Work of Many Hands: The Emergence of a Social Enterprise Movement in Queensland

Richard Warner is passionate about social change which sees those who are disadvantaged achieving a role, a stake & a fair share.

He works for Nundah Community Enterprises Cooperative (NCEC), awarded Australia’s best Social Enterprise in 2015 and 2020.

Richard is also Chair of the Queensland Social Enterprise Council.

He is a Social Worker who’s primary experience has been working alongside people with cognitive and psychological disabilities. He is also a doting father, deaf/cochlear implantee, long-term meditation practitioner & teacher within the Sun Mountain Zen community of Brisbane.

Richard reflects on the roots of social enterprise in Queensland, reflecting on some of the ‘firsts’ from one of Australia’s pioneer states in the ‘business for good’ movement.

Looking back: Creating impact

The roots of social enterprise go way back in Queensland - at least to the 1990’s. At this time, a number of people were experimenting with a new model of achieving impact, bringing entrepreneurial energy to critical social and environmental problems such as long-term unemployment, food systems, ethical trade and ongoing impacts of colonisation.

Although they didn’t realise it at the time, these early adopters secured a series of Australian firsts:

Establishing viable and impactful business models, which would become templates for sectoral growth
Kickstarting the first social procurement program with government (a model developed with Brisbane City Council in 2003 which blossomed in South-East Queensland and influenced other Australian states)
Mapping the intellectual and policy territory, authoring the first Australian publications on Social Enterprise and Social Procurement with Dr Ingrid Burkett in (2004 & 2005)
Commencing the Brisbane Social Enterprise Hub in 2006, the first in Australia and gaining support from federal, state and local governments as well as corporate sponsorship. (Hub model subsequently replicated in Ipswich, Logan, ACT and NSW)
Pioneering social enterprise finance through the mechanism of Australia’s first ethical superannuation fund.

Importantly, these early adopters chose to work together for the common good, forming a practitioner circle called ‘The New Mutualism Group’ (est 2004). New Mutualism would morph into the first peak body for social enterprise in Australia, the Queensland Social Enterprise Council (QSEC) (est 2013). Social enterprise champions within government, big business and philanthropy joined these early leaders, leveraging opportunities for the emerging movement, because they believed it a valuable policy lever. Social enterprises from across the state on similar journeys started to join QSEC - making it a truly state-wide peak.

From these seeds, a movement has grown. We now have a flourishing ecosystem with more than two hundred members in Queensland and a range of intermediaries, ready to support enterprises at all stages of the journey. The term ‘social-enterprise’, is now not something that causes a raised eyebrow, but is increasingly understood in business and government. Importantly, after decades of advocacy we are recognised as a distinct sector worthy of a funded government strategy and state peak. We are clearly making ground.

Looking Forward: Increasing impact

Looking back, we have a lot to be proud of - but what will help us moving forward?

My thoughts as a manager of a 25 year old work integrated social enterprise (WISE) and Chair of QSEC a 10 year old peak body, are as follows:

1. We must support enterprises to focus on what they do best – innovate for impact.

Social enterprise is a breath of fresh air, because it uses the freedom of earned income to address system failure. In supporting enterprises to proliferate and scale, we must ensure that the new systems we create do not constrain this freedom to innovate. How to do this:

As individual practitioners, we must continue to listen to the voices of those most effected by a problem and invite their participation - taking us outside of our comfort zones.
As enterprises, we should endeavour to retain a level of economic independence so we can hold our focus amidst competing demands.
As movement builders, it’s important the ecosystem we create encourages innovation and prioritisation of impact, above the needs of maintaining the system. This is our point of balance and our ‘edge’ which we must retain.

Nundah Community Enterprises Cooperative.

2. Enterprises in the social economy must connect across our differences, to support, partner with and learn from each other

If I’ve learnt anything from the past twenty years, it’s that we have so much to learn from each other. The social and ecological challenges we face are complex and their causes interlinked. Addressing this requires us to work across our differences by leaning into and supporting each other. Whether our primary impact is employment, food security or addressing climate change - we will tackle these challenges better as broad-based movement for change. Some of my biggest learnings for example have come from a community supported agriculture model ‘Food Connect’, who purchased their property recently through Australia’s first equity crowd funding campaign. Although Food Connects main purpose is not addressing long-term unemployment (it does however support the creation and continuation of hundreds of jobs including those facing barriers to employment), we in the WISE movement have benefitted from their creativity and clarity in putting values into action. We can incorporate aspects of their community enterprise model within our own, which will help us deepen and broaden our impact. We can also work together as trading partners and advocates for change and have done this in forming QSEC, which now supports hundreds of enterprises across the State. We are all in the same boat and are clearly better off steering it together.

3. We must hold to a clear vision and values whilst remaining open to challenge and change.

The world is at a critical junction, and we mustn’t turn away from the injustices and suffering that we see. Our movements vision is of an inclusive and fair society, that is a sustainable and regenerative – where we as individuals are not isolated actors, but deeply connected to each other and the planet that gives us life. An expansive vision is what is required to create positive transformation of existing challenges. To achieve this, we must develop a new set of entrepreneurial values that include gentleness, dialogue, cooperation, knowledge sharing and consideration of our place within a complex network of influences. Hard work and hustle, disruption and innovation will still be important, but we will need to move beyond the image of a white knight entrepreneur or quick technological fix. If anything is certain in these uncertain times, the linear thinking that got us where we are currently, won’t get us out. A social enterprise movement that creates lasting change will be the work of many hands.

It's been an honour to chair QSEC over the past two years and see social enterprises working together government, small and big business for the common good. A truly exciting and hopeful time, as we grow from independent entities and small seeds of change to a mature movement that influences the mainstream – it is all of our responsibility, to continue to shape it.