La mutualisation de services dans les entreprises de l'économie sociale

Abstract

At a time when markets are globalizing, the mutualization or the pooling of services is becoming more and more important for small and medium-sized enterprises, especially those of the social economy, that wish to remain competitive. The social enterprises have the particularity of trying to generate a social impact rather than making a profit for the shareholders. In short, these enterprises differ from the traditional forms of enterprises that are deemed capitalist. At the present time, the pooling of services seems therefore inevitable for the social enterprises to struggle against this mainstream economy. Through this analysis, we first want to discover the origins of collaborations and partnerships. Afterwards, we want to show the challenges and the benefits of the pooling of services for the social enterprises and highlight the different existing practises. In the second part, the experiences and knowledge of different managers will be discussed. All the results achieved will help us to draw major lessons and emphasise the logical and necessary steps to run a mutualisation project successfully. Briefly stated, this research aims to bring answers to the following question : « how to discern the appropriate pooling formula among those available for social enterprises ? »