How We Work

Our Approach

Business Skill Support

Achieving viable growth and impact is hard, and often associated with frequent pivot points that necessitate changes to the business plan.

We find it essential to take the time to understand the strengths and weaknesses underpinning any business growth plan. Then, we provide wraparound support through working collaboratively to agree the priority areas in which we can add most “additionality” — typically selected from areas below:

Appropriate Funding

Social enterprises and charities typically exhibit low and slow growth; therefore require long-term (7-12 year) flexible impact first financing tailored to their needs.

Our funding enables viable growth and impact, and is most often used to recruit staff and build core capacity, upgrade key operational systems, and fund working capital.

We take the time to understand the impact, business model and financing needs of each social enterprise and charity, and work in a collaborative manner to agree the most appropriate funding.

While we have no financial hurdle, we always seek to agree terms with each social enterprise and charity that balance affordability with the need for disciplined growth.

Typical financial instruments we consider include:

Performance-related

(e.g. revenue share, outcome-based)

Equity

(e.g. preferred shares, transferrable shares)

Our Selection Process

We proactively search for social enterprises and charities led by strong management teams and who are able to demonstrate:

Our pipeline is derived from our wide contacts: referrals from management teams we have worked with; individuals we identify ourselves; and Foundations and Incubator programmes known to us.

Sourcing

We adopt a proactive approach to sourcing new social enterprises and charities and seek organsations that are beyond proof of concept phase with strong management teams within our issue focus.

Screening

There are three key factors which must be satisfied before any organisation can proceed through the funding process:Clear impact potential Evidence the social enterprise or charity is beyond the proof of concept stage and can take on repayable finance Evidence the social enterprise or charity has a competent and committed senior leadership team

Due diligence and structuring

We conduct our due diligence in a collaborative manner at a timescale that respects the social enterprise or charity’s own needs. Due diligence enables us to better understand the organisation’s business model and to discuss and agree with each social enterprise or charity:Impact management and reporting Appropriate funding instrument and terms Priority areas for skills support and mentoring

Investment Approval

We develop a final detailed memo that is circulated to our investment committee for review and approval. It is important to note that the investment committee meets weekly and is consistently engaged throughout the funding process.

Performance Management & Reporting

We engage as often as required with the social enterprise or charity to provide the mutually agreed business skills support. This not only helps to resolve specific issues, but builds trust and leads to an open relationship.We expect every organisation we fund to share monthly financial information and to report progress against agreed impact KPIs (minimum bi annually). We anticipate any organisation we support to encounter unexpected challenges as they grow, and we want to develop a spirit of partnership so these can be shared as early as possible to enable us to work together to try and resolve them, adjusting the necessary skills support if required.

Exit

We always consider an exit strategy from any organisation as part of our initial due diligence, and will always seek an exit that does not adversely affect the ability to maintain positive impact.