSs and local Change Up partnerships
- Business Link franchise holders
- Regional social enterprise agencies
- SKiLD (Skills & Knowledge in Local Development)
- Trustees of small community groups
- Lead managers of small community groups
- Non-finance specialist managers and generic workers
- We are particularly seeking participation from BME and rural community groups
Why they participated
Will your organisation or those you advise still be needed after current grants run out? There are fewer and fewer grants available so if you want to survive you need to be planning a different approach, that will need new skills. Most of all you need to be able to recognise a viable trading opportunity and know how to work it up so it’s ready for market.
What was involved
The Action Learning Set met face-to-face at a launch session in London or Yorkshire during December 2007 to get to know each other and become familiar with the technology we will be using. They then met in a ‘virtual classroom’ online three times during January 2008. Each session will lasted 1.5 hours approx and explored real examples of community organisations that developed trading activity. The sessions were interactive with participants presenting the examples in Dragon’s Den style and others providing a constructive assessment.
They came together again at the end for a fun session where they voted on the best trading idea, the best presentation and the best assessment as well as considering how this learning approach can be cascaded out to others.
