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Meet the Researchers! – Professor Susan Baines

Research forms a crucial part of what we do here at the Centre for Enterprise, and in our new series we will be giving you the opportunity to get to know our researchers a bit better, and find out what they are working on right now.

Job title:  Professor of Social Enterprise

Length of time at CfE: Since June 2012

Please describe your current research in 2-3 sentences:


Currently I am Deputy Coordinator of a multi-national project called Innovative Social Investment: Strengthening communities in Europe (InnoSI) funded by the European Commission H2020.  This builds upon my experience of research about enterprise, communities and the social economy. 


What is the most exciting thing you have done as part of this project?

The most exciting aspect of INNOSI is the partnership of ten European universities along with ten non-academic teams (mainly NGOs) whose role is to help ensure the research will have an impact on policy and practice. It is also a new collaboration across faculties at MMU, with Humanities in the lead. The project is now entering its second year and its most challenging phase - collecting and collating primary data across ten countries.


Why is this project important and what do you hope to achieve?


INNOSI is a large-scale, multi-disciplinary study designed to produce robust, thoroughly documented evidence of the many challenges, successes and setbacks from implementation of innovative and strategic social investment at a regional and local level. I hope it will prove to be useful, practical, and influential. 


Other professional and academic interests:


I have researched and published on micro-businesses, social enterprise, social innovation, the social economy and public services.  Examples of other projects include: Making pub retailing greener: A university & private sector partnership to build and share research (ESRC Knowledge Exchange) and an ESRC Seminars Series (2014-17) entitled “Information Sharing in Policy and Practice: What needs to be shared (and not shared) when we share information?” I am a board member of the Institute of Small Business & Entrepreneurship (ISBE). For more details of my research and publications click here.


What is the best thing about working for CfE?

The Centre for Enterprise is exemplary for its success in working closely with a very wide range of businesses. Apart from that, the best thing about it is the commitment and expertise of colleagues.