As with any generation, we face challenges to our survival, health and prosperity. When I started this project a year ago, I was thinking about homelessness, climate change, economic refugees, and increasing longevity. The sudden global spread of Covid-19 in 2020 has exacerbated these and created new ones, but it’s also forcing us to develop and deliver new solutions and quickly. How can we create opportunities to strengthen individual and community resilience, mentally, socially and economically in these locked down, furloughed circumstances? 

The UK Government recovery strategy proposals post Covid-19 include redesigning the adult education system, increasing opportunity for reskilling, boosting local economies and supporting self-employed businesses to increase productivity. Local enterprise can be the cornerstone of recovery because it drives innovation and competition. It also accelerates the creation of a flexible labour force through ‘gig’ and ‘sharing’ economies. 

Local enterprise is rooted in distinctive, beneficial values such as social awareness, voluntary participation, solidarity, self-supporting and caring. Fundamentally, local enterprise shares a collective purpose, strengthened to build a community bond and increase local economic prosperity through active peer-to-peer networks. A strong and active local economy is a root of a sustainable national economy.

We recognise that the future is not what it used to be; Covid-19 has provided an opportunity to plan and act for it. People accept that there is no lasting job security; economic survival requires openness to re-skilling, and a bolder, more courageous attitude to creating and seizing opportunities.

My research revealed that people often have ideas about potential business possibilities, but don’t know how to start, or who to trust for advice or partnering. They have skills they would like to utilise, but don’t know how to optimise them. My idea is to create a safe space for local communities where people can share their interests, ideas and skills and link up with others, so that together they can develop meaningful projects for economic and social benefit.

For my final project I’m proposing an online community hub where people can register their ideas and skills and meet like-minded others, through local networking, word of mouth recommendations and by developing connections. The aim is to foster new business, however small, that will boost local economies, as well as create employment opportunities and socialising. The hub will start online, and will become face to face once we’re over the worst of Covid-19.

My project is a catalyst for social programmes, improving individual and community confidence through people-centred design solutions, and allowing us to imagine viable services with the capacity to positively transform how we live and work.