Opportunity
In 2010 the South Australian Government asked the Australian Centre for Social Innovation (TACSI) to design a program that would reduce the number of families needing crisis services, and keep more kids out of the child protection system. Many families were moving through the state care systems at an alarming rate and ultimately, too few families were thriving.
In 2016, social enterprise TACSI engaged TDi to collaborate on the project, and ultimately to turn a truly great pilot program into a sustainable and scalable social enterprise.
The ‘Nitty Gritty’
The TDi team worked side-by-side with TACSI to design a six-month process to identify, test and validate how to scale Family by Family.
Together, we identified 20 government stakeholders to interview across Australia and internationally to understand what their priorities were within child protection and the early intervention space. We also interviewed 15 not-for-profits (NFPs) using the same approach. We wanted to understand if they would be interested in becoming certified providers of Family by Family. What were their priorities for families? What did families need? Where were the gaps?
Following all of our analysis, we designed a certification and capability building service offer, which would provide NFPs the support and mentoring to deliver Family by Family enabling the program to scale and spread across different contexts, and ultimately allow more families to thrive.
Working with TACSI, we tested this with the same NFP audience and returned a second time to test price and begin negotiations. Capitalising on the momentum of these conversations was key.
After the interviews, TACSI and TDi workshopped the model over several sessions. We spent a lot of time deliberating on price and value to find the right balance, as well as understanding the cost model, and the scale that would deliver market-rate returns.
“It was an absolute privilege to work with TACSI because as an organisation, they think so deeply about how to create change in the world. There was a wonderful synergy between their design expertise and TDi’s ability to explore growth, scale and sustainability for the business”.- Anna Moegerlein, Senior Consultant
Outcomes
TACSI is now in the first stages of incubating the social enterprise and rolling out the certification and capability building model in partnership with the South Australian Government and South Australian NFP Uniting Communities. At scale, it will provide Australian and international NFPs with the opportunity to build capabilities to deliver the program, become certified providers of the Family by Family program and address child protection issues in a fundamentally different way. The model is set to deliver financial returns to TACSI and its partners to reinvest in community services and social innovations, and to support thousands of families in Australia and around the world to thrive, not just survive.