micro-enterprise: help for micro-providers

micro enterprise: help for micro-providers

practical guide for micro-providers

A guide to setting up your own local enterprise – giving support, care and choice to the people in your community

Setting up a new micro social care or health service can be a daunting experience. Community Catalysts has produced a manual which provides basic information for people interested in setting up micro-enterprise. It provides you with up-to-date information about the way adult social care is changing, and how you can play a part. It gives practical help and advice about forging links with the local authority and the community you operate in, and long-term assistance to ensure a successful enterprise with future security.

This comprehensive 32 page guide gives you all the information you need to pursue your dream of setting up a micro care or support service for your local community. Answering your very basic questions at the start, including:

• What are micro services?
• What’s in it for me?
• What type of service do I want to offer?

It then guides you through the many other things to consider such as legal implications, marketing, grants, policies and getting paid. This practical guide is a must for would-be entrepreneurs.

Written in a clear and easy-to-understand manner, the guide takes you through every step of the process you need to think about when starting up your enterprise. Handy web site links signpost you to further reading and support, and additional information comes in abundance in the final ‘further information’ section. If you want to bring satisfaction and enrichment to your own life whilst providing a specific service to your local community, this guide is perfect for you.

The guide costs only £30. Buy it now, or contact us on 01423 790126 for more information.

Shared Lives Plus membership

Community Catalysts is owned by an organisation called Shared Lives Plus. Shared Lives Plus is a membership organisation that represents and supports very small family and community based enterprises. Shared Lives Plus is able to offer membership to small organisations that offer care and support services, have 5 or fewer workers and are not part of a larger organisation. Membership brings many benefits including access to an e mail helpline, regular news bulletins, access to low cost tailored insurance products and an annual conference. If you are interested in finding out more about Shared Lives Plus membership please contact Dianne Parker at dianne.parker@naaps.co.uk or go to the Shared Lives Plus website.

help and advice – signposting to a local coordinator

We are working directly with a number of local authorities in England to help them to set up a local support agency where very small social care enterprises can get the help, advice and information they need to get going and to be sustainable.

If you are a micro enterprise that is based in one of the areas where we are funded to do this work, we can signpost you to your local Coordinator who will be able to provide you with individual advice.

Please contact Jill Wighton at jill.wighton@communitycatalysts.co.uk or 01423 790126 for more information about support agencies in your area.

low cost tailored consultancy support and advice

We are really passionate about the development and growth of micro enterprise in the UK and realise that individual micro providers do not always have the resources to pay our standard level of fee for consultancy support and advice. Our Associates and staff occasionally have free days and we are sometimes able to offer a service for micro providers which makes the most of these free days. We are able to link an Associate who has free days with a micro provider who is looking for help and advice at a daily rate of only £300 plus VAT per day. Through this arrangement Community Catalysts can offer a maximum of two days direct advice and support.

If you are interested in this kind of arrangement please contact Angela Catley at angela.catley@communitycatalysts.co.uk and she will send you details of an Associate in your area that would be willing to meet up with you and your team.

share your story

We work together with Shared Lives Plus to represent the views and experiences of providers and are often asked to speak at conferences, deliver presentations, contribute to consultations, and write articles to share the examples of challenges and successes.

Community Catalysts and Shared Lives Plus both have newsletters, websites and blogs. If you are facing challenges and barriers that you would love to get off your chest or have a positive experience you would like to share we would be more than happy to get it out there .

To share your story please contact Jill Wighton at jill.wighton@communitycatalysts.co.uk.

peer mentoring

We are currently exploring ways that we can help micro providers to support each other, to learn from each other’s experiences, and share good ideas, methods of working and documents. In the meantime you can follow our Facebook group to link up with other micro providers.

For more information contact us on 01423 790126.

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