Strategy Made Simple

Social media is a powerful force and opportunity if you use it well. To be able to do that, you need a solid social media strategy, a sense of what your goals are, and some consistency in your posting. In this conversation,  Alyson Shane joins Matthew Rempel to talk about social media, how to use it, and how things change between when you're just starting, and when you're more established. Thank y...

In this episode of the Strategy Made Simple podcast  Beth Cougler Blom explains how we can make better learning experiences by taking a learning design approach. She explains how her experience in learning design roles contribute to making better trainings and facilitating well with groups. We discuss how meeting ground rules and setting out the objectives for the learning experience. She also exp...

Lauren Lee is the social enterprise manager at Resource Assistance for Youth. The main social enterprise at RaY is a moving operation called RaY Works, where they help nonprofits move between office spaces, as well as helping people in residential support programs move between homes. Because RaY Works is a program within the larger nonprofit, there are various benefits to both the nonprofit and th...

Lucas Stewart has many titles. Presently he is the Executive Director of The WRENCH in Winnipeg. Previously he has been involved in the founding and development of a variety of social enterprises including Purpose Construction (Previously Manitoba Green Retrofit), and Senior Partner with Encompass Coop. His driving goal has been to help reunite families through providing good stable work while bui...

Robin Bryan was the General Manager of Compost Winnipeg at the time of recording (Jan 2022), and continues working with the team in a consulting and advisory role. Compost Winnipeg works to take food and other organic waste that would end up in the landfill and instead use it to make compost. Through this work, they have needed to work through some critical parts of the business including how they...

Jessica Floresco is the General Manager at Mother Earth Recycling (MER). Mother Earth Recycling does a variety of electronic and mattress recycling which reduces waste in the Winnipeg area. In addition, they are a work integration social enterprise, providing good jobs to people who have otherwise been excluded from the workforce, and MER gives their employees the skills and experience for them to...

Hazel Corcoran is the Executive Director of the Canadian Worker Co-op Federation. The Federation acts as a bridge and advocate for the various worker cooperatives across Canada that form it's membership. They also manage some investment options for cooperatives so they can receive investment through RRSPs and TFSAs.  Hazel also describes her transition from a student attending a conference, to pro...

Nancy Neamtan has been working on developing community economic development and the social economy ecosystem in Quebec for decades. Throughout that body of experience, she has been able to work on the challenges that come with building up a sector. In addition, she was one of the founders and builders of the Chantier de l'économie sociale, a major network of networks for the social economy in Queb...

Sandra Allen is a Member, Co-Owner, Board Member and People Team Lead for Shift Delivery Co-op. Shift Delivery is a last mile carrier based in Vancouver, Canada that uses e-assist trikes instead of motor vehicles for their deliveries. Sandra describes the value that Shift has in it's people, how they onboard new staff and help them prepare and transition into becoming members, and how Shift has be...

Chris Nichols is a Worker, Co-Founder, Director and Operations Coordinator for Wood Shop Workers' Cooperative. Wood Shop is focused on creating wood furniture out of reclaimed wood for customers in the Vancouver area. They are working towards creating a more circular economy through their work. They started by using reclaimed pallet wood to create their furniture, but now they take materials from...

David Thuss is the current Director at the London Brewing Cooperative, and one of the founding worker owners of the Co-op. He has experience in many of the areas of the brewing business, but now works in a supporting role for the other workers in the Co-op. London Brewing follows a triple bottom line approach to running a social enterprise, and also emphasises partnerships with other values aligne...

Joey Pittoello is the General Manager at Just Us! Coffee Roasters Co-op, and has worked in many different roles within the company. Just Us! is a worker Co-op, where each worker has the option to join as a member with a stake in the organization, and the opportunity to influence it's overall direction. One of the significant challenges that has been present throughout the history of Just Us! Coffe...

Susan Holt is the Chief Growth Officer for Plato Testing, a software testing service that hires and trains people with indigenous backgrounds. She also acts in the same role for their sister company PQA. She has been part of Plato Testing's growth from a single office to five offices across Canada over the past five years. Throughout the growth of the company, there have been decisions that have c...

Olowo-n'djo Tchala is the founder and CEO of Alaffia, an international fair trade hair and body product company based in the USA. He was able to take this company from the garage, to supplying large national grocery store chains with their products. Throughout the growth of the company, he has put the mission first, and ensured that the workers in West Africa continue to get fair wages for their w...

The purpose of B Corp is to certify and demonstrate businesses that are doing social good through their operations. Built into the system is an incentive to improve the impact that is being done by the business. ACU received their B Corp certification in February of 2020, and received the highest score in Canada and the 6th highest score in the world. I had the opportunity to sit down with Brendan...

Meg Ronson is the Project Manager for Legacy Leadership Lab, a team based out of the University of Waterloo. They are working on using social innovation labs to build up a network and tools to facilitate social acquisitions. Social acquisitions are a form of succession planning so that business owners can exit, and the businesses can be converted to co-ops or community owned businesses with social...

Erinch Sahan is the Chief Executive of the World Fair Trade Organization. The WFTO is a combination social enterprise and fair trade certifier, with offices around the world. The WFTO is a member led organization working towards improving the situation for workers around the world using the 10 Principles of Fair Trade. --- You can continue the conversation by joining SocialEconomyConnect.com. Soci...

The business model canvas is a powerful tool to get a quick sense of how a business works. It can also be used to show how businesses can create social good. In this episode, we will be examining what kind of relationships you social enterprises can have with their customers and stakeholders, what qualities go into defining those relationships, and looking at a case study of how Fairphone's busine...

Social enterprise describes many different kinds of businesses, and it needs to have a clear definition. In this episode of Strategy Made Simple, we go through several key elements to define social enterprise. Featuring content based on interviews with: Sophie Short: https://www.socialenterprisemark.org.uk/ Elizabeth Chick: https://www.buysocialcanada.com/ Rebecca Dray: https://www.buysocialusa.or...

The business model canvas is a powerful tool to get a quick sense of how a business works. It can also be used to show how businesses can create social good. In this episode, we will be examining how different forms of resources can be used by businesses to create interesting models. Specifically, we will be looking at Toast Ale, and how they have been able to take a waste product from another ind...

The business model canvas is a powerful tool to get a quick sense of how a business works. It can also be used to show how businesses can create social good. Without customers, you don't have a business. Finding the right customers can be the difference between a successful business and one that struggles. In this episode of Strategy Made Simple, we go through a few tools you can use to describe y...

The business model canvas is a powerful tool to get a quick sense of how a business works. It can also be used to show how businesses can create social good. Value propositions form part of the foundation of a business. By clarifying your value proposition, you can focus your business in on the things that amplify that value. We also go over how to create value using the UN Sustainable Development...

The business model canvas is a powerful tool to get a quick sense of how a business works. It can also be used to show how businesses can create social good. This is the introduction to a broader series on how to use a social business model canvas to create purpose driven businesses, also known as social enterprises. Watch this episode on Youtube. Transcript available on the Strategy Made Simple B...

For this episode of Marketing Social Enterprise, I was joined by Marty Donkervoort and Judith Harris to talk about how various models of ownership change the way a business is operated. We speak about some of the benefits and weaknesses of employee ownership and community ownership in social enterprise and co-ops. Continue the conversation by joining: social-economy-connect.mn.co --- Marketing Soc...

Principles of minimum viable audiences focus the efforts of business managers down to their core supporters and early adopters. They force attention on the specific people that the operation can help, and enables connection to happen with those people. It encourages conversation with those people and maintains the passion for the project. Most social enterprises don't need any help focusing on the...