The Social Enterprise Management (SEM) Program is a grassroots-level social capacity development training program anchored on Social Entrepreneurship concepts. It aims to increase one's knowledge and competencies in managing a social enterprise towards long-term sustainability and develop lifelong skills through integrated self-mastery modules.
SEM is intended for grassroots social entrepreneurs and social enterprise managers of pre-social enterprises, mainly: Low-income class households and most likely have only received very basic formal education in their lives; Organizations that are in the formation stage or that are still in the process of becoming social enterprises; and Enterprises at the pre-commercial level of operations and may not yet be clear on whether they are actually social enterprises.
The core topics of the SEM Program include the following: (1) Introduction to Social Enterprise Development, (2) Self Mastery for Social Entrepreneurs, (3) Opportunity Seeking, Screening, and Seizing, (4) Establishing Social Enterprises, (5) Marketing: Market Research and the 7 Ps, (6) Operations: The Enterprise Delivery System & Determining Market Expectations, (7) HR: Organizing Social Enterprises, (8) Finance: Constructing, Analyzing, & Forecasting Financial Statements, (9) Social Impact Management, and (10) Social Enterprise Planning.
The SEM Program was initially developed as a project under the Gender Responsive Economic Actions for the Transformation of Women or GREAT Women Project 2 Program of the Philippine Commission on Women (PCW) with financial support from the Government of Canada.
In the past, the SEM Program has been delivered through government agencies and non-government organizations, with a number of SEM trainers having been trained and accredited to teach the program in various regions across the country.