As a contribution to economic recovery and job creation in the Western Cape, the Western Cape Economic Development Partnership (EDP) is leading an initiative to strengthen collaborative practices that can enable the growth of small businesses.
The initiative is being coordinated by the Bertha Centre for Social Innovation and Entrepreneurship at the UCT Graduate School of Business, and Douglas Knowledge Partners, on behalf of the EDP.
The aim is to support entrepreneurship for wide-ranging employment and economic impact, by addressing market failures and opportunities to unlock growth in four key areas:
1) Access to finance
2) Skills development (both business and technological)
3) Start-up incubation and acceleration
4) Government support
The initiative will propose cross-sector partnering solutions that can address the collaborative gaps in the support provided to SMMEs at all lifecycle stages, considering both short- and long-term impact.
Through consultations with key stakeholders across the private and public sectors, we have gathered perspectives on both collaborative gaps and horizontal enablers to augment existing interventions.
We will be hosting workshops in September with entrepreneurs and stakeholders from various sectors, to inspire collaboration in constructing innovative and practical solutions to gaps in collaboration, with an ecosystem approach.
Our intention is to produce solutions that can be incorporated into the province’s economic strategy to reignite the economic cluster and create an enabling environment for breakout growth. The initiative should further inspire best collaborative practices for partnerships to maximise the impact of small business support.
Download the Preliminary Findings: Stakeholder Interviews report here.
The initiative is being coordinated by the Bertha Centre for Social Innovation and Entrepreneurship at the UCT Graduate School of Business, and Douglas Knowledge Partners, on behalf of the EDP.
The aim is to support entrepreneurship for wide-ranging employment and economic impact, by addressing market failures and opportunities to unlock growth in four key areas:
1) Access to finance
2) Skills development (both business and technological)
3) Start-up incubation and acceleration
4) Government support
The initiative will propose cross-sector partnering solutions that can address the collaborative gaps in the support provided to SMMEs at all lifecycle stages, considering both short- and long-term impact.
Through consultations with key stakeholders across the private and public sectors, we have gathered perspectives on both collaborative gaps and horizontal enablers to augment existing interventions.
We will be hosting workshops in September with entrepreneurs and stakeholders from various sectors, to inspire collaboration in constructing innovative and practical solutions to gaps in collaboration, with an ecosystem approach.
Our intention is to produce solutions that can be incorporated into the province’s economic strategy to reignite the economic cluster and create an enabling environment for breakout growth. The initiative should further inspire best collaborative practices for partnerships to maximise the impact of small business support.
Download the Preliminary Findings: Stakeholder Interviews report here.
Information on the second, validation workshop will be provided soon.
Two workshops will be held for this initiative.
The first convening, the ideation workshop, brought together experts from different focal areas within the small business ecosystem, spanning entrepreneurs, local government, tech hubs, academia, funding community, and civil society, to propose collaborative solutions to the gaps in small business support, drawing on the findings from interviews.
We aimed to inspire collaboration in constructing innovative and practical solutions—with a particular focus on unlocking job-creation in high-potential enterprises and supporting businesses that are often underfunded, such as those led by women and youth.
Our keynote speaker, Melvyn Lubega, delivered an inspiring presentation on his journey as an entrepreneur and the challenges faced in the ecosystem. Melvyn is an actuary by training and is an experienced technology entrepreneur and executive, who has built businesses that serve customers across the world. He is also a referenced thought leader and invited speaker both abroad and locally on digital transformation, disruptive innovation, the future of the workforce, as well as business strategy. He is a co-founder of South Africa’s first “Unicorn” (that is, a startup valued at $1 billion), Go1. It was a great honor to hear Melvyn’s story and his valuable insights on the challenges faced by startups.
Thereafter, breakaway groups focused on i) finance ii) policy iii) talent and iv) integrated support brainstormed creative, collaborative solutions to gaps in small business support.
At our next convening, a virtual workshop in the next six weeks, we aim to bring together a smaller group of experts to validate the findings from the first workshop. Through a world-cafe style, we aim to enable a ‘creative destructive’ process with cross-pollination of ideas to augment the proposed solutions that came out of the first workshop, identify the stakeholders that need to collaborate to implement solutions, and solidify best practices for effective collaboration.
The first convening, the ideation workshop, brought together experts from different focal areas within the small business ecosystem, spanning entrepreneurs, local government, tech hubs, academia, funding community, and civil society, to propose collaborative solutions to the gaps in small business support, drawing on the findings from interviews.
We aimed to inspire collaboration in constructing innovative and practical solutions—with a particular focus on unlocking job-creation in high-potential enterprises and supporting businesses that are often underfunded, such as those led by women and youth.
Our keynote speaker, Melvyn Lubega, delivered an inspiring presentation on his journey as an entrepreneur and the challenges faced in the ecosystem. Melvyn is an actuary by training and is an experienced technology entrepreneur and executive, who has built businesses that serve customers across the world. He is also a referenced thought leader and invited speaker both abroad and locally on digital transformation, disruptive innovation, the future of the workforce, as well as business strategy. He is a co-founder of South Africa’s first “Unicorn” (that is, a startup valued at $1 billion), Go1. It was a great honor to hear Melvyn’s story and his valuable insights on the challenges faced by startups.
Thereafter, breakaway groups focused on i) finance ii) policy iii) talent and iv) integrated support brainstormed creative, collaborative solutions to gaps in small business support.
At our next convening, a virtual workshop in the next six weeks, we aim to bring together a smaller group of experts to validate the findings from the first workshop. Through a world-cafe style, we aim to enable a ‘creative destructive’ process with cross-pollination of ideas to augment the proposed solutions that came out of the first workshop, identify the stakeholders that need to collaborate to implement solutions, and solidify best practices for effective collaboration.
