Step by step guide to help social enterprises and social businesses assess and improve the readiness of their teams and organisation when scaling impact and operations. This guide is based based on the PATRI Framework for Scaling Social Impact.

1. Readiness To Scale:
A Guide for Scaling Social Business
Rizwan Tayabali
Supported by Ashoka Globalizer

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3. Adapted from
The PATRI Framework
for Scaling Social Impact
© Rizwan Tayabali, 2014
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4. The PATRI framework takes you step by step
through all the aspects of diligence needed to
understand whether or not scaling is feasible
for you and if so, to produce an effective scaling
plan that you can follow during implementation.
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5. PATRI
Framework
I
Purpose
II
Applicability
(Viability)
III
Transferability
IV
Readiness
V
Implementation
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6. An overview of the complete
PATRI Framework, is provided in a
linked presentation called ...
“PATRI Framework for Scaling
Social Business”
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PATRI
Framework

7. Caveats
1. The following guide is specifically targeted at social
businesses and therefore places an emphasis on
financial viability along with impact i.e. It is
designed for organisations that create their impact
through the use of business models.
2. The PATRI Framework is focused on scaling rather
than incremental growth. If you are simply aiming
to set up operations in another location or enter
another market, then the framework will still offer
you value, but some aspects of it may only be
applicable a bit further down the line.
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8. The 1st step of the Framework is to define
purpose and targets, without which you have no
useful basis for planning or design.
If you haven’t already got clarity around
these, more support is provided in a
linked presentation called ...
“Defining Purpose: A Guide To
Scaling Social Business”
Purpose

9. The 2nd step of the Framework, is to understand
whether or not your model will be applicable at
scale, and if not, how you could adjust it to
make it more relevant and viable.
If you haven’t already considered
applicability, support is provided in a
linked presentation called ...
“Applicability at Scale: A Guide To
Scaling Social Business”
Applicability
(Viability)

10. The 3rd step of the Framework is to
improve your solution and model’s ability to
be replicated or delivered by others i.e. to
ensure that it is systematic and transferable
for use in scaling, either by your own teams
or by external partners.
If you haven’t already addressed
transferability, support is provided in a
linked presentation called ...
“Transferability for Scale: A Guide To
Scaling Social Business”
Transferability

11. Once you have standardised your
methodologies and processes, you can begin to
focus on whether or not your organisation and
people are ready for scaling.

12. This guide thus focuses specifically on the
4th step of the Framework, which helps you
establish whether or not your organisation
and people are ready for scaling, and if not,
what you can do about it.

13. Readiness
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14. It is worth evaluating organisational readiness
prior to implementation because the costs
involved are typically significant, not just in
terms of infrastructure, but also in terms of
time and effort required to embed new
working practices.
Readiness

15. Once you go past this stage, you will also begin
to commit significant resources to scaling, and
it will get harder and more painful to back out
or change direction if things don’t work out as
planned.
Readiness

16. As the costs and implications aggregate, this
therefore is the final stage at which you can
safely decide whether or not to proceed with
scaling in the way you expect.
Readiness

17. Key
Factors
Organisational
Design
Optimal Size
Decision
Making
Resistance to
Change
Knowledge
Technology
Infrastructure
Readiness
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18. Regardless of approach, the process of scaling
is likely to require a degree of organisational
evolution and some increase in size.
Readiness
Organisational
Design

19. Existing capacity and expertise may need to be
redeployed to focus on scaling, and new teams
and skills may need to be created.
The way your organisation is designed needs to
be flexible enough to support this.
Readiness
Organisational
Design

20. You can improve flexibility by...
1. Reorganising your teams, roles and
responsibilities into verticals that directly
reflect core strategies and components.
2. Reducing management hierarchies by
moving towards a skill oriented one.
3. Focusing rewards on collective
outcomes rather than individual ones
4. Devolving decision-making and rewarding
initiative & entrepreneurialism
Readiness
Organisational
Design

21. Scaling can require technical skills that aren't
necessarily present in social organisations, and
often requires a level of capacity that can't
easily be fulfilled by overstretched teams.
This is especially so when you are embarking
on new pathways to making an impact.
Readiness
Optimal Size

22. Increasing the workload of existing teams,
especially when this includes new activities
they aren't familiar with or specialised for, can
introduce a significant element of risk and
operational stress.
Readiness
Optimal Size

23. Estimating workload at this stage will therefore
give you an early idea of the kind of resourcing
it will actually take to effectively implement and
deliver outcomes at scale.
Readiness
Optimal Size

24. The key is to map out the skills and capacity
that you think will be required for setting up
and executing your chosen mechanism(s) of
scaling.
Readiness
Optimal Size

25. An effective way to do this, is to
1. Identify the programs and activities
needed to deliver your core strategies
2. Break those activities into component tasks.
3. Then estimate the skills and effort required
to execute those tasks to the quality you need.
Readiness
Optimal Size

26. The end result should allow you to establish at
least a fair understanding of what your optimal
size and structure should be, both to kick off
the scaling process, and to eventually run and
manage delivery and outcomes on the scale you
are aiming for.
Readiness
Optimal Size

27. Having established what you need, you can then
evaluate whether or not the skills are easily
available to your organisation, what it will cost,
and subsequently whether or not procuring
them is likely to be a feasible option.
Readiness
Optimal Size

28. Small and mid-sized social organisations are
often structured around a single founder or
leader, which can lead to decision bottle-necks.
Readiness
Decision
Making

29. With only so much time available to any
individual, scaling priorities can mean a
diversion of attention away from the original
endeavour, which often puts not just the impact,
but also all existing operations at risk.
Readiness
Decision
Making

30. The ideal scenario would involve a dedicated
team that is able to focus on the planning and
set up of any scaling endeavour, with only a
high-level involvement of the leader or
leadership team.
Readiness
Decision
Making

31. If this doesn't seem feasible, and you can’t
finance an increase in leadership capacity, this
again should drive a reconsideration of scaling
plans, or change in timeframes to allow for
developing internal resources to fill that role.
Readiness
Decision
Making

32. Scaling often has significant organisational
impact, not just on workload, but also on
internal hierarchies and expectations.
Readiness
Resistance to
Change

33. Any activity that changes internal parameters
or pushes people and teams out of their
comfort zones needs to be carefully managed.
Readiness
Resistance to
Change

34. It can otherwise result in unexpected and
sometimes extreme behaviour, including both
intended and unintended sabotage as
individuals look to maintain the status quo
while things are changing around them.
This is known as resistance to change, and is a
real and well documented risk.
Readiness
Resistance to
Change

35. As a leader or founder too, it is important to
consider the implications that scaling will have
for you, and whether or not it is something
you're comfortable with.
Readiness
Resistance to
Change

36. The best way to manage resistance to change
is to put resources towards a decent
change-management programme, underpinned
by a good internal communications plan.
Readiness
Resistance to
Change

37. Decisions need to be thought through and
benefits carefully communicated to ensure that
teams and staff feel supported and engaged,
have realistic expectations and are genuinely
behind the scaling effort.
Readiness
Resistance to
Change

38. As you scale you will also learn more about the
domain and issue that you are trying to impact.
Readiness
Knowledge

39. If you don't have a good knowledge-sharing
culture, a lot of this learning will remain
isolated.
Most commonly, the result is an ongoing
reinvention of the wheel with resulting losses in
efficiency and effectiveness.
Readiness
Knowledge

40. This learning alternatively represents
opportunities to drive continual improvement,
and consequently refinements and increases in
quality of outcomes.
Readiness
Knowledge

41. Both factors make it worth investing in
managing and sharing knowledge when scaling.
Readiness
Knowledge

42. A good place to start is to
1. Make strategic planning and design
freely accessible to internal teams
2. Embed ongoing team learning reviews
3. Invest in the systematisation of your model
(see section III.Transferability)
4. Set up information repositories to make
knowledge easily accessible across your
organisation or partner network.
Readiness
Knowledge

43. Most small or mid-sized organisations have
very basic office level hardware, networking
and security, potentially with shared drives, and
the primary use of technology is e-mail.
These systems can get rapidly overwhelmed
when scaling, and are difficult to standardise
in terms of working practices.
Readiness
Technology

44. On an operational level the key is to check
whether your hardware and software have
enough spare capacity to accommodate more
users and more data, and whether or not they
can adapt to different needs or uses as your
organisation or network evolves.
Readiness
Technology

45. Technology can also have great
strategic application.
Readiness
Technology

46. From the web to partner portals, platforms,
intranets and social commerce, technology can
be a great enabler for scale.
In today's world of ubiquitous mobile access,
SMS messaging and apps can also help access
and interact with beneficiaries in a wide range
of environments.
Readiness
Technology

47. It is therefore worth considering and building
the costs of technology into your planning, or
alternatively managing the rate of scaling
in a way that doesn't overwhelm the technical
infrastructure that you have.
Readiness
Technology

48. Infrastructure implications should have been
factored into your choice of scaling pathway
already, but at this stage it warrants a deeper
analysis to ensure that you aren't putting
your organisation at risk of being
overwhelmed when scaling.
Readiness
Infrastructure

49. Even if your scaling pathway does not explicitly
involve organic growth, most scaling efforts do
require some form of organisational evolution
and increase in size.
Readiness
Infrastructure

50. The scale of your ambition and related
optimal size may require more physical space
to support these changes.
Readiness
Infrastructure

51. If you are also planning to enable physical
operations in multiple locations, there is a
direct implication for physical infrastructure to
support that too.
Readiness
Infrastructure

52. Physical infrastructure isn't just
limited to space.
New premises still have to be filled. You will
need to consider the costs of fixtures and
fittings, furniture and computing hardware,
plus any other equipment that your teams need
to perform their work or deliver impact.
Readiness
Infrastructure

53. The feasibility of raising the finance/funds to
enable this increase is a critical factor in an
organisation's ability to deliver impact on scale.
Readiness
Infrastructure

54. If the costs of organisational readiness seem
too high, you could consider sharing and re-use
strategies, or limit your scale ambitions to
prevent overloading your physical and
logistical resources.
Readiness

55. You could also adjust your design to increase
the autonomy of partners or local units to
reduce the load on your organisation, or simply
decide to let others scale your impact for you
by making your model replicable and openly
available for them to independently use
and apply.
Readiness

56. When you have understood what is required to
get your organisation and people ready for
scaling, you can move on to the final piece of
the process, which is to prepare for
implementation.
Readiness

57. A guide to the next step of planning and
creating roadmaps for implementation is
provided in a linked presentation called ...
“Implementation at Scale: A Guide for
Scaling Social Business”
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Implementation

58. ©Rizwan Tayabali, 2014
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