Work 4 Progress (W4P)- promoting entrepreneurship for job creation (SDGs 1,5, 8, 9, 16, 17)

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Description

Intro

The Work 4 Progress programme aims to create an open innovation platform for promoting entrepreneurship-led job creation for Women and Youth. Supported by “la Caixa” Banking Foundation, the programme practice is modelled to create systemic shifts through co-creation and collaboration with a network of public and private sector partners. India’s impressive growth trajectory has not translated into a corresponding increase in jobs. The lack of information and access to support services prevents potential entrepreneurs from taking simple steps that would transform their lives. We are currently in Phase II of the programme, following a successful initial phase.

Objective of the practice

The programme practices are applied to develop a culture of entrepreneurship through the following interconnected objectives: 
• Nurture constructive communities, who respond positively to shifts in the new social system and build a resilient economy with quality jobs and social well-being 
• Uncover and unleash entrepreneurial energies of individuals by removing the social, intergenerational and gender barriers to build a culture of entrepreneurship 
• Empower small businesses through a robust enterprise ecosystem and enable them to become catalysts for job creation 
• Mainstream enabling mechanisms for entrepreneurship-led job creation through a coalition of micro movements 
 
The orientation for systemic transformation is planned such that it first removes barriers that stifle the emergence of microenterprises at the individual and community level, and second, puts them on an accelerated growth trajectory through a robust ecosystem. These processes are managed in a participatory manner with communities and stakeholders, and the collaborative action enables entrepreneurs to turn into their job creators. 
A distinguishing feature of the programme is that instead of using a linear, top- down approach to job creation, it applies social innovation methodology. This practice ensures: 
LISTENING through deep dialogue with communities and stakeholders for developing multi-stakeholder perspectives 
CO-CREATION by collaboratively develop sustainable enterprise solutions with communities and networks that accelerate job creation in a sustained manner with regional and local partners 
PROTOTYPING: to demonstrate the viability and sustainability of the identified solutions for acceleration at scale 
This dynamic and collaborative methodology is especially suited to the kind of coordinated action that is crucial to achieve the 2030 Agenda. Work 4 Progress aims to create fulfilling jobs that people want through locally relevant microenterprises for youth and women, that also address local social and environmental challenges. By doing so, the programme practices contribute directly in achieving targets for the Sustainable Development Goals (SDG): 
• SDG 1: access to appropriate technology and financial services 
• SDG 5: empowerment of women 
• SDG 8: inclusive sustainable economic growth and decent work for all 
• SDG 9: inclusive and sustainable industrialization, and foster innovation 
• SDG 16: Promote inclusive societies by building effective, accountable institutions 
• SDG 17: revitalize global partnerships for sustainable development 
 
One major challenge for the programme team was to “de-learn” traditional methods of implementation and adopting crucial practices such as “deep listening”. The programme has an important learning component that ensures an action and learning loop runs across the programme. The iterative and dynamic nature of the methodology assumes that there are gaps in our understanding and constant evaluation and reflection of our work ensures that our initiatives are truly targeted towards the needs of the community. This was compounded as the identified programme geographies do not possess any historical or sociocultural contexts that enable entrepreneurship. The programme, therefore, required creating shifts in mindsets of individuals and their families, and fostering trust between them and local government stakeholders.

Partners

Networked service delivery models enabled by partnerships are core to the programme methodology. Partnerships across scales ensure a robust ecosystem for microenterprises. Civil society organisations, financial institutions, technology providers, and academic, learning and capacity-building institutions provide support services across technology, finance, market and capacity-building. The programme has also joined hands with market aggregators like EcoAd and CropConnect.
A key initiative for stakeholder engagement is the coalition. Coalitions consist of stakeholders like MFIs and local government institutions which aid microenterprise development; they meet monthly to discuss joint action to support microentrepreneurs in their region.

Implementation of the Project/Activity

Project Planning: Planning based on deep listening was undertaken throughout the project to build sustainable solutions.
Project Execution: A matrixed team structure was designed, with each member leading a component and sector specialists for the support services. For enabling mid-course correction, adaptive learning cycles and tracking against programme outcomes, in addition to outputs, were put into place. The execution of the project was undertaken by on-ground staff and implementation partners, both of whom were made to undergo training sessions and workshops to de-learn conventional methods and adopt a social innovation-based approach.
Monitoring Mechanisms: For project monitoring, an external agency was hired in addition to the internal tracking mechanisms used by the W4P team. At the organisational level, weekly project meetings and quarterly reflection workshops with programme advisor and teams were undertaken. The programme learnings were captured through extensive photo and video documentation, with analysis being shared both internally and externally through project bulletins and reports. These learnings were in the form of reports on meetings, interviews and case studies with entrepreneurs, or reports on emerging trends in the local entrepreneurial ecosystem. At the end of each phase, the programme would go into listening mode with the programme team, field team, network partners and beneficiaries. This was done as a two-step process where listening was undertaken and, as a second step, this information was synthesised by a smaller core team for programme development and decision-making to chart the way forward.

Results/Outputs/Impacts

The programme has demonstrated the evidence of quantitative and qualitative results that can be attributed to the practice. In a period of two years, the following results were achieved:
Improved awareness and information on entrepreneurship for youth and women indicated through dialogue: The programme directly engaged over 2050 women and youth in dialogue accessing technical information required to start a business. In addition to this, 100 regional and 200 national stakeholders were engaged to enable entrepreneurship
Improved utilisation of enterprise opportunities and services availed by youth and women, reflected through co-creation: Over 200 youth and women were engaged in ILO-based business training for co-development of 20 business plans. Over 100 youth and women designed 5 prototypes that remove sociocultural barriers related to entrepreneurship – safe spaces for women, participatory governance learning, peer to peer learning network, regional joint action coalition with other stakeholders, and self-learning application.
Increased local micro enterprise development and a culture of entrepreneurship through a series of prototypes: In a period of 24 months since its inception, 175 microenterprises creating 422 jobs have been supported and set up. 56 of these enterprises have been set up by women and 10 are designed to provide social goods – ensuring no one is left behind. Through the power of collaboration in the regional coalitions, the programme connected over 50 entrepreneurs to enterprise support providers for technology and financial access. We estimate that this has led to an investment of INR 15 million in local economic development. Entrepreneurs have reported a 30% increase in income from baseline over the first three months of their operations. These are supplemented with prototypes like 10 information centres through which over 200+ youth have been connected and formation of 2 safe spaces for women to access livelihood solutions in a sustained manner – post-programme implementation.
In this journey, we are intrigued by the coalition of micro-movements that have been spurred. We have been able to observe small scale shifts in relationships within the community, shifts in the attitude and behaviour of local government stakeholders towards entrepreneurship, and shifts in the processes of local institutions. Through our efforts at recording these micro-level system changes we have been able to observe the ripple effect of solutions that are co-created. Some of these are briefly described below:
• Organic growth of enterprises through the power of social information networks
• Entrepreneurs involved in the same sector are exchanging information in an efficient and effective manner through tech networks
• Entrepreneurs have taken small steps towards helping one another by forming customer networks between themselves
• An enabling environment for transference and acceleration of enterprises as institutions amend their systems to support entrepreneurs
• The communities are viewing entrepreneurship as a viable source of income generation as they set up enterprises independently of the programme

Enabling factors and constraints

Amid what is now being termed by expert economists as a job crisis, India’s youth is experiencing considerable frustration about the lack of attractive job opportunities, despite the fact that many are well-educated. This remains an issue of national concern despite the promise by the government for accelerated action in this area. In rural areas, the high rate of migration to cities to search for better livelihoods, as well as the lack of interest in traditional family occupations, creates a high level of restlessness among unemployed youth. This has created a need among them to look for meaningful and dignified jobs, increasing the demand for what the programme offers.
Enabling external policy environment for the programme: The timing of W4P’s entry into Eastern UP and Bundelkhand was when the central Government had rolled out programmes for micro enterprise development like the MUDRA scheme, Start-Up Village Enterprise Programme and Udyog Aadhar scheme to create a conducive environment to support micro entrepreneurship. This placed an impetus on local governments to work on these issues while also creating awareness among communities – all positively influencing the implementation of the programme and ensuring the success of initiatives like the local coalitions. The co-creation and collaborative methodology capitalised on this opportunity to create regional multi-stakeholder joint action coalitions in the programme. Earlier, we would invite government officials to disseminate the programme and its practices. In this programme, these officials and stakeholders are members of the platform and take ownership of the activities - shifting the power dynamic from giving and receiving towards co-creation and joint action. We have been able to leverage a sum of INR 665,000 to support entrepreneurs through these coalitions. While the outlook of microfinance institutions towards entrepreneurs has changed, facilitating easier access to credit, we need to work closely with banks and financial institutions who can provide larger loan sums. The intensity of job creation is directly dependent on the size of an enterprise, and not having access to larger loans has been a limitation for the programme.
The power of digital technology for last-mile access: The increased connectivity on online social platforms, partly due to the availability of cheaper mobile internet, has enabled the creation of online communities and access to new information flows. We see entrepreneurs connect with one another for information exchange. In addition to this, the sharing of data and information for project implementation was more efficient when communities had access to smart phones. In order to capture the latent energies of the youth, the programme also used this opportunity to develop a self-learning application on entrepreneurship to foster change.
A challenge that the team has faced is collecting the data from the ground. This tedious and time-consuming process often leads to delays and inconsistencies. In order to overcome this, a dedicated team member has been made responsible for collecting and monitoring the data. The team is now in the process of setting up a GIS-based management system.

Sustainability and replicability

Sustainability: The programme promotes the creation and handholding of enterprises to ensure their development for increased viability and profitability for at least three months. In addition to this, entrepreneurs continue to engage with teams for continued access to support services. Addressing environmental sustainability, the programme ensures the use of the least polluting technologies. Additionally, new technology solutions and business models that reduce carbon emissions or save virgin resources and promote waste utilisation are encouraged through incentives like increased subsidies. The programme, in its design, keeps people and their needs at its heart, ensuring that communities are empowered to access information and take decisions with respect to enterprise development. In order to ensure no one is left behind, it focuses on creating opportunities for youth and women, who are often marginalised. It also incentivises the creation of community-led businesses for delivery of social goods, like water services. or those that impact livelihood development at scale, like farmer cooperatives.

Resilience: The programme has invested in the development of local community-led movements of change for the sustainability of the programme – safe spaces for women, creating a network of star entrepreneurs, and building local self-governments as centres of influence. In addition to this, the prototypes supported are businesses which, by their nature, will ensure economic sustainability and resilience, if successful. A network of local support service providers and information kiosks along with an experiential learning unit have been set up to service these entrepreneurs. To build a robust ecosystem, the programme has enabled the role of bridging the gap between local market/government stakeholders with entrepreneurs through the coalition and marketplaces. This will ensure a continued connection even after programme exit. Moreover, in order to ensure that the programme is sustainable in the medium and long term, a component of deepening impact is being devised as we move towards the next phase. This is designed to ensure that self-sustaining movements and local access points are created to organically enable micro enterprise development in the geographies.

Replicability: The programme has ensured periodic process and knowledge documentation while also building a compendium of tools by assigning a knowledge management person to the core implementation team. The knowledge created by the project that is important for implementing and using these social innovation methodologies has been conserved in the form of tools, toolkits, and other knowledge products for knowledge sharing and dissemination. The programme tools are being replicated in Peru and Mozambique, using the same social innovation methodology, and are proving to be successful in those geographies as well.

Conclusions

The NITI Aayog, Government of India, released a report in December 2018 which reveals the baseline index of performance of all states on the SDGs. Uttar Pradesh and Madhya Pradesh – the direct areas of intervention of W4P— remain aspirant performers on most of these goals, highlighting the relevance of the programme to continue its contribution towards the achievement of the Sustainable Development Goals. 
While Work 4 Progress has effected significant change in the programme geographies, as evaluated by a third-party agency, and the social innovation methodology has demonstrably led to measurable change, the programme still has a lot to contribute in weeding out the various barriers to entrepreneurship, especially for vulnerable groups. De-learning the linear approach to job creation and development has enabled the programme team to understand iterative processes that enable innovation; the documentation of the project in the form of periodic reports, bulletins and case stories highlights the achievements and insightful learnings from the first phase of the project. 
Meera Devi, a cosmetics store owner who became the first woman to invest in an e-rickshaw in her village in Niwari, which is now used to transport young girls safely to and from their school outside the village, earlier used to use a coal stove in her kitchen. She now uses a gas cylinder. Her child, who earlier studied in a Hindi-medium school, has now been able to shift to an English-medium school due to her increased income. For the Work 4 Progress team, it is these changes in attitudes, aspirations and quality of life apparent in every story that are as significant as wider quantitative measures of regional impact in our efforts to tackle multiple inequalities and do our bit towards achieving the 2030 Development Agenda. Going forward, we believe that we, along with the communities and partners we work with, have the potential to learn further and eventually transform 1 million livelihoods.

Other sources of information

Our latest impact bulletin, as well as the monograph containing the reports of our listening activities and our case stories, may be accessed here:
https://drive.google.com/open?id=1Nj9zRoFLy1C6DT3DfVjIf3LqQNgE7oXH

SDGS & Targets

Goal 9

Build resilient infrastructure, promote inclusive and sustainable industrialization and foster innovation

Goal 8

Promote sustained, inclusive and sustainable economic growth, full and productive employment and decent work for all

Goal 5

Achieve gender equality and empower all women and girls

Goal 16

Promote peaceful and inclusive societies for sustainable development, provide access to justice for all and build effective, accountable and inclusive institutions at all levels

Goal 17

Strengthen the means of implementation and revitalize the Global Partnership for Sustainable Development

Goal 1

End poverty in all its forms everywhere

Deliverables & Timeline

N/A

Resources mobilized

Resources

Financing (in USD)

910565

Partnership Progress

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Action Network

This initiative does not yet fulfil the SMART criteria.

Timeline

15 November 2016 (start date)

14 November 2018 (date of completion)

Entity

Development Alternatives

SDGs

9 8 5 16 17 1

Region

Asia and Pacific

Geographical coverage

Two project geographies in India: Bundelkhand (Jhansi and Niwari districts, 25°24'42.7"N 78°39'02.9"E) and East UP (Bhadohi and Mirzapur districts, 25°08'18.0"N 82°34'31.5"E)