Unfortunately, reflecting increased budget restraints and shifting priorities for funders, PSEN has not currently secured funding to continue with the same level of staff capacity, and as a result the contracts for our core operations team, Gareth, Amerie and Matt, end on May 31st.
However, PSEN, as a membership organisation and member owned CIC, will continue operating in the same way as it has for most of the past 15 years, with the board and volunteers continuing to provide advocacy, networking, promotion and support to the businesses that make Plymouth a leading Social Enterprise City.
We continue to look for funding opportunities and contracts which will benefit our members, and hope to have good news to share with you soon.
What does this mean for our members?
Firstly the core membership offering remains unaffected, there will still be network meetings, including our AGM in July, and we will continue enhance these spaces for learning and socialising with updates, guests and insights from members.
A newsletter will continue with members being updated on representation and opportunities, and the public newsletter continuing to share member events, news, and jobs with people across Plymouth and beyond.
Our social media will be monitored, and your content re-posted to our followers across platforms.
The Social Enterprise City Festival will return in November, with a focus on bringing more Plymouth people and custom to your enterprises.
However, over the summer, you will notice a drop off in PSEN organised events, and direct communications will be less frequent. So please send us any news or opportunities to share in good time: Newsletter@plymsocent.org.uk
All sectors of the economy continue to face complex challenges, but we believe social enterprise remains the best way to overcome them by putting people and planet first. We’ll be looking at the general election results with great interest and be unpicking the opportunities presented by a new government at our AGM the following week. We hope you can join us.
What do an artisan papermaker, outdoor activities instructor, poet, change agent, workspace designer and social researcher have in common? We all run our own businesses. We are all motivated by social justice. We are all members of NeuDICE CIC. And we are all gloriously neurodivergent.
Neurodiversity is the natural human condition: no two people make sense of the world the same way. Humanity is diverse. But, somehow, some ways of experiencing and making sense of the world became seen as normal and healthy while others are seen as divergent or more usually weird or broken. (If neurodiversity/neurodivergence is a new concept to you, NeuDICE Plymouth can be found at The Plot most days and you can book a half hour slot to learn more – or book our half-day training for your business).
NeuDICE is working for a world that values and relishes human neurodiversity. We have to work for this because the world needs all of our skills and talents, all of our ways of making sense of the world, all of our ways of understanding the social issues of the day that social enterprises exist to address. The world does not just need neurodivergent people. Equally, the world cannot survive with only neurotypical people, the people for whom society and business are currently organised.
In the meantime, while we work towards a wonderful neuroinclusive world, we are creating a community for the business outsiders. Our community is a safe space for those who have believed they are broken because society tells them they are. We are community open to people who are often called weirdos behind their backs and treated as outsiders. [as an aside, when friends of our co-founder Anne have watched the Barbie Movie, they have all laughed when they saw Weird Barbie (who is called that to her face and behind her back) and thought “That’s so Anne”. And Anne is happy with that. Like Weird Barbie, she and we can feel isolated and excluded but can also be the heroes a society needs precisely because we can see and be and do what others cannot]. We are the innovators, the visionaries, the changemakers. We are these simply by existing in public life and within the business world.
And yet, we are outsiders. We can find it hard to get established. It takes longer. We need to find new ways because we cannot access the established ways into the business and social business worlds. As outsiders, we needed the support and allyship of insiders to get started. We’d like to thank PSEN, POP, Nudge and UnLtd for their support and for opening doors for us to grow and thrive in Plymouth.
Here’s to being stronger together in all our glorious human diversity.
Guest writer Anne Collins – co-Founder and Director of NeuDICE – takes a reflective and critical look at inclusivity at business events.
Business world, we have a problem
Business as usual isn’t working. Let me rephrase that. Business as usual is working extremely well for a narrow sector of the diversity of people who are or could be founding, working in and being directors of social enterprises. For others, it is challenging to try to fit in and accommodate themselves to an alien way of thinking and doing.
The statement that business as usual isn’t working applies to the whole breadth and depth of activities and ways of thinking in the business world. It matters because we live in an era of change. We live in a time where society needs the combined understanding and involvement of the broadest diversity of thinkers and doers in order to survive. This has not always been the case. In times when we know ‘A’ and ‘B’ and there is a clear path between them, we do not need diversity. Society can afford to exclude anyone who doesn’t fit the stereotypical business mould. We do not live in such times. Society and the business world cannot afford to continue with business as usual. We need to work together to find ways to reimagine doing business and being business people.
PSEN is already at the forefront of this. NeuDICE CIC is delighted to have been invited to work with them to advise and co-create solutions for one particular group who are often ideally suited to social enterprise. These are the neurodivergent thinkers, doers, lovers of social justice, visionaries and collaborators. We are not broken or defective but business as usual can break us; we are part of the diversity of humanity for which the business world is not designed.
Let’s think about networking, workshops, strategic meetings and public forums. We use them in the business world to gain visibility, contacts and credibility. In the world of social enterprise, we also use them to co-create ways forward for a stronger society. If we need a diversity of thinkers and doers in business and social enterprise, we need a diversity of people able to come as their whole selves to these events and participate on a level playing field.
If you want to include us in these activities, here are a few things to start you thinking.
Intersectionality
We are not all the same. We certainly aren’t all white male graduates. A recent NeuDICE Living Lab session heard from an Asian Muslim woman who is a carer for disabled children. Her barriers were not the same as Anne’s – a white woman with a PhD and no dependents. At the NeuDICE launch, we didn’t think to provide the slide deck with descriptions and transcription in advance despite knowing someone with a visual impairment was coming.
Sensory environment
Acoustics, lighting, smells, textures, even air pressure can all impact our ability to focus or even remain in a space. Great hybrid meetings give us a chance to participate while controlling our sensory environment. Lockdown was a revelation for many of us as we found we could do a meeting a day rather than one meeting leading to two days of inability to work due to overload.
Thinking out loud
We need ways to capture ideas as we have them. We need space to think things through out loud. For in-person meetings, a paper tablecloth can take the place of the chat box for capturing ideas as they arise. Creating structured spaces for reflection and pairs or small group slows things down and deepens the conversations.
We can take longer to process information. If you want us for our contributions not just our presence, make sure we have that time. The easiest way is to tell us in advance of any questions or activities so we can do the thinking before we arrive in our own way.
Communication
Give opportunities for spoken, written and drawn contributions.
We may find it hard to know when it is our turn to speak, so create a structured approach and enforce it. One bit of business as usual that actually works is only contributing via the Chair and having a Chair who does a go-round allowing sufficient pause for each person to contribute rather than flicking their eyes round after asking if anyone else has anything to add.
You may need to turn standard written information into a set of colour-coded stickie notes, a mind map, a multimedia virtual white board (eg Miro) or bullet point lists to make it easier for them to process information.
I always check what style of email works better, if they want key facts in bold and whether I should put information in the body of an email or as an attachment.
NeuDICE CIC chose Plymouth for its UK launch on 17th April 2023. Our mission is to open the business world to neurodivergent entrepreneurs. We provide consultancy, training, coaching and research services along with growing a UK-wide community and peer to peer support for entrepreneurs themselves.
You are on your way!
Please fill in the information in the fields on the left, select your payment method and then click “Sign Up”. Follow any additional instructions and if you have any problems, use the Contact Us link to let us know. Thanks for joining the Plymouth Social Enterprise Network as a member, your support and activity in this thriving community keeps us all working towards a better and fairer tomorrow.