A Socialbox.biz Blog Post Update by Sam (4 April 2017) We are always grateful for any recommendation, commendation and collaboration for fostering ideas and systems to make the community outreach that much more effective helping maximise social impact and create the jobs of tomorrow. It is great to see some of the big businesses working with smaller socially focused startups on making a positive impact on our local community. We applaud any effort from large firms to further our social impact mission of making the world a better place, one donated laptop at a time via our Laptops for the Homeless, Elderly, Looked after children, and unaccompanied Refugee minors” and other initiatives in London and UK. We are determined on building unmatched social impact via successful social enterprise for the local community with the help of our clients .” Outstanding examples, inspirational and supportive business leaders The team at SocialBox.biz would like to extend special thanks to Paul Polman CEO at Unilever for the invitation to the latest Unilever Sustainable Living Young Entrepreneurs Awards attended by Socialbox.biz founder. The event is recognising socially focused entrepreneurs and their start-ups from all over the world in a number of fields. This is an excellent practical example of how some companies are connecting with those entrepreneurs who might otherwise not have a chance to realise their entrepreneurial ideas and drive whilst helping creating a long- term inclusive society.

As part of the prize, Dr Sara Saeed of doctHERs was awarded €50,000 and she is being supported by Cambridge Institute for Sustainability Leadership (CISL) and Unilever through a tailored mentoring programme over the course of the year. A number of other finalists received tens of thousands in funding and for their exciting initiatives and tailored mentoring support according to Cambridge University website. Unilever and CISL believe that the ingenuity and determination of the younger generation is critical in helping to identify sustainable solutions to what are often seen as impossible problems. Unilever CEO Paul Polman said: “We need new ideas, new energy, new business models – particularly from the young and the entrepreneurial. They need our help and support to realise their initiatives and change the world to create a bright future.”

Paul Buchanan, Executive Director, Business in The Community wrote to our founder during the launch of SocialBox.biz and said: ”It’s good to see you still blazing a trail on this important area”. In other news and developments; Socialbox is now working with a top UK University based social impact group on a study to further identify the value to companies participating in social impact activities and innovative ways of measuring it. This collaborative study is due to be delivered in 2019.

We are also seeking engagement from UK Universities to further assist them with their obligation towards the local community: SocialBox.Biz seeking to engage UK Universities in digital inclusion and laptop handover initiatives SocialBox.biz is now also donating laptops to the Refugee Support Network (RSN) for young people in their mentoring programme. Refugee Support Network helps young refugees, asylum seekers and survivors of trafficking to build more hopeful futures through education. https://www.socialbox.biz/socialbox-biz-working-with-refugee-support-network/ Socialbox founder came to the UK as an unaccompanied refugee minor age 15, after staying in a children’s home and foster family he was given work experience at Microsoft UK whilst still in his teens as a part of his BTEC business studies and then worked in the IT industry. A computer that was given to him changed his life as he was able to do his homework and later complete an honours degree in Computer engineering at the University of Westminster. Wanting to give something Peter now heads a technology social impact community interest company with a mission to put the majority of its profits into supporting social causes.

“When war broke out in the Balkans I was forced to flee. I arrived in the UK with only 30 Deutschmarks (about 10 Pounds) in my pocket and probably the same amount of English words in my vocabulary. But through hard work and the support of the community I came through and it’s fantastic to be able to give something back now.” Peter commented. Peter received the London Day Award certificate from former Mayor of London in recognition of his “outstanding contribution to life in London” and won several others awards. A while ago The Daily Telegraph spoke with Peter and called him a ‘born entrepreneur’ talking about how ran his first business at the age of 12, selling Commodore 64 computer products to friends and small businesses. Speaking with The Guardian newspaper some time ago during the Refugee Week he said: ”it’s different as a refugee my whole experience gave me an extra kick and motivation to do this.” A lot of these refugees really want to work, really want to get jobs but there’s a bit of a gap; a bit of a stepping stone missing in terms of experience, confidence, references, the language, as well as practical things”. London Evening Standard newspaper spoke to Peter recently and reported that; Social entrepreneur said the gift of a computer changed his life after he arrived in London as a child refugee from war-torn Bosnia. Now he is trying to make a difference to the capital’s homeless by handing them refurbished laptop computers to help them get online. The pioneering scheme aims to offer homeless people better access to the job market, so they can find and apply for jobs online, as well as other services like web learning tools… http://www.standard.co.uk/news/london/pioneering-scheme-launched-to-give-laptops-to-homeless-people-a3197616.html Advancement of Society A colleague and freelance writer Anesa recently commented in our constant positive impact blog on Word-press that there are various companies in this world that pride themselves on multiple things such as how large the company has become since inception, but not many can say they put advancement of society as first with their practices. We hope that this will be an example for other businesses to follow. At Socialbox.biz our services to businesses and our culture of being an example will hopefully transition 2017 into the year that businesses in general take stock of where they are and whether a drive for profits is really and truly the main goal and motivator. More about Socialbox.biz solutions to corporate social impact social purpose problems