Wednesday, December 29, 2010

Why Social Enterprise is Shite

I work for a charity these days.  The big thing being pushed at charities in the UK is 'social enterprise.'  We're all getting sent on (free!) courses on how to set ourselves up with arms that trade, so that we can support our charitable work ourselves, instead of relying on donations or government handouts.

Sounds fair enough.  Does it not? 

 Arms that trade.  Makes me think of that poem, 'not waving but drowning.' 

I object.  The thing I object to is the principal that trading, selling stuff, is the only activity that matters.  Especially if this 'stuff' is just exactly that.  Stuff.  More crap that no-one really needs.  It may well be small-scale, organic, recycled, ethical and local - all good principals to direct your purchase-power.  But ultimately, it's about selling more Stuff.  More soap.  Or bags.  Or Christmas cards.  Or cakes and coffee, to an already over-cafeinated and caloried society.

Crap.  Shite.  Clutter.  Junk.

I am a person who objects to the culture that pushes us to buy, need and want ever more Stuff.  And yet now I'm being trained to direct a huge chunk of my intellectual energies and working hours towards thinking up a viable business model for creating and selling shite.  Even it is actually very good shite.  Shite that people want.

No.

The reason I do the work I do, the reason I work for a charity and not a bank, is because I'm primarily concerned with people's needs.  Not their wants.  The people I work with have severe disabilities and are not able to work.  Which means they do not have money.  Which means that they do not have any power.  Even though they have huge needs, they will never be able to buy the services they need, and so no-one will ever go out of their way to provide that service.  It is not a viable business model.

And that is why charities exist.

The ultra-consumerist, free-market-driven model is all about first creating and then catering to the wants of people who have money, and already have everything they could possibly need. Which is all very well.  But now they want charities to do the same. 

Fuck that for a game of soldiers.

Image by davco9200

Too Many Projects Syndrome

It's that hiatus between Christmas and New Year, that lull, the time when weeks of too much food, drink, work, stress, buying, spending, travelling in snow and general fretting finally gives way to... a rest.  Whew. 

Which of course turns the mind to New Years Resolutions.  I don't tend to do New Years Resolutions.  Don't see the point.  Why wait till the 1st January?  Why set yourself up for failure at the bleakest time of the year, the time when you're mostly likely to need the comfort of bad things - be it calories, alcohol or retail therapy?

But then, I'm also prone to making resolutions very regularly throughout the year.  Catch me out at any time of year - and if you can get me to be honest and up-front about it which is unlikely since I'm a fairly defensive kinda gal - I could confess to several resolutions bubbling away on the back burner.  I don't call them resolutions though.  I call them projects.

I am definitely someone who has 'Too Many Projects Syndrome.'

So, what are the projects sloshing round my head just now?  Well:
  • There's the Creative Writing course I'm actually doing, which leads to the Someday I'll Write a Novel project. 
  • There's the Very Small Business (VSB) project.  But then, there have been various VSB projects that I've worked on over the past couple years.  None yet have led to much.
  • There's the Weight Loss project.
  • There's the Overcome Injuries project.
  • There's the Get Back into Running project - oh how I desperately miss running.  I glare daggers of envy at runners when they pass me.  
  • There's the Healthy Eating project.
  • There's the Reduce my Clutter project.
  • There's the Save as Much Money as Possible project.
  • There's the Make Nice Presents for People project.
  • Etc.
Much of this is all about the changing and harnessing of habits.  There's an excellent blog called Raptitude that discusses habit change.  The blogger, David, explores habit change through a series of very focused experiments.  I love his honesty, about himself and his processes.  I can't remember which post in particular it was, or maybe there were a few, but ultimately he points out that trying to change umpteen different habits all at once is a recipe for failure. 

This year's resolution?  To have fewer resolutions.  To get over my Too Many Projects Syndrome.  Ha!

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