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A really useful new tool for social enterprises  Business Link in London has launched an on-line free to use Business Planning Toolkit, click here. This really useful tool has been produced by Red Ochre on behalf of Business Link in London. Other social enterprise support organisations gave support and guidance to the project; they included Social Enterprise London, School for Social Entrepreneurs, London Rebuilding Society and Unltd. The toolkit is supported by 51 guides that are free to access and download, they cover most areas that potential social entrepreneurs or existing social enterprises will need both to support their business planning but also about the legal, structural, management, financial and employment aspects of starting, managing and growing a successful social enterprise. There are also guides for charities thinking of setting up trading activities. The toolkit itself is divided into a number of sections. Within each section is a guide as to how to create the content for the section and what the section should contain. Each section is cross referenced to the 51 guides. The guides themselves give further links to sources of information. The Toolkit allows you to write your business plan into an expanding word box. This can be saved and accessed as and when required. When ready you can print off the business plan. The Toolkit is simple to use and is an invaluable resource for anyone interested in social enterprise. 
Business Link Social Enteprise Site
......................................................... Largest Korean Social Enterprise visits Red Ochre
Uday Thakkar with Hyuni Hwang and friends | 
Martin Cooper is talking to the group with his beautiful flip chart paper |
The Beautiful Store is Korea’s largest social enterprise. It operates 150 shops across Korea. It sells recycled clothes and goods as well as goods made out of recycled materials. They claim to be the Korean equivalent of Oxfam. The delegation led by Hyuni Hwang is visiting the UK to learn more about how social enterprise prospers in this country. The delegation is also spending some time with Oxfam. Korea is increasingly active in the social enterprise field and has sent a number of delegations here over the last few years. A government delegation visited Red Ochre in 2009 to discuss the challenges of government support for social enterprise and the applicability of social enterprise to support an ageing population. Hyuni Hwang and her friends were particularly interested in finance and fundraising, marketing and PR and impact and evaluation. The delegation ended up staying with us for a whole afternoon and are returning next week to participate in a marketing workshop and to play Red Ochre’s ethical enterprise game. ........................................................ What to do when you are in trouble workshop Red Ochre ran a half day workshop on “What to do when you are in trouble” for trustees and senior management of charities. The half day workshop was free for struggling charities. The workshop looked at the areas that can cause problems for charities and the likely impact of the changing economic landscape. The delegates worked through ways of identifying cash flow problems and discussed possible ways to salvage the organisation. We also discussed what would need to be in place if sustainable strategies were not possible. Comments from delegates included the following comments: “Excellent!” “I wish I had attended this workshop months ago it would have saved me so much heartache and anguish – I learned so much more I feel inspired in battling on!” “Really good!” Red Ochre is considering re-running the workshop again if you are interested please contact Anna on anna@redochre.org.uk ........................................................
Funding & Finance for Social Enterprise
Finance remains a major weakness for most potential and existing social enterprises. Understanding finance and financial management are necessary to demonstrate before attempting to raise funding. This workshop will review finance and financial management and how to use these skills to make funding applications and improve management decisions. The workshop will also look at the different sources of funding available to social entrepreneurs including grant-making trust, government and lottery funding, as well as bank funding, social lenders and other new methods of funding. This workshop has been specifically designed for the social enterprise sector and takes place on the 1st July, 2nd September, 16th November, and the 7th December. To join the facilitator, Uday Thakkar, on any of the above dates please contact the call centre on 0845 6000 787 to book yourself a place. .........................................................
Impact of National Occupational Standards for Commissioning Workshop Robert Foster, co-founder of Red Ochre, spoke on The Impact on Workforce Development at the Impact of National Occupational Standards for Commissioning Workshop on the 26th May 2010. The event was run by the Institute of Commissioning Professionals (www.iocp.co.uk) and was attended by over thirty public sector commissioners from around England. The main outcome of the day was the draft specification for the IoCP’s Accredited Commissioner qualification.
DSC Charityfair Workshops Uday Thakkar ran two workshops at the DSC Charity Fair on Tuesday 22nd June called 'Financially Managing Grants and Contracts', and 'Presenting Financial Information Favourably'. Charityfair offers nearly 100 individual training sessions to suit people at all stages of their career. AMSU Conference Uday Thakkar spoke about social enterprise at the AMSU Conference on Tuesday 22nd June, at Royal Holloway. They hosted the annual AMSU conference on June 20-23 http://www.amsu.net/about. The theme of the conference this year was about ‘Dynamically Engaging Students’ Unions’.
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Red Ochre Profile Red Ochre is delighted to welcome our new French colleague, Anne-Helene, to the team. Anne-Helene is an experienced consultant, researcher and evaluator. She has worked with a wide range of public and private sector organisations on strategic planning, organisational development and evaluation matters. Recently, she has delivered national public policy evaluations on innovation related issues between the public and private sector, and provided strategic actions plans addressed to Councils, Ministers or the European Commission (as part of the Operational Programs 2007-2013). Anne-Helene also worked on large-scale organisational change projects, including merger and post-merger projects requiring redefining work processes, human resources roles specifications, designing new governance approaches, etc. in a sensitive context. She also has previously worked with small and medium enterprises around business planning and helping them develop new income generating services. ......................................................... 
 smartResources supported by Red Ochre, a free resource centre for the Third Sector. .........................................................
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"When you do the common things in life in an uncommon way, you will command the attention of the world." George Washington CarverWhat is Social Entrepreneurship?Statement of Faith
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