A story about the sought experience, shared practices and inspiration found by a group of Bulgarian social enterprises in Italy
This is a first party story of Aylin Yumerova - part of the executive team of the BCNL project “Know-How Lab for Social Entrepreneurship” (Lab4e), as an expert on social innovation geared towards improving the process of training and support of the labor cadres on the social enterprises.
For a long time, I was wondering how to start this story. On an emotional or a business tone. However, when a person visits a warm-blooded and colorful country like Italy with its extremely hospitable and emotional citizens, it is almost impossible to remain indifferent in the speech. And, after the 5-day intensive program of out study visit with the laborers in Lab4e to the city of Padua, in the Veneto Region, Italy, filled with a variety of visits and new acquaintances, the task gets even more difficult. So, I will start from there - from the very beginning, presenting the participants in the study visit: Day 1 – Monday, the 26th of March, 2018
After a few unexpected tribulations and a proper Italian lunch – pizza and short coffee – the introductory session started for our colorful group of representatives of organizations from various spheres and cities in Bulgaria. The representative of our partner organization in Lab4e - Franca Barison, Head of the International Projects Department at the Regional Institute for Cooperative Education and Studies - Irecoop Veneto, became our guide star and hospitable host for the upcoming days of our study visit of different social enterprises in the Veneto Region.
Day 2 – Tuesday, the 27th of March, 2018
Full of sunny mood and impatient curiosity, early in the morning we headed to the hills of Eugenia, close to city of Padua, where we visited Casa Marina hostel, managed by the social cooperative Terra di Mezzo. There, we met Barbara Vettorato, Head of the Marketing and Workplace Safety Department at Irecoop Veneto. Barbara presented the activity of the Regional Institute which offers training and professional courses for the improvement of the professional qualifications and skills of the employees and managers of local social cooperatives, but not only. The interesting thing about these cooperatives is that, together with Irecoop, they are developing projects involving trainings for the staff members. These projects are funded by the Veneto Region with funds from the European Social Fund and the training and courses are provided by Irecoop (as a certified institute) after a public procurement contract. For its part, the Institute pre-examines the needs of enterprises, including social enterprises, and on this basis prepares and adapts its training programs.
The main part of the trainings are devoted to the administrative management of human resources, the internal organizational activity and the equal participation of all partners, who are cooperative employees, in the process of decision making. In its courses, Irecoop also relies on the method of assessing the employability of employees with intellectual disabilities and mental health problems to help their colleagues. Specifically, some of the program trainers are professionals who have previously worked for many years in social enterprises and are familiar with the specifics of the work process and staff management.
Our second meeting was with representatives of the social cooperative Terra di Mezzo – Francesco Loreggian, President of the cooperative, and Luisa Betto, a team member. They presented us to the organizational management structure of the cooperative which has the status of “social” as it provides employment for people with disabilities, representing 30% of the total staff. Some of them are partners in the cooperative itself and can participate in the decision-making process at the Partners' Meeting, including when adopting the annual budget.
The Social Cooperative provides non-formal education services through outdoor training courses for children and students and ensuring their accommodation at the Casa Marina hostel, where we were as well. It also offers entertainment services against payment through the adventure park LE FIORINE. The work of the Park is in fact the leading business activity that supports the existence of the cooperative as well as its ability to provide employment for disabled employees. After conducting vocational courses for unemployed persons with disabilities, which include training and apprenticeship in Casa Marina (with the assistance of Irecoop), some of them remain on the job or in the hostel are directed to other appropriate entities. The main key for the success is actually the highly motivated team of Terra di Mezzo which strongly support its employees with disabilities, while everyone in the team is in a relationship of equality.
Day 3 – Wednesday, the 28th of March, 2018
The hospitable Chiara Frattina and Ricardo Stocco, partners of the start-up company, Ocioo, opened the doors of their Bike Store, a café and a bistro. They told about their innovative project to develop cyclotourism in the city of Castelfranco. The project is related to the management of a building next to the train station, offering healthy food and drinks for visitors, service and bicycle rentals for local residents and guests of the city. The initiative was one of the few financed projects from the Veneto Region with funds from the European Regional Development Fund.
The hospitable Chiara Frattin and Ricardo Stocco, owners of Cooperative Ocio - a new start-up company for sustainable tourism - oped widely the doors of their Bike Store / Bike Cafeteria and Bike Bistro. They told about their innovative project to develop cyclotourism in the city of Castelfranco. The project is related to the management of a building next to the train station, offering healthy food and drinks for visitors, service and bicycle rentals for local residents and guests of the city. The initiative actually was one of the few financed projects from the Veneto Region with funds from the European Regional Development Fund. 
The reasons for this were several:
At present, the functions of the 5-member team in the enterprise are so distributed that they can be interchangeable - both in sales and behind the bar.
After the traditional lunch dose short Italian coffee we headed to our next meeting in the industrial area of Castelfranco. We met Valentina Campanario, Public Relations Department at the Consorzio InConcerto consortium, consisting of 15 social cooperatives. Our visit was also honored by the consortium Director himself and a representative of the Veneto Region.
What we all unanimously found as valuable in this model is that everyone who gets accepted as a partner (after paying the initial payment) can work in the industrial laundry and can participate in the decision-making, that is to vote for the discussion of issues related to the management and operation of the cooperative`s activity. In this regard, Eureka organizes regular trainings for workers with basic knowledge and skills on what rights, duties and functions of social cooperatives are, as well as the opportunity to provide feedback and recommendations on the management of Eureka. As a result of such training, an internal document has been drawn up with specific instructions and recommendations relating to the daily work process and cooperative relationships, as well as the partners' objectives for the next 3 years. One of them was to improve dialogue between colleagues from different ethnic groups and between workers and their.
After Eureka, Valentina showned us yhr Cooperativa Campoverde's "Social Farm". In addition to producing organic farming, the social cooperative also welcomes groups of children and students who, through non-formal education, learn how and where the fresh milk comes from in supermarkets, how to grow vegetables, etc.
During our afternoon visit we also met the activities of another social cooperative, part of the Consorzio InConcerto network - Inncontro which simultaneously provides social services (shelter, day center) and provides employment in the industrial sphere of people with mental health problems . We have learned from Valentina that within the framework of social services, each of the consumers goes through their individual plan of training and skills building until the person begins to feel confident and well. At this point, the cooperative helped them to go through work experience to prepare for the labor market. In the framework of the course for each of the users takes care of a trainer - a social worker. If the internship passes successfully and the user is doing well with his / her duties, the cooperative helps him / her find a job. Since it is clear to Incontro that some people do prefer to work in the industrial laundry and others feel better in farming, it has started to incorporate new cooperatives that provide employment in different spheres. This model of reunification between different social cooperatives was also recognized by the group as a good working practice that allows for flexibility and diversity in the development of labor skills of disabled workers.
Day 4 – Thursday, 29th of March 2018
In order to make this visible, and through free online services, the network brings the idea to create the cooperative Sinfonia which acts as a communications, web and digital marketing agency. Every year, Sinfonia allocates from its budget training for staff capacity development as well as team-building services. As part of the Sinfonia team, Luca shared that in 2018, with funding from Irecoop, they provided individual courses to each employee to find out what his/her professional growth could be and his/her personal growth paths within the company for the next 2-3 years. Another important training that is regularly provided to employees is to develop customer service skills
Our last meeting was with Daniela Moro, Head of Social Sphere at Irecoop Veneto. We learned about some basic methodologies and models of training programs of the Human Resource Development Institute, which also stimulated the motivation for the work of the staff themselves. In order to promote the exchange of staff, joint training programs are often organized with employees of different cooperatives and enterprises
And here is the end of our immensely interesting Italian visit. I take the opportunity to thank Franca Barrison of Irecoop Veneto for all the responsiveness and attention she gave us during the three days of our business visits and she still found us to enjoy us with pleasant surprises. I would also like to thank Ivelina Velichkova, who was our sunny translator who helped us in the translation from Italian to Bulgarian and back and to our full communication with our Italian counterparts.
Day 5 – Friday, 30th of March 2018
It is again time to board the plane, but this time in the opposite direction - to return back to Bulgaria. The smiles were on everyone's faces – they were visibly inspired and dreamy - and returned with heavier luggage, but not just with pasta and prosecco, but also with a lot of new knowledge and circulating ambitious ideas that were rolling in our heads and were already looking for ways to apply to the work of our social enterprises. And something else weighs in our suitcases - the example of solidarity among people on all levels, which we can’t wait to scatter across the Bulgarian soil.
The project “Know-How Lab for Social Entrepreneurship” is held under the “Human Resources Development” Operational Program 2014-2020 through joint financing by the European Social Fund in the European Union