New national Quality Standards Framework for Ireland’s enterprise hub, co-working and remote working sector unveiled

A new national Quality Standards Framework for Ireland’s enterprise hub, co-working and the remote working sector has been unveiled by Minister Damien English TD, Minister of State at the Department of Enterprise, Trade & Employment.

The development of the framework was overseen by a National Steering Committee, chaired by Minister English, was funded by Enterprise Ireland and managed and coordinated by the Community Enterprise Association Ireland.

Quality Standards Framework

The first of its kind in the world, the new framework provides a professional standard for the 350+ enterprise hub, co-working and remote working locations nationwide that play a pivotal role in supporting start-ups, SMEs, multinationals and remote workers across the public and private sectors.

Entitled QHubs, the overarching aim of the new quality standard is to raise the overall quality, environmental and innovation performance of the sector, due to the ISO standards the framework is grounded in, and ensure the national hub network continues to support the realisation of a sustainable and balanced regional development model for Ireland.

Committee members included senior officials from Enterprise Ireland; IDA Ireland; Skillnet Ireland; the National Standards Authority of Ireland (NSAI); the Department of Enterprise, Trade & Employment, the Western Development Commission; the Regional Enterprise Plans Programme and the County & City Managers Association (CCMA). Independent consultants Dolmen Design & Innovation were appointed to design and deliver the project.

When a location, centre or hub signs up to the new QHubs Standard, they will go through the following process to achieve their quality standards status:

— Engage in an ‘Innovation and Quality Diagnostic’ process to define their current status based on their strategic purpose, size, capacity and occupancy as well as services and facilities available.

This ranges from Level 1, which is a local community hub that provides good quality and affordable workspaces, shared services and networking opportunities, to Level 4, which offers more regional, national and international collaborations, shared learning and peer to peer opportunities, and market access for client companies that want to scale globally.

— With assistance from a dedicated mentor, each participant will identify their desired ambitions and goals, such as how to add value to the facility for client companies via improved services, products, experiences and upgrading business model and processes used. This offers an opportunity for locations to move up through the ranking system from Level 1 to 4, if that is their desired ambition.

— A customised ‘Growth Pathway’ will be developed to help each participating location work towards their targets, as well as access to the support required to achieve this. This Growth Pathway is verified by an external independent party.

— Annually all hubs will be measured and their progress benchmarked, with an external verification party reviewing progress in line with their Growth Pathway. To facilitate this, a range of KPI’s will be set in a variety of areas such as:

• Quality, Environmental and Innovative performance
• Community & Network
• Customer Experience
• Digitisation
• Job Creation

— As well as having access to a host of best-in-class resources, managers and team members of each location will be invited to engage in MentorsWork, a 12-week management and innovation programme from Skillnet Ireland and SFA.

Involving one-to-one mentoring, webinars, masterclasses and workshops, the programme is designed to meet the ongoing talent development needs of the managers and staff across the national network.

— An annual Benchmarking Report of the sector, broken down by county, region and sector, will be shared with all participants, while an annual Award Ceremony will take place to recognise growth and performance achievements as well as share best practice learning.

Minister Damien English said: “There is a significant number of remote working hubs and enterprise centres across the country which are valuable assets in promoting national, regional and local economic development. The Quality Standards Framework will further strengthen Ireland’s position as a world-class destination for remote working, support for entrepreneurship, collaboration, rural regeneration and enterprise development.

“The Quality Standards Framework is a key action of CEAI’s Regional Transformation Programme and has been supported by my Department’s Regional Enterprise Development Fund.  I am grateful to the steering committee for their commitment and determination to oversee this project which will benefit the development of the enterprise centre and hub space infrastructure in Ireland.”

Mark Christal, Manager of Regions & Entrepreneurship at Enterprise Ireland, said: “The new Quality Standards Framework is an important development that will prove of great benefit to this important and growing element of Ireland’s regional economy. It will not only establish standards for each location but also provide them with a framework on how development can be achieved and transparently reported.”

Gary O’Meara, Chairperson of Community Enterprise Association Ireland and CEO of Meath Enterprise, said: “We’re delighted that we were in a position to bring together such a dynamic group of key stakeholders to develop this world-class QHubs Standards Framework.

“At a time when the sector is more important to the Irish economy than ever before due to the Covid-19 pandemic, this system will enable Community Enterprise Association Ireland and our members to be even more ambitious, more professional, more creative and, importantly, more collaborative.”

For more visit https://communityenterprise.ie/