Andrea Comastri On Addressing Employment Barriers Through Inclusive Business Models

Andrea Comastri is a Co-founder and Director of Hotel Etico Australia, the first social enterprise hotel in Australia, employing and training young people with disability.

Andrea is focused on establishing the social enterprise as a leading example of innovation in the sector, providing opportunities to young people with intellectual disabilities as well as challenging the wider community to see both the human and economic value of an inclusive society that focuses on abilities rather than disabilities.

Andrea is an expert changemaker with 25 years’ experience facilitating change and social impact in the community, while having held management, executive and director roles in charities and philanthropic organisations in disability, youth and education as well as advisory roles in a number of State and Federal advisory bodies in health and aged care. Andrea is currently Director, Social Advisory & Research at RPS focusing on social value and social procurement through Australia’s investment in infrastructure.

Between 2016 and 2021 Andrea was responsible for the establishment and management of the PAYCE Foundation, working with a wide portfolio of charity partners in areas such as addiction, homelessness and social isolation, domestic violence, mental and disability and youth unemployment. Andrea is an Honorary Industry Fellow at the UTS Business School, where he has been a guest contributor to the Master of Not-for-Profit and Social Enterprise and a Partnership Committee member of the Social Enterprise Council of NSW and ACT (SECNA).

Andrea discusses incorporating inclusivity into the foundations of a for profit business and how impact minded individuals can create valuable and sustainable business propositions.

Highlights from the interview (listen to the podcast for full details)

[Indio Myles] - Could you please share a bit about your background and what led to your interest and work in social enterprise?

[Andrea Comastri] - First of all, you've covered a lot of it already in the introduction, but as you said, I've worked in and around the not-for-profit sector for over 25 years. I've gone from working at the front-end in services at small organisations to having more all-round roles as a marketing manager, executive, director and CEO in both small and large organisations in the not-for-profit sector. I considered myself and those who employed me at the time as really working in and for the not-for-profit sector and everything that goes with it. As you said, over the last five years after having worked for a long time directly in the not-for-profit sector, I worked in the philanthropic area and sector. This involved establishing and managing the foundation at PAYCE, which is a large property developer in New South Wales, it opened up another way of working for and in the not-for-profit sector.

I have to admit at that point, it was an area that I didn't really know well but has opened up a great deal of opportunities in my mind of what can be done to unlock potential, innovate and make a difference.

Particularly in that role, we were very focused on finding ways of unlocking innovation in not-for-profit minds and professionals. The social enterprise model was definitely one of the key tools that we were looking for and we used to facilitate change. We ran a couple of other social enterprises ourselves within the hospitality sector and the horticultural sector supporting youth unemployment and people with an addiction to substances and alcohol. [This was] both in terms of providing employment and training opportunities, as well as generating profits that would then go into the provision of support of those particular individuals. We supported other charities in terms of trying to unlock new ways of doing business, and so there's a great need for the non-profit space, and this is nothing necessarily too new, but there is a great need to unlock the ability of becoming sustainable and not being reliant on just one source of funding or help from the government necessarily. This is something that actually is going back to my experience in the not-for-profit sector 20 years ago.

We were already quite extensively in that space creating new business through a new ability of generating funding that would allow us to do more.

As you said, within the circles of the social enterprise sector since then, I've had a number of different hats both in terms of interacting with Social Traders in terms of certifying the social enterprises that I'm involved in, or being involved in SECNA, the new peak body in New South Wales, which is really starting to make a difference in the sector in facilitating and spreading the great power for change the social enterprise model has. Then ultimately, in my newest professional role at RPS as Director of Social Advisory and Research, myself and my team focus on making sure that the large level of spending and investment that governments in New South Wales, around Australia, and in reality, around the world, are unlocking a great level of social value in addition to the economic value that that creates. In a lot of ways, throughout my career, I have been involved in the not-for-profit sector more recently for the last five to six years with a strong focus on social enterprises, and then obviously, the last two or three years Hotel Etico has been a great focus for my approach and my way of implementing this great passion around the power of social enterprise.

Andrea, you're the founder of Hotel Etico in Australia, could you tell us a bit more about the social change it is creating?

It is a model that was born in Italy over a decade ago actually, established by bright innovators that I had the great luck of meeting here in Australia. That's where it all started in Australia. With [Alex Vercelli], the founder of the model in Italy, I founded the social enterprise in Australia. Over the last two or three years, we've worked like every good start-up in terms of establishing the organisation, registering it, finding the initial seed funding, and finally, in November last year, we opened the first Hotel Etico. It is the first social enterprise hotel in Australia that employs and trains people with a disability. We focus on intellectual disabilities, and we have trainees that are employed by us and trained for a period of at least four months. They're trained and supported by a team of hospitality and disability professionals.

The key is that they learn on the job the hospitality skills, and as they learn, they develop their capacity for independent living because we have an onsite apartment that we call the Academy of Independence.

Through the academy, they live there while they work, and they put into practice the skills that they learn on the job but that they also need in their everyday life. We always refer to the hotel as a big home, everything you do in a hotel is really transferable to your individual private day to day life. You welcome guests, you prepare meals and clean kitchens. You clean your bedroom, bathroom, sweep the floor and everything else that goes with it. It's a big supportive way of learning those skills that then you can transfer to your life and become independent, but at the same time, learning a job, skills, earning a living and having the opportunity, to then transfer that into actually open employment outside of Hotel Etico at the end of the program. The key thing at Hotel Etico is that trainees are really front and centre of the whole experience. They may interact with guests every day, they face the public, talk to the public and they're not tucked away like it used to be in the past when disability employment used to be put in place.

We are a totally inclusive workplace, and our trainees are the key feature and the key engine of the hotel.

Then, we partner with their families to make sure that the skills they learn are utilised at home, and then at the end of the program, we support them in securing longer term employment outside the hotel. That's the impact that we want to create, that we have experienced overseas in creating with our partners overseas, and already the model and the international network of Hotel Etico has employed over 150 trainees. More importantly, it has changed people’s attitude towards disability employment for the thousands and thousands of people that have already come into contact with the hotel, and that's really ultimately the big picture change. We change individual lives, but then we also change everybody else out there, and that's really the major objective.

You've had recent success with Hotel Etico as a finalist of The Funding Network Australia's Virtual Live event where you managed to raise significant funding to support this enterprise. What are the next steps for Hotel Etico, and where do you see yourselves by the end of next year?

That was an absolutely overwhelming experience, and the level of support that became evident through that event both from the TFN team, all the partners and the public that came to the event, there's just no words to describe it. It was really heart-warming, we know that we are onto something really successful and really good, to see it happening and hear the support, positive words and the dollars coming [because at the end you need money to run the program] is just overwhelming. First of all, our first focus at the moment is to re-establish ourselves after an extended period of lockdown. A lot of businesses, but especially hospitality, have been locked down from the end of June last year. Up until recently, unfortunately, we had to be in forced lock down. Obviously, everything went into a little bit of hibernation, even though we continued to conduct a program online to maintain the connection with the trainees and to keep the training going.

But we've reopened in October, our trainees started back last week which is fantastic and there's a great level of excitement and energy from everyone both internally and externally.

The support that came out of the TFN events has been another great springboard in a way to feed that energy. At the level of promotion, the practical support that we have received is amazing. In terms of looking at the future, at the end of 2022 [and mind you nowadays looking forward has become like a bit of a gamble with how things change pretty quickly], we will definitely have graduated the current group of trainees expected to graduate in the middle of the year. We would have started a new intake around that time. We will have also most likely expanded the current group of trainees. We have six trainees at the moment, but we're looking at potentially 10 to 12 trainees also thanks to the contribution of the funds that we were able to raise from The Funding Network. It is amazing we have the capacity to expand. We have also started building employment pathways outside of Hotel Etico, which is an important element of our program. We are working with the hospitality industry as we speak to create solid pathways out of the Hotel and into open employment.

We want to equip the business sector, the hospitality sector, and particularly the business sector in general, not only with open-mindedness, but also with the skills and ability to be ready to employ people with a disability.

We are encouraged by the fact that the federal government is about to release a disability employment strategy, so I think there's a bit of momentum. There's been quite a bit of talk in the media about the employment of people with disability and inclusion, so we're very encouraged by what's happening, even though there's a long way to go. Then ultimately, I believe that by the end of 2022, and we have already started talking about it in fact, we will be a little bit more serious about our plans for expansion.

We have a very clear vision of expanding the Hotel to other sites around Australia, and we would like to have a hotel in every state and territory in the country within the next decade. We already have quite a bit of interest from some areas, and so we are going to start planning on that. Obviously, we need to resource that with proper plans and not just a vision, but we are working in that direction. By the end of 2022, I think there will be more concrete things around that area.

Where do you see opportunities for people to create value while tackling global issues through business?

I always have a way of filtering my professional roles in a way where I see them as a way of acting on behalf of the not-for-profit sector. My role that I started only three to four months ago with RPS is really trying to unlock through the unprecedented levels of government investment in infrastructure that we are seeing in New South Wales, in Australia and around the world social value out of that investment.

RPS has a strong reputation and expertise in working with governments at all levels around that space, especially around infrastructure projects.

We are talking about roads, airports, metro lines, trail lines, water, energy, renewable energy and there's an enormous opportunity for government, business and the general community to make sure that there's the real long lasting social value unlocked through that. Our role at RPS through the team of Social Advisory and Research is to make sure that those infrastructure projects are not just creating economic value and physical infrastructure, but they are used to unlock that value and value that is about first and foremost employment of people that are facing barriers. We're talking about people with disabilities, Indigenous people, migrant refugees, women in non-traditional roles, young people and long-term unemployed.

There's a great opportunity for governments and the contractors that end up building infrastructure to really make a difference that is long lasting, place-based and unlocks local potential.

This goes well beyond the value that they're creating physically, and it goes well beyond their staying in the area. You want to focus on capacity building, and so our focus is to work with our clients and with government to make sure that happens. We've got great expertise within the team, and we are already working on a number of significant projects around the country, and it's very exciting because as I said, from my personal perspective, it's just another stepping stone in that pathway for me to be a change agent for those that are less advantaged, less capable or that often find barriers to employment, fulfilment or inclusion. For me, it's just another way of unlocking that in a much bigger scale.

How do you believe entrepreneurs can best build their businesses to operate sustainably and utilise resources responsibly?

Everyone can and should definitely do their own bit, and that's just not about entrepreneurs or businesses. In a way, every individual in their own life can make a difference. From a business perspective, both large and small businesses need to look at their own practices. They need to look both at the environmental perspective, but also from a social responsibility perspective. There's plenty of wealth to go around for everyone. Looking at practices within a business that are inclusive and facilitate the inclusion and the building of the capacity of those that face barriers in their life for whatever reason just makes good business and human sense. It's about changing environmental practices within a business, having an inclusive workforce and engaging the workforce to look at opportunities outside to make a difference.

To know the communities that you work with and to put back into the communities in a meaningful way is crucial, and I'm not just talking about donations.

Of course, donations are needed. Money is needed by the not-for-profit sector, the social enterprise sector and the charity sector, but it needs to go beyond that. I think there are examples out there that are really powerful, but the difference really in creating long lasting and meaningful change is about engaging with your customers, staff, communities and partnerships. If I think back on what I was doing with the PAYCE Foundation, it wasn't just a funding relationship that we had with our charity partners. It was true partnerships where we were really working hand in hand, and that in the end it makes sense for the business that sits behind, but it makes sense just as human beings. As I said, there is plenty to go around, and I think we can all share it a little bit more and we can all make a big difference in the world by being inclusive and open to help each other.

What other organisations have you seen that you believe are creating a strong social impact?

That's a hard question because first of all, it's hard to single people out as there's a risk of leaving others out. One thing that I can say is [and it's probably just to do with the fact that it's fresh in my memory and experience], having just come from a philanthropic sector, I can definitely tell you that there are some amazing examples out there of really enlightened philanthropic organisations that are doing amazing things. That's both in terms of family foundations and corporate foundations. Names that your audience has probably heard many times are The Snow Foundation, The English Family Foundation, VFFF, The Westpac Foundation and quite a number of other ones, but obviously they've got the capacity to make a difference and that makes a difference as it makes it easier.

But they also have a vision and they've really understood that it's all about creating capacity. It's not about a handout. It's not about giving people fish, but it's about teaching people how to fish.

It's about building capacity, accepting the fact that things can fail and speaking with the people that you want to support and for the long-term accepting that some things might not work, but others will work and will make a difference. I think that those are just some examples, of course. Then there are examples in the social enterprise sector of small and larger social enterprises. One I think that is going to be significant at the moment that is really making a big difference is White Box Enterprises. They are really making a difference in not only supporting the sector in growing, but also in unlocking scalable models of social enterprises that turn the model on its head. It's not anymore about little start-ups that might not make a huge difference on a large scale and in large numbers, but actually big employment businesses and making a big difference that actually meets the demand. One of the big things that we face as a challenge in this space is that while there is an increase in demand pushed by government and enlightened philanthropy organisations or corporates, there also needs to be a strong supply side.

There are champions within the sector that are working around it, and White Box is one of them, but there's also a responsibility I think for governments both at a state and federal level to facilitate the growth of the capacity of the supply side of social enterprises.

Buyers want scalable, reliable and quality services and goods that they can buy. It can be nice to buy them, but if they're not there, they will struggle, and so the governments need to work at both ends of the spectrum.

To finish off Andrea, what books or resources would you recommend to our listeners?

I'm a bit of an obsessive long-distance runner, so I have a lot of time by myself on the road listening to books. I will give you three books that I've recently listened to, and it will give you a little bit of more of an eclectic picture of what I listen too. I listen mostly to non-fiction things, so one book that I've really enjoyed, and I think it's a book that needs to be listened to rather than read is Mythos by Stephen Fry. It's a book about Greek mythology, but it's amazing.

First of all, Stephen Fry is amazing in how he reads his books, but it just gives this great link to the two things that we talk about and say every day and the current thinking of how language is developed.

It's all linked back to a lot of the stories in Greek mythology, so I find it really fascinating and enjoyable. Another book that I love to run, breathe and listen to is Born To Run which is a more semi-fiction book by Jonathan Rado. It's actually an enjoyable book for anyone. Then one of the more recent books by Simon Sinek who's known for Starting With Why and a lot of very innovative ways of thinking of management, change and being successful is The Infinite Game. It's about opening up the mind to the game, and that the game doesn't have to be a finite game, but we need to open up our horizon and see things as ‘growing the pie’ in terms of opportunities. It's a bit of an eclectic choice of books, but I like to mix it up and as I said, I listen to them rather than read them.