Social Enterprise

DubMeet Tuesday 2nd July 2013

Dublinked hosted its first Social Enterprise DubMeet on

Tuesday 2nd July 2013, in Fingal County Council Offices

Blanchardstown. The event received great interest, with

over 50 social entrepreneurs, innovators and organisations

in attendance. The event provided an introduction to the

Dublinked Innovation Network and datastore. Presentations

encouraged participants to explore the potential of data

sharing for social innovation, identify data, and discuss

opportunities and challenges that a social enterprise needs

to explore to engage more with open data. Speakers on the

day highlighted their experience with data, how data has

lead to insight and more fruitful understanding of

demographic, service provision and strategic development.

Speakers on the day included:

Chris Gordon – Irish Social Enterprise Network, SOCENT.ie

Chair, Irish Social Enterprise Network; Founder, Positive Informatics; Founder, 222 Ireland

Chris MM Gordon is a starter, business and social entrepreneur. He believes passionately in 222 Ireland, and

how better data can lead to better services. Chris is a Social Innovation Fellow with StartingBloc, a Pathfinder

Fellow form the Tällberg Foundation, Founder of Positive Informatics, Chairman of the Irish Export

Cooperative, Chair of the Irish Social Enterprise Network and a few more things.

Trutz Haase- Pobal HP Deprivation Index

Social & Economic Consultant, Trutz Haase

Trutz Haase has been an independent Social & Economic Consultant since 1995. Previously, he worked for the

Northern Ireland Economic Research Centre (Belfast), the Combat Poverty Agency (Dublin) and the

Educational Research Centre at St. Patrick’s College (Dublin).

Throughout his work as a consultant, Mr. Haase has been responsible for the design and implementation of

monitoring and evaluation frameworks for government programmes aimed at alleviating poverty, as well as

developing resource allocation models to target social expenditure on the basis of objective need criteria. In

this capacity, he has worked for a number of Irish Government Departments, Local Authorities and non-

governmental agencies. He is best known for his work on the development of an Irish Index of Relative

Affluence and Deprivation which features in the National Spatial Strategy and the current Regional and Local

Development Plans. Work outside the Republic of Ireland includes studies for the Northern Ireland Statistics &

Research Agency (NISRA), Special EU Programmes Body (SEUPB), International Fund for Ireland (IFI), OECD and

the European Monitoring Centre for Drugs and Drug Addiction (EMCDDA).

In many instances, Trutz Haase is working in association with Dr. Kieran McKeown and Dr. Jonathan Pratschke.

In recent years, Feline Engling has joined the team as a fourth member. This collaboration has resulted in over

30 joint studies to date.

Sandra Fitzgibbon – Dublin Simon: Data, Innovation & Social Enterprise

Property Development Manager, Dublin Simon Community

Sandra Fitzgibbon, Property Development Manager at Dublin Simon Community has worked in Homeless

services for 4 years to increase accommodation and improve the quality of accommodation for people who

present as homeless. Sandra has made the transition from the Commercial Property Sector to build on her

research in Social and Affordable Housing and contribute to delivery of Housing Led Initiatives in the Social

Housing Sector. She is a member of Society of Chartered Surveyors Ireland and Chartered Institute of

Personnel and Development. Her research areas include Social and Affordable Housing delivery, Housing Led

Initiatives, Personal resource development for staff in “care” environments to increase engagement and

reduce burnout, Strategy, Leadership and Justice.

What participants said:

“good to see many charities and social entrepreneurs interested in

sharing data”

“Excellent speakers and relevant

content”

“timely conversation starter”

“interesting to see SME use to data”

“very informative”

“excellent range of speakers”

“great to receive in-depth explanation and examples of Pobal HP

Deprivation Index”

“Dublinked is a great resource all social enterprise agencies,

funding bodies, entrepreneurs should utilise and familiarise

themselves with”

Tweets from ‘Social Enterprise DubMeet’:

Click here to view archive of tweets from ‘Dublinked Social Enterprise DubMeet’

Discussion Feedback from Breakout Sessions

Key Ideas from Presentations

To collect data need to provide education/ awareness process to ensure data understanding and future data collection success.

Use of data

Change in mindset – reiterate example of Donegal Rally social enterprise example presented by Chris Gordon

Potential use and innovation opportunity of sharing information and organisation data

Lots of data collected, but few shared within sector

Opinion that data collected is only valuable to collecting organisation, going forward encourage sharing of data cross sector.

Challenges in the Social Enterprise Sector that can be addressed through public data sharing and collaboration:

Lack of communication between centres and services

Interpretation of data, perhaps lack of interest to interpret data

Systems and knowledge to collect and transform

Poor data literacy, risk of misinterpretation o Data quality o Age of data

Mapping needs through cross sector analysis, through collaboration and sharing knowledge better able to address regional issues

Raising awareness in cross referencing data o Instruction set on how to collect properly o Access to expert could be invaluable o Collaboration required to release data to protect those most vulnerable

Brainstorm for new or improved services from data

Map services/ activities taking place locally – ‘What’s happening near me’

Community to act as problem solvers - crowdsourcing data to better support service provision and reporting

Aid mapping of disability needs through cross sector analysis

Map local knowledge and service provision o Pobal HP Deprivation index putting data in local context

Community group identification

Lots of unforeseen uses, opportunities to collaborate to provide/ develop service provision -social enterprise sector holding vast operational data

Data access, understanding, use or reuse

o Use data sharing combined with crowdsourcing to update and correct data o Make it easier to decipher - standard formats o Provider easier route to access it o Social inclusion in providing data – encourage people to analyse data relating to their

areas, visualising data directly related to area o Local knowledge freely available, encourage sharing of information o Ease of pulling and updating data will lead to improvement in data quality o Provide insight on bettering service provision and reach

Data we need or want to collect

o Access to expenditure data at small area/ ED level o Operational data to help identify needs or gaps in the service o Resident Association RSS o Huge local knowledge wide available, challenge to collect it o Central repository of services and resources

Callan Institute National University of Ireland Maynooth Maynooth County Kildare Ireland

www.dublinked.ie dublinked@nuim.ie Twitter: @dublinked

About Dublinked

Dublinked, a new regional data sharing initiative sees previously unreleased public operational data

being made available online for others to research or reuse. With the initial data coming from Dublin

City Council and Dun Laoghaire Rathdown, South Dublin and Fingal County Councils, it is expected that

other public and private organisations in Dublin will link up with Dublinked to share their data and

invite research collaborations. The information is curated by NUI Maynooth to ensure ideas can be

commercialised as easily as possible and to minimise legal or technical barriers that can be

impediments for small and medium businesses (SMEs) seeking to develop and prove business ideas.

If you would like to hear about future Dublinked events, send an email to dublinked@nuim.ie to join

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