INNOVATIVE COLLABORATIONS Erasmus Project

Project Title

INNOVATIVE COLLABORATIONS

Project Key Action

This project related with these key action: Cooperation for innovation and the exchange of good practices

Project Action Type

This project related with this action type : Strategic Partnerships for vocational education and training

Project Call Year

This project’s Call Year is 2020

Project Topics

This project is related with these Project Topics: Enterprise, industry and SMEs (incl. entrepreneurship); Social entrepreneurship / social innovation; Civic engagement / responsible citizenship

Project Summary

The social economy is playing an increasingly important role, largely thanks to its ability to tackle some of the main challenges facing Europe, in particular the need to promote sustainable and socially inclusive economic growth and create jobs.
The ambition of the INN-CO project is to place its action in an ecosystem conducive to the development of social enterprises. It is about increasing their visibility and that of citizens’ initiatives, in particular:
– model the key factors for the success of social enterprises, identify the conditions for their transferability,
– Increase the competitiveness of social enterprises through innovation in the use of digital tools and the creation of strategic alliances.
– Promote processes of innovation, knowledge transfer, commercial, scientific and technological exchange through the creation of synergies between companies and relevant entities in the social economy sector.

Objectives of the project are:
– Strengthen the skills of teacher-researchers and trainer-researchers in the digital management of social enterprise projects in Europe
– Increase the collective skills of European social entrepreneurs by sharing practices and innovations.
– Generate new common European knowledge and models.

The project involves the creation of 2 outputs:
– O1 The Collaborative Design Model as an important support tool for social SMEs
– O2 Virtual Cluster for Social Enterprises to support members in the development of initiatives and awareness programs in the field of entrepreneurship and corporate social responsibility and the creation of social partnerships.
There will also be training activities considered LTTA Trainings (C1-C5) as fundamental elements both to increase the knowledge and skills of the project participants and for the development of the outputs of the INN-CO project through co-creation with a collaborative approach. Each will involve 3 participants per partner organization involving the staff of the members of the partnership made up of trainers, tutors, educators in the VET area, professional social enterprise experts, social entrepreneurs. This could also include some volunteers from the project partners.

As regards the impact, the participants thanks to the training received during the project and the exchange generated with other participants from the member countries, will be able to put the Collaborative Design method into practice with its various tools (participatory workshops, dialogue and experiential learning) to achieve a specific goal or solve a specific problem.
The partner institutions will have more synergies between the members of the partnership, social enterprises members of the Virtual Cluster, stakeholders involved in the social economy.
The social entrepreneurs involved will improve their skills in promoting the Collaborative Design approach within their companies and the social enterprises, associations and other stakeholders involved will be part of the Virtual Cluster.
Finally, a strong impact at all levels will be given by ITC technologies and digital skills developed in the participants, allowing them to reach more stakeholders globally to develop future collaborations.

EU Grant (Eur)

Funding of the project from EU: 177670 Eur

Project Coordinator

Istituto Regionale per la Formazione e la ricerca & Country: IT

Project Partners

• Association for Social Cooperatives
• CENTRE RESSOURCES AROBASE
• SYNTHESIS CENTER FOR RESEARCH AND EDUCATION LIMITED
• Bruxelles Europe asbl