So often I speak with people in regional communities who are frustrated with how slowly change happens. They can see and feel the problems, and despite their best efforts things just don’t shift. Or they shift for a while, then the grant runs out, or a great staff member or volunteer leaves and the momentum fades.
We know that government funding for project delivery is not going to sustain the change needed. The harder question is what to do instead, and that’s where it gets complicated.
In 2009 I went to the Social Enterprise World Forum in Melbourne and for the first time in my working life I felt I’d found my people. Those who existed somewhere between business and community and were comfortable there.
I took the wrong message home. My message could have been that there were different ways to approach change. But instead it was that social enterprise was the pathway to change in my regional community, and we needed one. And as I was the only person from my community there, nobody argued with me.
My reasoning wasn’t bad. I was managing an Aboriginal Corporation at the time and my funding had KPIs aligned to making the service sustainable (the service had been trading in a similar way to a neighbourhood centre). And, at least there was some momentum in the area of a fashion business. So, we went for it.
While there is no doubt we did great work, had a lot of support and sold some beautiful clothing, without a consistent production line, access to markets and support that existed beyond a course or consultancy, the social enterprise, and its multiple objectives were doomed from the beginning. So, it failed, and I felt that for a long time.
It didn’t put me off social enterprise. I went on to support many more regional social enterprises and slowly pulled together a community of practice, which was amplified when I convinced the School for Social Entrepreneurs to run a regional program.
But it took well over a decade to understand what had really gone wrong. I hadn’t missed the bigger picture and I’d already put thought into other revenue streams and was working to diversify our grants. Social enterprise looked like our best bet, but once that became our focus it sucked the energy out of the room. With so few people and so little time, our focus narrowed to feeding that beast, and the broader conversations faded.
There’s so much more on offer now than there was in 2009. There are businesses that trade for community benefit, funds that pool local money, groups that own and run local assets, and the networks, courses, consultants and peak bodies that support them. Collectively it’s often called the social economy. But talk of sectors, ecosystems and movements means very little when you’re sitting outside the city limits, just trying to find a sustainable way to create safe spaces for the people who live in your town. So it’s no wonder that when I move through regional, rural and remote communities and start talking about different ways to create and sustain change, I still get puzzled looks. Most of that world, and its language, hasn’t reached the places that need it most.
What may have reached them is the hype. Rather than the full picture, communities tend to get one idea at a time, whichever is loudest that year, arriving with momentum, champions and the promise of support. If you’re a local person who simply wants things to be better where you live, it’s no wonder you either throw your hands up or grab the first thing that looks accessible. And the first thing that reaches you is usually the one with the biggest marketing budget or the most confident champion, which tells you a lot about who is promoting it and very little about whether it fits your community.
These things aren’t interchangeable. Some are business models, some are ways of holding and moving money, some are assets a community either has or doesn’t, and some are ways of working together. Every one of them has merit and has been the right answer somewhere, but none is the answer everywhere and none works in isolation. Diving into any of them before you understand what you’re actually trying to solve is like opening the marshmallows before anyone has gathered the kindling.
I’ve watched a great deal of money go into structures and programs that were never fit for the places they landed in and that sucks.
So here’s a sense check. If you find yourself saying “we just need to have a…”, “we need to learn how to…” or “we need to become a…”, treat that as the signal to pause. Turn back to your community and ask more questions before you commit: what are we actually trying to change, who will do the work, and what will we stop doing to make room for it?
Then ask more of the people bringing you ideas. What else is out there? Where hasn’t this worked, and why? What does it cost in people and time, not just money? The social economy is much bigger than whatever happens to reach your inbox, and you’re entitled to see more of it before you choose. Some of the best learning comes from people in other places who’ve tried these approaches, including the attempts that didn’t work.
That matters because regional communities, whatever their history, location and capability, almost all share one thing: there are never enough people able to work consistently and together over the long haul. Whatever you take on will eat most of their energy, as it did ours. It should be something that fits your community, not the thing with the best brochure.
Otherwise you’ll be looking at another empty shopfront and another round of lost hope.
Please remember, there is always more than one pathway to sustainable change. Do what fits.
