About Trading Up -- An Introduction to the Project and Programme
Contents of this section:
Trading Up is a community based enterprise programme aimed at increasing the number of businesses started up by people from disadvantaged areas or deprived backgrounds.
The six-week programme has been developed by a partnership led by Business Link Kent with financial support from the Equal initiative, itself funded by ESF -- the European Social Fund. It combines workshops, mentoring and an innovative Business Board Game to provide participants with support to take forward their ideas and start a business.
The workshops are designed to be an informal and informative way to learn about starting a business and gain the knowledge and experience needed. The basis of the workshops is life skills and the Trading Up delivery team use their experience and also that of the group to bring business to life. Some of the sessions are specifically aimed to increase the confidence and motivation of participants.
The Business Mentor role is crucial to Trading Up. Mentors are involved in guiding participants on a one to one basis, complementing the skills and experience that are being learnt through the workshops. Mentors are often entrepreneurs themselves and from their experience they guide the participants to further information, support and advice on individual issues.
One of the innovative developments arising from Trading Up is the use of Business Board Games. The games give players the experience of running their own company and making business decisions, in a fun and relaxed environment. Covering everything from sales and marketing, health and safety, to employment, the Business Board Games have been powerful tools for encouraging and developing business skills. Under the trademarked name of Taktix™ the Trading Up project has developed the Business Board Game further so that customised versions of the game and an online version of the game are available to a wider audience.
The Trading Up project has also developed a web based Trading Up Toolkit which provides a guide for business start up organisations or local community groups wishing to establish a Trading Up programme or introduce elements of the programme into their own support measures.
The Toolkit can be accessed without charge by registering via this page.
The Trading Up model proposes a four-step approach that will allow any business support providers to develop a full strategy and deliver a programme to promote and support enterprise creation within most under-represented, under-resourced and disadvantaged groups of the population.
The toolkit consists of 4 stages:
Introduction
Introduction to the Toolkit
The need for the Trading Up Initiative
Most of the existing business support schemes don't take into account the specific needs of disadvantaged/excluded or under-resourced groups. Despite important adaptation to suit regional needs, business support provision remains principally focussed on mainstream groups.
Trading Up is a pilot project with the main focus on the theme of 'encouraging more enterprise in disadvantaged communities, under-resourced and under-represented groups' by providing access to a community based confidence building programme built around the establishment and running of a business.
It seeks to strengthen the understanding of local Business Support agencies including the new Enterprise Gateways of the needs of local individuals who are in the pre start-up phase of business development.
- Trading Up is project funded by Equal under its Thematic Scheme C – Business Creation.
- The Project is managed by Business Link Kent via a Development Partnership (DP).
- Timescale: July 2005 to December 2007.
Purpose
Opening up the business creation process to all by providing the tools required for setting up in business and for identification and exploitation of new possibilities for creating employment and regeneration in urban and rural areas.
The Trading Up Project is primarily targeted at Beneficiaries / Participants who are resident in an under-resourced area and who are themselves in some way at a personal disadvantage, and who may be dependent on State Benefits.
Such Areas are most easily defined as Wards having a high Index of Deprivation, high levels of unemployment and high levels of Benefit Claimants.
Personal ‘disadvantage’ could include disabilities, unemployment, etc. (See ‘Defining Participant Eligibility Criteria )
Trading Up seeks to encourage the setting up of Social Enterprises, or Not-Only-For-Profit initiatives. ( For more information about Social Enterprises, use the link provided in the Further Resources section, below.
For the purposes of Funding, Delivery and Evaluation, the Project comprised 3 distinct Activity Areas:
- Action 1: Preparatory action – research, development, consultation and consolidation of the Development Partnership, establish monitoring, management and communication systems, and recruitment of project staff.
- Action 2: Training Business Advisors / Mentors and delivering Pilot programmes to the most disadvantaged localities in Kent, with a range of additional support.
- Action 3: Development of the Toolkit providing a step-by-step guide to delivering the approach. Target audiences for networking and dissemination via national, regional and local agencies.
This website is the product of Action 3 – it is the Toolkit in an on-line version.
How Trading Up Complements Other Delivery Models
In order to address the government’s objective to open the business creation to all, some "mainstream business support organisations" have developed at the national level a variety of initiatives to encourage entrepreneurship within groups facing barriers in the labour market.
Among these organisations are the Prince’s Trust which has developed a support scheme for young unemployed, Job Centre Plus and the InBiz programme (part of the New Deal), the National Federation of Enterprise Agencies and its New Entrepreneur Scholarship programme.
At national level there is also the on-going work of PROWESS, the womens’ enterprise advocacy organisation, that is running various projects in the UK with the support of the Phoenix fund and the European Union (i.e. Accelerating Women's Enterprise).
In parallel to initiatives set up at a national level, thousands of others programmes and support schemes have been developed by local authorities, non-profit organisations, charities, regeneration partnerships, universities, etc.
These "ad hoc" programmes are tailored to address at local/regional level the specific needs of an area (deprived neighbourhoods, rural area, area in economic transition, etc.) or a group (ethnic groups, refugees, disables, etc.).
Highly specialized these "ad hoc" local programmes are also almost impossible to reproduce nationally but are capable of adaptation to meet local needs.
- To develop business simulation materials and an approach to be applied in local community settings for people living in the most disadvantaged areas of Kent.
- Encourage enterprise in disadvantaged communities and under-represented groups by providing access to a community-based, confidence building, motivational learning programme.
- Running of a simulated team based business exploring the opportunities of social / community enterprise.
- To be fun. As well as building a range of soft skills alongside the specifics involved in starting and running a business.
- To share information / best practice with transnational partners who are working in similar thematic fields. Partners include the Czech Republic, Spain, Italy (Naples & Venice).
- Support 300 participants or beneficiaries into employment or self employment.
- Support Government targets for community and Social Enterprise development.
- Provide a model of support for older workers, which will be transferable across EU regions and beyond.
Project Outcomes
The project met its overall target to raise awareness of enterprise amongst 490 people. Between 2004 and June 2006 a total of 494 people took part in the Trading Up programme, with 176 of them enrolling on the core business start up training course. 42 businesses were created. All the training workshops took place in areas of disadvantage in Kent and Medway, with a final programme being delivered outside of Kent in Hastings, East Sussex as part of the mainstreaming plan.
Beneficiary Profiles
The Equal Opportunity monitoring process set up and carried out through all the duration of Trading Up allowed the project management to react and adapt its actions to groups the most in need. The typical Trading Up participant experienced more than one type of disadvantage. Certain beneficiary groups, such as people from ethnic minorities were represented on the training programmes at a much greater level than in the local population profile, evidencing a demand amongst those communities for the kind of support provided by the programme. The target for recruitment of women on to the programme was missed; this had been set at 70% participation by women, whilst 59% was actually achieved. This result is however encouraging because the representation of women on the programme was significantly higher than the proportion of women in the population and because Business Link over the project period had also established a wider series of programmes supporting business creation among women that did not focus just on disadvantaged areas and groups.
Impact on Beneficiaries
The project team used the innovative Rickter Scale® system to assess the impact of the programme on soft outcomes including areas such as personal motivation, confidence and resilience. The before and after Rickter® assessments demonstrated that the people on the programme felt that they were better equipped for life’s challenges after experiencing the support received through Trading Up.
Businesses Started
The focus of the programme was on raising awareness of enterprise, with an expectation that 10 businesses would be started. By the end of the project 42 businesses had been started by people who had participated in the Trading Up programme. The businesses started included a film maker, an electrical trading company run by a husband and wife team.
A copy of an interim Evaluation Summary is available from the linked document in the Further Resources section below.
Toolkit Website Structure
For ease of use, this Toolkit Website is structured as follows:
- Introduction to Trading Up
- Stage 1 – Introduction to the Toolkit
- Stage 2 – Preparation & Engagement with the Target Audience
- Stage 3 – Delivering to and Supporting Participants
- Stage 4 – Managing and Evaluating the Programme
Acknowledgements
Trading Up is part of a community programme called Equal- a European Social Fund initiative which tests and promotes new means of combatting all forms of discrimination and inequality in the labour market. The GB Equal Support Unit is managed by ECOTEC.
Business Link Kent CIC (Community Interest Company) is the main delivery partner of Trading Up, supported by many organisations in Kent including:
Kent County Council
Kent Sustainable Business Partnership
Highlands
Dover District Council
Medway Council
DiCara Associates
The Rickter Company
Kent Adult Careers Guidance
Napier Ralf Associates
University of Kent
Canterbury Christ Church University
Media Kent Ltd
Sunil Kumar
Cyberkix
Swale Borough Council
Learning and Skills Council Kent and Medway
Colin Gilfillan Associates
The Princes' Trust
East Kent Enterprise Gateway
Folkestone Enterprise Gateway
Medway Enterprise Gateway
Romney Enterprise Gateway
Another Journey Begins
Liz Blackler
Jane De Rose
Route Marketing
Anthony Leaver
Ten Sixty Six Enterprise
Further Resources
Learning Points
- The initial Trading Up Programme featured very little specific IT training partly because of the time available on the course and also because such training is readily available from a variety of trainers. However, Participants felt there was a need for some instruction in basic IT techniques to enable them to be more confident in applying them to their fledgling business ideas.
- By coincidence, a separate programme to encourage awareness of basic IT techniques, principally for the Over-50s was being delivered at the same time. Its principles were soon incorporated into the Trading Up umbrella, with the original Trading Up programme being re-named Step-by-Step.
- Having had the experience of delivering the two programmes separately, it was decided to merge the two and deliver a combined programme under the Step-by-Step banner.
Tips & Ideas
- Select a name for the Programme which indicates what it does but without being daunting. Whilst the original Trading Up name had to be retained for Project Management reasons, it was off-putting to some who, before they had completed the course, felt far from confident that they could establish themselves in a trading position, let alone one in which they were moving up the commercial ladder.
Step-by-Step proved much more attractive as a name.
Links within Toolkit
Links to Docs
| Document description | Size | Last Updated | Download time | |
 |
Interim Evaluation summary | 746KB |
3/11/2007 (expires 30/3/2008) |
500K: 12 sec. 56K: 2 min. |
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