By editorial team (Original publication in Spanish)

Every year, the Entrepreneurship Area of Catalunya Emprèn, a programme promoted by the Generalitat de Catalunya that promotes public and private initiatives for entrepreneurs, organises a trip with experts from the Catalan region. This activity aims to create an atmosphere of inspiration and to transmit the entrepreneurial spirit to entrepreneurs through an international and significant experience. Due to the emergence of Covid-19, Catalunya Emprèn decided to offer this opportunity for international innovation through digital tools, thus creating a virtual community with multidisciplinary profiles.

Ideas for Change (Barcelona), through the Pentagrowth Academy, together with Metabolic (Amsterdam) and with the participation of Bold&Open (Nice), designed a tailor-made programme that provides the conceptual and methodological resources necessary for local entrepreneurship and innovation managers to boost the activity of their departments with the greatest possible positive impact.

At the end of 2020, Catalunya Emprèn's Pentagrowth Innovation Experience took place in a virtual space with around 30 participants. The event, which was held over four days, provided a practical methodology for designing disruptive business models with canvas and customised activities. In addition, our international team helped each group using digital and collaborative tools such as Miro or Slack.

Four sessions of inspiration and co-creation

Throughout the workshops, we address a wide range of topics: from impact entrepreneurship, the Green Deal and the circular economy, to alternative finance, the social and collaborative economy and disruptive innovation. Bringing together multiple actors with a shared purpose is key to creating a better system. Our aim during the sessions was to create a positive impact on the entrepreneurship and innovation scene. During the week, we analysed opportunities in these fields that can help improve the system. Following the Pentagrowth methodology, we would like to share our ideas.

1. ‘Open systems and the disruptive mindset’.

Anticipate. Instil an open, disruptive and ambitious mindset. Create your #FuturoQueMola.

How can we build a new normal where we create impactful businesses that support social and regenerative ecosystems while maintaining thriving businesses?

This was the main question that Jaime Arredondo, coach and founder of Bold&Open, addressed in his workshop ‘New levers to accelerate tenfold the construction of a meaningful future’.

2. ‘Systems thinking: identifying root causes. More with less, and better. Inner abundance’.

Decompose. Harness internal potential: open up and broaden the view of what is available within the organisation.

Chris Monaghan, founding partner and director of Metabolic, presented the framework of Systemic Change Theory and showed attendees practical examples of the systemic enterprise business model.

He also presented the Systemic Change toolkit, a set of educational materials that can help individuals or entrepreneurial teams in building a systemic impact enterprise. While the process of creating an impactful social enterprise can be complicated and iterative, the toolkit is designed to lead entrepreneurs through the early stages of the process, integrating key approaches such as systems thinking, circular economy, human-centred design thinking, service design and community co-design.

‘We need bold thinking that can address the enormous challenges we face, and working models need to be highly scalable and economically sustainable to have the level of impact needed.’ - Metabolic

To close the second day, Javi Creus presented the Emerging Capabilities Observatory. This report by Ideas for Change shows different strategies to overcome the current crisis and gives multiple examples of how organisations are reformulating their business models, professionals are reinventing themselves and society is transforming.

3. ‘Discovering external abundance: the available potential and the next technological and social wave. Disruptive combinations’.

Explore and Combine. Open and broaden the vision of what is available outside the organisation. Formulate a proposal that combines internal and external abundance with the next technological and social wave.

On the third day, the Ideas for Change team explained in depth their Pentagrowth methodology, which aims to design disruptive business models by creating virtuous combinations.

We work in teams to co-create business ideas and explore possible synergies in the entrepreneurial ecosystem. Participatory technologies, match-making platform between stakeholders and positive impact clusters were some of the ideas that emerged during the activity.

4. ‘Alternative Investment. Impact finance workshop’.

In the final session, Seadna Quiqley, CFO and Head of Circular Finance at Metabolic, gave an overview of new forms of innovation in start-up and impact finance, beyond traditional exit-focused equity investment.

Traditional equity investment often does not meet the specific funding requirements of impact companies. There are a variety of emerging resources that combine elements of grant, debt and equity financing to address the specific risk and return profiles of these companies. In addition, he pointed out the forms of exit that are most suitable for impact enterprises.

Seadna explained the different financing options for companies and how emerging ownership structures, which help founders and early-stage investors, embed the company's mission in the organisation, while providing investors with the liquidity they need. Finally, he showed how portfolios can be managed to maximise impact while still achieving returns on investment.

Let's create better systems

As we have seen in the Catalunya Emprèn Innovation Experience, sharing a purpose is important to build something worthwhile. As Javi Creus pointed out in his last article, purpose is the key element that shapes the whole system. From logistics, to healthcare, mobility and energy. Let's activate a system with radical and shared purpose, let's build together #FuturosQueMolan!