The Social Entrepreneurship Development Model (SEDM), which also serves as a guide for Social Entrepreneurs (SEs) educators, is the 1st output produced under the Project “Boost Aid for Social Entrepreneurship through Training” (BASET), funded by the Erasmus+ Programme of the European Commission. It was created by the team of the Knowledge, Innovation and Strategies Management Club and shares the project team insights and its experience of working with entrepreneurs. This guide is followed by two other interrelated outputs - Train the Trainers Toolkit and Train the Investors Handbook. These three tools are components of a package for professionals who support or invest in the social enterprises’ development.

The model builds on the work of partner organisations: Caban Capital - UK, IDEC - Greece, Creative District - Belgium, CEED - Bulgaria and the project coordinator KISMC - Bulgaria, that have experience not only in their countries but also around the world and which collectively can be recognised as visionaries in the development of this important field of knowledge.

The purpose of SEDM is to provide the educators with practical instruments (tools) that will enable them to effectively teach, mentor and facilitate entrepreneurs who have decided to do business with a social mission.
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In the context of social entrepreneurship and for the needs of the BASET project the EDUCATOR definition in this guide is: a person who acts professionally as a trainer, teacher, mentor, coach, advisor, consultant, facilitator or some other kind of professional who works with social entrepreneurs in order to facilitate and support the start-up and the development of a social business (venture).

The guide can help educators to better understand what social entrepreneurship is, what the social entrepreneurs’ profiles look like and what is the typology of the business models used. So, it will enhance the professional development of these group of people by providing them with general and specific knowledge of how to work with social entrepreneurs in an effective way.

During the first stage of the development of the BASET project and after an in-depth research of cases, good practices and findings from other projects, the partners discovered that educators who use well-structured tools can better prepare themselves for their important roles to support social entrepreneurship.  

Ultimately, the guide includes a step-by-step process for assisting social entrepreneurs how to launch new ventures, support educators in exploring and using diverse models of social entrepreneurship and in giving capacity to social entrepreneurs to get a global vision.
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The beta version of the guide is ready and there is an open access to read it here


Author
Coordinator @BASET
KISMC

The Business Model Canvas (BMC) was developed by Alex Osterwalder and Yves Pigneur, and co-created with an array of 470 practitioners from around the world. It offers a simple, visual, one-page canvas on which entrepreneurs can design, innovate and dialogue about their business models. It is not the only framework that has been developed to articulate business models but like many of the frameworks this one was built out of careful research. However, unlike many others, it has also been tested and enhanced through the input of many practitioners.
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In addition, the BMC itself sits inside a very innovative business model, including licensing under Creative Commons and a commitment to co-creative innovation within the methods around the BMC. Business Model Canvas and Business Model Generation book written by Alex Osterwalder and Yves Pigneur can be found here: www.businessmodelgeneration.com
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Working with the Business Model Canvas in and around the social enterprise sector Ingrid Burkett Knode realized that there were some ‘special’ things about social enterprises that could easily be reflected in the BMC using a few simple adaptations.
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Ingrid Burkett Knode has used the BMC to work in the social enterprise sector and has found the canvas to be very helpful, particularly in early exploratory stages of development and in relation to growth and innovation stages. She has documented her knowledge on the BMC in the material: "Using the Business Model Canvas for Social Enterprise Design".

What she concluded was that there are three basic different ways in which social enterprises organize themselves in achieving the goals:
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1. They may directly support, train and employ people who are experiencing some form of exclusion and disadvantage (for example, a social enterprise cafe may employ people who have been homeless and unemployed);
2. They may provide services or products to directly meet a social need or achieve a social impact (for example, a community supported agriculture enterprise may make fresh, local produce available whilst also supporting smaller, local farmers); or
3. They may generate income for a charitable or social purpose (for example, an op shop may generate income to support a larger charity deliver other social purpose programs). 

​Many social enterprises find it difficult to explain their business models, and that many start working on their business plans before understanding their business models thoroughly.


Author
Partners @BASET
KISMC & CABAN
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As we have realized and already shared in the blog article 'Why Social Business Modelling is Important for Social Entrepreneurship' managing a social business is not about just adding business skills to the realm of social impact! Balancing a social mission with an intention to trade and manage a business requires a blending of skills which is greater than the sum of each set of skills alone.

​The social impact inside a business operation is not cost neutral - so both the skills needed to deliver on a social impact and the costs involved in doing so need to be considered in designing a viable and sustainable business model. Therefore, business modelling is crucial for social entrepreneurs and for that reason, we are clarifying a few important points regarding business modelling in social entrepreneurship.
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A business model (BM) is more than the product or service an entrepreneur or a company offers. It is a logic description of how businesses make money. It is a tool that helps stakeholders understand and clearly articulate how the entrepreneur (company) creates, delivers and captures value for itself as well as the customers at an appropriate cost.

From the management point of view BM is a step-by-step plan for generating revenues and making a profit in a specific marketplace. It explains what products or services to produce and market, and how it plans to do so, including what expenses it will incur. The business models differ from each other depending on the nature of the business. To put together a good business model, one needs to know what to offer in the form of goods or services that is of value to potential customers or clients, ideally in a way that differentiates the entrepreneur (company) from its competitors (it is called value proposition). A successful business model just needs to collect more money from customers than it costs to make the product.
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In their simplest forms, business models (BMs) can be broken into three parts:

1. Somebody makes useful something: design, raw materials, manufacturing, labour, and so on.
2. Somebody sells that thing to those who need it: marketing, distribution, delivering a service, and processing the sale.
3. Those who need it pays to have it: pricing strategy, payment methods, payment timing, and so on.

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So, a BM is simply an exploration of what costs and expenses the entrepreneurs (companies) have and how much they can charge for the products or services they generate. New business models can refine and improve any of these three components. 
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Many authors (D. Mills-Scofield) state that every business is (or should be) social business and there is no significant difference in the business models themselves. However, we need to recognize that social enterprises have business models that can be a little different from an ordinary business - indeed social enterprises are special business! In fact, social businesses are a powerful way to increase social impact.

The Social Business Model (SBM) differs from the classical business model, as aside from showing a road map how to generate economic value, it has to show also how to create social value in a measurable way. In other words, social impact also has to be a part of a business model. The process of building SBM relies on some strategic moves as the conventional business model innovation. However, one specificity of the social business model is the need to consider all stakeholders, not only shareholders, and the need to define the social profit that is the aim of the social business.
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The purpose of every one SBM is the social entrepreneurs and the supporting professionals to understand how the enterprise generate both financial and social value, and what the relationship is between the two types of value in the enterprise. It should be able to be focused on how a social entrepreneur does business, how that business generates revenue, what value a business offers to whom, who the customers are, and why customers would keep coming back to the entrepreneurs.

The social business model can help the entrepreneurs understand how and why their business works, and it can help them to design and innovate their business and how to make and increase social impact.

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Author
Coordinator @BASET
KISMC