Launching into the social enterprise stratosphere

Trying to sum up what we do at On Purpose is always difficult.  I have to admit that even I didn’t know quite what to expect when I turned up to induction in January, I’m happy to say though that 10 weeks later, its all getting a bit clearer.  With a little more perspective, and an ever developing armament of skills, I’m beginning to get a picture of what it takes to make it in the social enterprise world.

From the get go, we were challenged at induction to learn the ins and outs of problem solving, issue trees and porpoising, not to mention the 17 new names and faces of our fellow Associates.  In the weeks’ since, we’ve been poked and prodded by our mentors and coaches, learnt to reflect on ourselves and our colleagues through the lens of Myers-Briggs, acquired the skills to become productivity ninjas, and thanks to Noggin and The Spring Project, learnt to see body language in a whole new light.  We’ve also been provided with lots of opportunities to develop skills in our own areas of interest from blogging to video making to social media.

For me personally, it’s perhaps the financial skills training that has really helped to kick-start my career in social enterprise.  Learning to read profit and loss statements, develop financial models, and to use Excel effectively has meant that I can now do what I would have previously asked a colleague to do for me.  And you know what?  It’s really not that hard! 

The hard part is finding the opportunity to learn while working.  So, now that I’m here, I’m doing what I can to make sure that at the end of my On Purpose year, I have a full set of Mutually Exclusive and Collectively Exhaustive skills to launch me into the social enterprise stratosphere.  It’s really not that difficult when you have a community of Associates, Fellows, Trainers, Mentors and Coaches to help you along the way.