It's been one of those "always in a meeting" weeks for me here at SSE. Quite a few of them useful and productive, but occasionally frustrating also (see 'patience' and 'exhaustion' on the left). But we are a learning-by-doing organisation, so thought I would share a few bits of learning + wisdom from the week. Hopefully these are of some interest, if slightly random.

– Total Place is becoming a much bigger deal / much more real on people's agendas: featured in two very different meetings this week, but its 'whole' area approach to public service delivery will become increasingly important as budgets get devolved to local authority level; particularly for social entrepreneurs / social enterprises who deliver multiple cross-cutting outcomes…more here

– From SROI's excellent Measuring Social Value conference (well done Jeremy et al), I took away the following: transparency leads to credibility which leads to trust which leads to support (hat tip to Daniela at the Impetus Trust)

– Someone else at the same event (my notes don't reveal who!) pointed out that it took 100 years for commercial business to arrive at the current set of metrics they use….which are still far from perfect; so we shouldn't beat ourselves up about it in the social sphere

– from Nina of FRC, talking about why measurement is important: "Are you busy with the things that matter….or just busy?"

– Campbell Robb of OTS at the same event: "At the heart of smarter government is a government that buys better"; he followed that with "there is no excuse for not having a go at proving your impact….and the organisations that put this at the heart of their business will be the successful organisations"

– (from Julie Harris at the Ambassadors meeting): 60% of people searching online are looking for video content [hope I got that statistic right]

– Leeds has the best value office space in European cities; Oslo has the least pollution; London is low down the list for both. From the fascinating (!) European Cities Monitor

– Also, did you know that: "Over 750,000 SMEs are based in London, making up 99.8 per cent of all
London businesses. With annual turnover exceeding £360 billion, this
sector also accounts for almost half of all employment in London." (see here for more) Which came up at the LDA meeting re. getting social + ethical businesses inside their economic development strategies…..