Let's start this post by telling you that this is a completely different post to what I usually make on this blog. Over the past couple of months, I have been using my blog to discuss my fantasy map projects and the things that make me feel passionate about cartography, as part of a plan to create a business idea out of it. Thus, I have been involved over the last week in a social enterprise programme, and I would like to share the experiences of my time there.
The "Make a Difference Boot Camp" is a social enterprise programme that is run jointly by the Enterprise and Entrepreneurship team at the University of Suffolk (with the event managed from that side by Amy Volkert) and Dot-to-Dot Consultancy, a consultancy firm helping people build social enterprise business ideas. It is set to take place over nine days in the months of June and July, with the programme culminating with a pitching event on the 7th of July.
The event takes place on the University Campus, and if you are not familiar with Ipswich (or even the United Kingdom), I am going to show you a picture of the iconic University of Suffolk buildings, located along the waterfront (and it really is stunning!):
Overview of how things went
Day 1 - 7th of June 2023
The Boot Camp started at 4:00pm, as I entered the University of Suffolk's Atrium building, waiting to go into the Lecture Theatre. The main area of the building is an absolute glasshouse in the summer with extremely high temperatures (perhaps those that are just as high as typical temperatures in some places on the fantasy Youtubia continent).
The session started off with people talking about their business ideas, and needless to say, the idea of mine to work on fantasy maps as a business idea has attracted widespread applause from across the Theatre. Then the participants would go on to have some fun answering questions surrounding the statistics of social enterprises (it amazes me that social enterprise founders come from very diverse backgrounds!).
Then it was time to move onto the guest speakers of the evening - first up was Karen Cannard, who started up a blog called "The Rubbish Diet", a campaign to reduce the amount of waste being thrown into rubbish bins, something which has subsequently attracted national media attention. After that, we met the founder of Bush Adventure, Paul Norris, via video call out in the Thetford forest, where he was discussing a social enterprise promoting outdoor leisure activities for people with disabilities.
The next guest speaker was Vivian Mushati who started up See your Life, a social enterprise that is designed to raise awareness around body dysmorphia by working with other charities, schools and parents to provide mentoring services, in an effort to cut down on the number of mental health referrals and body surgery appointments.
And finally, the fourth guest speaker, Levi Fernandez, started off with a hospitality social enterprise in Melbourne, Australia, setting up sustainable food options, and has now set up Redemption Roasters, a social enterprise in the UK helping out people who have been through the court system and done time in prisons in getting their lives back on track.
I must say, that all of the guest speakers have shared some very inspirational stories behind their enterprises and campaigns and it was a big motivation booster for the days ahead.
Once the guest speakers finished their talks at 7pm, I would then go on a wander with the University's Enterprise Manager, Amy Volkert and a few other participants in the programme to the Escape Room in Foundation Street in Ipswich. Needless to say, the plan to go escaping was foiled, but we still walked away from there with lots of enthusiasm about the days ahead, and the sunset was just incredibly beautiful that evening as I started making my way home.
Day 2 - 8th of June 2023
Oh, yes, it's the start of the serious work now!
The day started off by working on a problem tree, highlighting the root causes, the problems and the effects that these problems can cause (the problem tree was done on post-its, so please excuse the quality of this next image!).
The main theme of the problem tree for my idea was concentrated on the issues associated with the current offering of fantasy maps on the market - lack of social enterprise initiative and people's behaviour.
After this, I would then move on to creating a Business Model Canvas, describing how the business is going to be run in general and the overall value proposition to customers (have to say that it is a really good way of putting things together into a business plan).
And as part of this, I've managed to come up with some really interesting branches from the original plan - how about setting up a community group where people can come together, in person, to build their own sets of fantasy maps!
I am looking forward to making some blog posts on the organisation of those events as a way of encouraging others to pursue their Dungeons and Dragons dreams (and dreams of creating modern maps!), so do keep an eye on this space over the coming months.
Overall, it has been an incredibly exciting day as I went back home feeling very energetic and proud of what I had achieved that day.
Day 3 - 9th of June 2023
Day 3 was a continuation from the ideas adopted in the Business Model Canvas, going through the Theory of Change - which describes the steps that will be taken to address the main needs for a social enterprise, as well as the things that are needed to make the idea possible. For the fantasy map idea, I decided to go with a balanced mix of outcomes, that are divided between meeting customer demand (particularly when working in publishing) and the social aspects of the enterprise.
The afternoon sessions initially started off in relative quiet, describing the legal issues and constraints that are associated with running different types of social enterprise businesses. Then the climax built up, as I used the remainder of the afternoon sessions to take the opportunity to develop the Outcomes Framework for the three outcomes that I had identified earlier. Here is what I have managed to come up with so far:
After that, had a few parting words with Enterprise Manager Amy and I began to make my way off campus and back home (the temperature outside now being 23 degrees). On my way back home, I noticed a loud sound - a big music festival was taking place in the Cornhill and I ended up rerouting along Tower Street and back to the main roads out of town. With that, the week was over and the temperatures over the weekend continued to rise.
Conclusions of the first three days
I have a lot of great things to say about the Boot Camp so far. The event is really well organised, the atmosphere in the room was incredibly contagious and full of laughter (Amy's personality absolutely shines!), and I've managed to come up with new forks in the fantasy map ideas, and overall, it's been an absolute pleasure to meet a wide range of different participants in the event and talk to them about my business ideas. I am definitely looking forward to sharing days 4 and 5 once I have taken part in those days.
I would like to see these up and coming days as a way to improve my business acumen, so if you see anything in any of those diagrams that I have taken pictures of that can be improved further, do let me know!
With much love,
Jakub
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