2ndly
Do you have a template for a community NEEDS survey?
community= ethnic organization
Hello,
I am assuming your two questions are related, meaning that you are considering conducting a needs assessment in order to understand what your community needs that you can provide via a social enterprise?
First of all, if your goal is to cover your operating costs, set a revenue (and net profit) goal for your enterprise that will match them. Think about how much monthly revenue you will need - this will give you an idea of the scale of the social enterprise you need to run.
Then, analyze your assets and opportunities. What kind of skills, resources, talents, opportunities do you have in your organization or your community. If you build the enterprise on something you already know or are strong at, you will be off to an easier and faster start. For example, do you have access to productive land you can grow on? Do you have a key location where you can sell your merchandise? You should also think about whether some of your partners or friends have some assets and whether you can cooperate to combine resources.
And third, and this is to your last question, you can also think about your community's needs and whether you can build an enterprise that serves those needs and makes some profit. This is a little tricky because often communities need something but cannot afford to have so you might not have customers with a lot of purchase power. It is a decision you need to make - whether your buyers are from the community or a wealthier outsiders.
With regard to the needs assessment - it is difficult to provide a template because the assessment must be very specific to the community in question. Please look at Chapter 3 on Needs Assessment - there are links to examples there, including a lot of practical advice on surveys in Section 7. You can also find there many links to guides and examples.
I happen to know a very successful social enterprise in Nashville, Tennessee: https://thistlefarms.org/. You can look at their website and see how their work is organized.
There is also a whole universe of social enterprise resource networks that you can look for if you want to connect with existing enterprises or get advice. Here is one of them: https://www.the-sse.org/resources/starting/start-social-enterprise-10-steps/. And here is another: https://turnerfamilycenter.com/social-enterprise-resources/.
I hope this is useful as a starting point.
Kind regards,
The CTB Team.