Welcome to the OCBC Website

AIMS AND OBJECTIVES:

A not-for-profit organisation interested only in the consolidation, growth and enhancement of the community.

The aims and objectives are:

• 1. To facilitate funding contracts for services to be delivered by the community.
• 2. Its objectives are to enable community organisations to serve their communities and channel more funder’s money through to its intended beneficiaries.
• 3. Assist the growth in the community enterprise sectors of the Black Country.
• 4. Provide services to our consortium that would not be available to individual organisations.
• 5. Obtain and manage contracts for work on behalf of community organisations.

SOME CONCEPTS FOR COMMUNITIES

The current Government Policies are geared towards supporting community activity and devolved decision making. Many of the funders and strategies are determined and managed at a sub-regional level. The most obvious of these is the new Learning and Skills Councils. There is one just for the Black Country. It has a new and focused agenda on looking at communities in a whole way and their ability to embrace change and responsibility. It has a strong emphasis on improving basic skills levels and enterprise to replace declining industries. It can be predicted that as part of these new strategies will be the contracting with newer organisations who are in touch with communities and wish to see the investment reaching the intended beneficiaries.

The proposition therefore is to establish an organisation that will facilitate a consortium of groups who do, or wish to provide, services to their own community. This consortium will act as an intermediary body only on behalf of the consortium members to secure funding and contracts.

The principle services that require a consortium are:

• Specialist staff and expertise supporting their activity and growth into enterprise
• Education and training programmes through shared accreditation
• Capacity building the organisations to enable them to control their own activities
• Management of services for the consortium i.e. Quality Assurance, Government Paperwork, Contract Management etc.
• Bidding for funds to Governmental and other sources on behalf of consortium members
• Obtaining and delivering contracts for work from Local Authorities, LSC, Housing Corporation etc.

Community organisations are increasingly taking ownership and control of elements of their local activity. These are many and varied and include training initiatives (particularly ICT centres and computer access), Social Housing, Sporting and Social activities and local democracy as well as the usual meeting place management. On many occasions organisations would be best placed to deliver contracts or services for work but are limited in their access to funding by a number of factors.

These usually are:

• 1. Lack of specialists in Governmental Systems and procedures
• 2. Not large enough in their own right to obtain some form of accredited status or to manage the process
• 3. Dependent on other public bodies for their financial and organisational survival
• 4. Financial probity and support from independent professionals
• 5. Not enough capacity or recognised skills amongst their members

These factors prevent progress and growth in the community sectors, social capital and in particular enterprise.

The whole project has a Marketing Plan:

• Needs analysis with the community organisations – the community will be researched to identify those organisations currently, willing or able to participate in new enterprises. The target organisations are those who believe the increased participation will add value to their activities or community.
• Researching the competition – are there similar services organisations or part of existing providers that operate these community support services. If there are how can OCBC work in partnership or complementary to those that do exist.
• Establishing the niche for the company – the whole operation can only exist if it establishes those niche markets appropriate to community and social enterprise.
• Raising the company profile with the potential funders – establishing through a strong marketing campaign the profile of a community service organisation operating as a not-for profit company.
• Producing quality publicity material – the world of publicity is one of high quality material available all day and every day through the letterbox. OCBC has to establish a strong publicity brand.

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