So where next for Your Own Place? 2019-2020 is our year of consolidation. We’ll be six next birthday and whilst the terrible toddler years are over, we’re not grown up yet either.
Being a start-up got us to about five years old. Everyone gets terribly excited and then like good wallpaper, you’re just background and you don’t need any help…
Like any small enterprise we could be gone next week. There would be a small article in the local press and we’d be forgotten. We talk of prevention, but I see little real commitment.
The funding landscape is deeply flawed. There are tiny amounts of short term cash for new ideas, large cash for scaling and long term social investment for the big boys. That leaves very little for us who are meant to be sustainable by now, right?
Wrong. We’re still tiny, committed to quality above all else and know that quick growth would probably kill us off. Short-term cash for crazy outputs and new ideas doesn’t help us to become sustainable. It just distracts us from what we should be doing.
And that’s measuring what we do well, understanding our impact, financial modelling and bringing about real systemic change. I don’t work this hard to nibble round the edges and ‘do what we’ve always done’.
And so, whilst growth and the ‘new’ excites me, there will be one final step before this happens. And that’s why this year is our consolidation year. We’ll be getting under the skin of our impact, ensuring fidelity of the model and outcomes and getting the right people on the bus in the right seats.
Who’s in?
