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Social Enterprises here in the UK should be exceptionally proud of how we have moved into pole position for developing the global movement. It wasn’t so long ago that people learning about best practice and development of social enterprises would almost always turn to the USA for their learning and to see great examples of social enterprise in action.  

This is no longer the case, and developments like the Social Enterprise Mark have meant a further leap-frog into the future where the age-old arguments and debates about ‘what is social enterprise’ are at long last being tackled. A fast growing number of businesses are now turning to the Social Enterprise Mark as a way to market themselves as part of the movement and here at COSMIC we’re very proud to have been pioneers in the development of the new Mark. The international community is looking very closely at these developments and how they might replicate them in their own countries – including Finland, Australia, and yes the USA.

Its been truly great to see UK social enterprises taking up new prime status and being used as examples for learning around the world – including of course those run by Social Enterprise Ambassadors. Here at COSMIC we’ve had visitors from oversees including Australia, Japan, Germany and now a group from the Rotary International next month.

We don’t do work internationally (yet!) here at COSMIC – most of our work is focussed on digital inclusion in the South West area of England, but we do some project and commissioned work across UK. And our supply chain is mainly focussed on local providers and suppliers who work closely with us and support our objectives. But of course some of our ICT services are provided globally and indeed as the development of ‘Cloud Computing’ in particular takes hold, then we can consider ourselves a part of a global supply chain very easily in future.

I do think that there is growing market for us to work internationally in future, particularly when we consider the growth in ICT service online and how we can work remotely with partner social enterprises to develop their own digital inclusion agendas. I’ve been really impressed with how online communities have really developed a sense of joint working, collaborative style and the desire to support. This can only mean great things for social enterprises doing business online so let’s all look out for the opportunities internationally!

For more advice and top tips on working internationally, visit our advice section here.