Entrepreneurship in Homes and Neighbourhoods

Entrepreneurship and small firms are seen to have important roles in facilitating economic growth. Debates and policy strategies focus mainly on access to business capital and the creation of entrepreneurial environments in designated areas such as Enterprise Zones while a great potential for local growth occurs 'under the radar' of enterprise policy and business services: many people start their businesses from home, and many business owners operate mainly from their homes. Home-based businesses are very significant as at least half of all small- and medium-sized businesses in the UK and the US are home based, and the proportion of home-based businesses is rising over time. This applies to rural areas in particular, but is also apparent in suburban areas and cities. We expect that more people now use their homes to start-up their own businesses than prior to the economic crisis in 2007/08, because of rising unemployment and a drop in the level of business funding.

Entrepreneurial activities are also influenced by the local neighbourhood context. For example, local networks in the neighbourhoods where potential entrepreneurs live are important for generating and realising business ideas. For those who mainly run their business from home or those who want to set up a business, coffee shops or other local places are important for meetings and social networking. Successful entrepreneurs are also significant 'role models' for (young) people in their local neighbourhoods.

Despite the fact that homes and their local neighbourhood contexts are important for many entrepreneurial activities, there has been very little academic research on home-based businesses. The importance of homes and their local neighbourhood context for enterprising people is also largely ignored by policymakers. For example, social housing regulations have prevented people from using their homes for business purposes. In contrast to 'mainstream' enterprise policy and research, this Seminar Series seeks to develop new perspectives in local economic growth based on the notion that home-based business activities are essential to increase start up rates and to promote economically lagging and deprived communities.

Main topics we will work on with a group of international researchers from different disciplines, practitioners and policymakers over the duration of three years include:

- Understanding home-based businesses: Why the home? How entrepreneurial are they? Was the house chosen/designed with a business in mind?

- Home-based businesses and their local settings: What are their wider benefits for communities? Are they able to revitalise/stimulate villages and 'bedroom suburbs'? Can they act as driver of economic growth in rural/suburban/urban localities?

- Neighbourhoods and local networking: How can local authorities/communities stimulate start-ups, and how can they benefit from local entrepreneurship? How important are local neighbourhoods for the social networking of (potential) entrepreneurs?

- Planning, regulation, finance, and technology: To what extent are home-based businesses below the regulatory radar? How can home-based businesses be supported by planning and regulation?

An important aspect of this Seminar Series will be to engage with policymakers and practitioners. Two seminars will be hosted by key government bodies: the Department for Business, Innovation & Skills (BIS) and The Scottish Government.

It is also important to learn from other countries and their approaches to local economic growth and entrepreneurship. For example, Dutch researchers have developed innovative ways to think about local entrepreneurship by looking at the social capital of neighbourhoods for fostering entrepreneurial activities. One seminar will be hosted by the OTB Research Institute for the Built Environment at the TU Delft (Netherlands). We will also invite international researchers and practitioners to seminars in the UK.

This Seminar Series addresses the intertwined issues of entrepreneurship, housing, and neighbourhoods. The beneficiaries span different policy and practice areas, professional groups and academic disciplines:

- Policymakers in enterprise policy at UK, devolved, city and local levels, in particular the Department for Business, Innovation & Skills (BIS), and equivalents in the devolved administrations and City Councils, will benefit through knowledge of the economic significance and wider benefits of home-based businesses in the UK and other countries and a better understanding of start-up processes and economic growth. Specifically, the Directorate for Business of the Scottish Government is interested in learning how to strengthen communities as part of their assets-based approach. BIS considers this Seminar Series as important for the work of its 'Local Growth' team. The Barnet Council and the London Assembly Economy Committee at the Greater London Authority have indicated interest to actively engage in the Seminar Series in relation to developing their future local economic growth strategies.
- Policymakers in housing and neighbourhood policy, in particular the Department for Communities and Local Government and the Homes and Communities Agency and equivalents in the devolved administrations, will benefit from this Seminar Series in understanding the links between housing and neighbourhood policy with enterprise policy, and the economic outcomes of housing.
- Business support services and sub-national economic development agencies (e.g. Business Gateway), will gain a better understanding of how people start-up businesses and the needs of home-based businesses. This is of relevance for national/regional funding schemes and advice services.
- The Seminar Series will be of relevance for lenders in better understanding the nature of home-based businesses, access to business finance, and barriers to economic growth.
- Home-based business networks such as Enterprise Nation will benefit through contacts to policymakers and the development of networks to researchers established by regular seminars and the JISC mailing list.
- Social housing providers and house builders will learn how entrepreneurship can be facilitated in social housing and through house design. In particular, social housing providers will benefit from networks to policymakers to discuss future regulations in social housing. This is of relevance given that the most recent round of welfare reforms will have a significant impact on the under-occupancy rule ('bedroom tax') from April 2013.
- This Seminar Series is of relevance for the entrepreneurship community across different academic disciplines. Entrepreneurship researchers in economics and economic geography will benefit from the exploration of theories in other social sciences including neighbourhood effects and neighbourhood change, housing, social capital, community development and assets, social economy, and empowerment. This cross-fertilisation of ideas and theories will enable a better understanding of the economic outcomes of individual behaviour.
- The interdisciplinary nature of the Seminar series will add to housing and neighbourhood research across disciplines by developing linkages between neighbourhood change and community development with agglomeration and cluster theory, economic behaviour, and economic growth. This will enable a better understanding of the economies of neighbourhoods and the role of housing in the economy.

There is the potential for exploitation of outcomes of this Seminar Series in the UK, England, Scotland, The Netherlands, Germany and elsewhere. In the short term, new strategies for economic growth in local authorities/communities could be developed based on empirical evidence and international practices discussed in the seminars. In the long term, new policy and institutional connections may be encouraged by the outcomes of this Seminar Series across the UK.