SIAN CUFFY-YOUNG always felt out of place as an entrepreneur, because what she wanted to do as a businessperson was always different from the many other businesses that she knew.
She would always complain to her business coach that she felt different, she told Business Day.
“I would always tell my business coach that something was different about what I am doing, I just don’t know what it is.”
Cuffy-Young was told to look up the term “social entrepreneurship,” and with that she found her place in the business world.
“I was like oh my God, this is me,” she said. “I knew I was different, I just couldn’t put my finger on what the difference was.”
Cuffy-Young, founder of Siel Environmental Services Ltd, which specialises in waste-management education and training, said impact-driven social enterprise will be the business model of the future – combining benefits for people, the planet and profits.
But in TT, social enterprises are not getting the attention they deserve. She said the business model has not been identified by the Ministry of Legal Affairs, and banks are still struggling to understand the viability of social enterprises. She is now calling on investors and the government to take a better look at these businesses which seeks out sustainability and profitability, while using their influence and reach to make the world a better place.
Social entrepreneurship, according to the US Chamber of Commerce’s website, is a process where individuals, startups and entrepreneurs develop and fund solutions that directly address social issues. So, a social entrepreneur does not only seek profits, but seeks to explore a business opportunity that would have a positive impact in society and in the world.
Not to be confused with non-profit organisations, social entrepreneurship still seeks to make money.
A good example of a successful business in the social enterprise spectrum is popular shoe company, Toms, which was founded in 2006 by Blake Mycoskie, an entrepreneur out of Arlington, Texas.
Toms used a social-entrepreneurship model which would provide a pair of shoes to children in need for every pair it sold. Up to 2020, TOMS has given over 95 million shoes to people in need, and has extended that model to include providing access to safe drinking water from profits from coffee sales, free eyecare from profits from sales of eyewear, and other social issues such as preventing bullying and safe births.
Cuffy-Young’s business model focuses on reinvesting its profits into its own brand of education and consultation in waste management. She provides this service in three areas, the first is through a waste education and literacy programme, at the centre of which is the children’s book, Ky’s Magical Adventures – Where the garbage goes.
“We are using story to be able to teach our nation's children about waste, what happens to it where it goes and what they could do,” she said. “Because I always say that they are the eco heroes.”
Siel also engages in consultancy and education for individuals and businesses. Cuffy-Young told said the company has waste-efficiency programmes for SMEs which can be accessed on Udemy, an international platform for courses.
She said the services have not only become profitable for the business but beneficial for TT on the whole, as it educates people on proper waste management and engages in addressing issues surrounding composting and managing food waste.
“People keep that they did not find out about food waste from anyone locally. They would have found out about it from some documentary, or reading an article online. I realised that not enough attention was being paid to food waste, so one of the things we need to do is bring forth more local content on the topic from someone who is here, understands the space and is able to reach people,” she said.
Her business model also engages in helping with the education of other social enterprises. Cuffy-Young said her company took part in a waste management business accelerator programme which had its first session last Thursday.
The eight-week programme has 12 organisations from TT and three from the region, including Barbados and Dominica in the first cohort. The programme will teach businesses about business strategies, impact management, financing and funding.
“We will also be teaching how to attract customers and focusing on your vision, mission and purpose. My role as a facilitator is to guide them through their sessions every week; to encourage the peer-to-peer engagement so that they learn from each other,” she said.
Major corporations also engage in social entrepreneurship to enhance their business models. British Petroleum, for example, uses one of its three business groups to create low-carbon energy solutions through integrating its natural gas capabilities with power trading and growth in low carbon and renewable businesses and markets. According to the bp website it creates value through integrated gas and LNG businesses, the development of onshore and offshore wind power, hydrogen and CCS solutions, marketing of renewable and non-renewable power sources and its 50 per cent stake in Lightsource bp – the global leader in solar development, management and operations which has developed 282 utility-scale projects in 19 regions.
Despite the social benefit that can be derived from businesses such as Siel, banks still struggle to see the viability of social enterprises, Cuffy-Young said. She noted that while financial institutions are now beginning to see the value of social enterprises, in TT there is still a long way to go.
“When you go into a bank as I have and explain your business, they would say that they don’t understand what you are doing,” she said.
She recalled going to an insurance company seeking funding for a project at a landfill, and was told that her premium would have been higher than other companies.
“They said they never insured companies like mine before. I thought to myself, this is crazy.”
She said financiers have to look at social enterprises differently to traditional business. She called on financiers not to treat social enterprises with the same broad brush as regular businesses.
“It just doesn’t apply,” she said. “If I am just starting out as a social enterprise and I need financing, financiers will have to be willing to give me a moratorium, or tell me that I would have no interest for the first three years, or something.”
“It is important that we pay attention to the different business models that exist and that we make financing work for them.”
She said TT is poised to take advantage of these new business models but businesses in the social entrepreneurship space needs to be supported. She called for better engagement with social entrepreneurs to make the sector more viable.
“We need to be listened to and supported in the ways that we feel are necessary, and not what everyone else things we need. We know what our challenges are. Help us address those challenges.”
“It is like my professor said to me so many years ago, sometimes it is not about doing things better, but it is about doing better things,” she said.
