A look back at the conference “Scaling up social innovations: how can patrons change the game?”

On Tuesday, March 22, 2022, we were at the Philanthro-Lab to discuss the role of patrons in the scaling up of social/environmental impact structures with five speakers.

The event brought together a large audience of foundations, social enterprises and actors from the SSE ecosystem, and addressed key issues such as:

• The importance of supporting first and foremost and over time the intention of scaling up rather than the journey to get there.
• The establishment of a relationship of trust and co-responsibility between the sponsor and the project leader, key factors in the success of the change of scale.
• The allocation and type of expenses to be covered by the financial support: supporting operating expenses, particularly HR expenses to structure and facilitate the change of scale (HR and support functions for example) and not just projects.

After an hour of discussion on the issues, practices and levers to contribute to the acceleration of impact enterprises, the audience was able to contribute during a participatory time (World Café) at the end of the event on the practices to be favored and to be avoided to better support the scaling of social innovations. Here are some key ideas shared: