PRIME Initiative

PRIME’s main goal is the relief of unemployment - particularly through helping people become self-employed.

In our Memorandum and Articles PRIME’s charitable objectives are described as: The relief of unemployment in the United Kingdom (with particular regard but not solely restricted to the encouragement of self-employment) of members of the general public who are over the age of 50, who are not engaged in paid employment and who would benefit through enhanced income, opportunities for engagement in meaningful activity and the prevention of social exclusion.

Source: Entry at Central Register of Charities maintained by the Charity Commission for England and Wales

Our current business plan says:

PRIME’s mission is to ensure everyone aged 50+ has the opportunity for financial, social and personal fulfillment through sustainable self-employment, business or social enterprise.

OVERVIEW OF PRIME PROVISION

Who does PRIME help?

PRIME works principally with people over 50 who are not aware that self-employment is something that could provide them with a living. These are over 50s who:

• have worked in a job for many years and then were suddenly made redundant:
• left work to look after someone - often a sick relative, and then find they are no longer wanted in the labour market:
• have taken early retirement and then found they cannot afford to live on their reduced pension:
• though working, see redundancy looming;
• have always had a dream of starting a business or have a business idea, but do not know how to go about it
• want the freedom and personal satisfaction of running their own business.

PRIME offers them all help by raising their awareness of the opportunities; offering mentoring assistance; providing personal development related to self-employment; signposting publicly funded provision; creating micro-finance loans; offering post-start-up support, sometimes through an olderpreneur club; and helping people to develop a strategy for leaving their business with a retirement income.

What does PRIME offer?

PRIME has developed a unique expertise on 50+ self-employment and enterprise and is in demand for:

• delivery of advice and support
• inspirational events
• specific training programmes - for clients and those who seek to help them
• mentoring, particularly at the early stage of a client’s enterprise journey
• micro-finance loans
• work books and guides
• one-to-one guidance and help
• research (see Research)

PRIME offers different services to meet the varied needs of people aged 50+. These range from:

• a concentrated delivery of services, often at a one-to-one level, usually delivered in the more economically depressed areas like the ex-mining areas of Derbyshire or the ex-shipbuilding communities of Belfast:
• training programmes and workshops: to
• the provision of guides and workbooks.

In any region or area, PRIME works to complement existing provision, often concentrating on the pre-enterprise phase of the journey to self-employment, by creating awareness and recruiting, developing an understanding of enterprise, creating self-confidence, offering a mentor to provide support at a stage when someone is making life-changing decisions, and helping each client to formulate a business idea in the light of their knowledge, experience and skill. Examples of our work can be seen in PROJECTS above.

Not only can PRIME manage and deliver local self-employment and enterprise support and help to the growing number of over 50s who will find it increasingly difficult to find a job, but PRIME can also train your staff who will have to help an increasingly large group of workless over 50s.