South African lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and intersex business owners and entrepreneurs – and their supporters – are urged to register for the SA LGBTI+ Business Network Summit 2021/2022.
Hosted by PLUS. The LGBTI+ Business Network, registration is free and online here: http://lgbtiplus.com/annual-event-registration/.
The Summit will take place at the EY Offices, 102 Rivonia Road, Sandton on 27 January 2022 from 08h00 to 16h00. A reception and cocktail dinner will follow at the Indaba Hotel in Fourways from 18h00 to 22h00. PLU. however, reserves the right to limit numbers.
PLUS. aims to champion, promote, support, and empower LGBTI+ owned businesses and entrepreneurs with valuable opportunities to learn, network, do business and prosper. As such, the theme for the non-profit organisation’s latest annual colloquium and networking event is ‘Capitalising corporate supply chain and supplier development programmes to scale up your business’.
“We’ve made tremendous progress over the past four years advancing the rights and causes of the LGBTI+ business community. However, the emergence of the pandemic has highlighted the need for us to pull together and sharpen the tools in our business toolkit so that LGBTI+ entrepreneurs can help make the world a fairer place while more effectively pursuing opportunities as suppliers and valued business partners,” says Dean Ebden, a longtime media and hospitality entrepreneur and PLUS’s recently-installed 2021/2022 chair.
He is joined by PLUS’s 2021/2022 Board of Andrea Maharaj, Simphiwe Tshabalala, Fanney Tsimong, Samantha Samuels, Nduduzo Nyanda, Neo Modisakeng, Fundi Ndaba, Jason Fiddler, Heinrich Gottsche, Thembinkosi Kitshini, Petros Abraham and Zini Godden who will all devote much of their valuable time over the coming year to ensure LGBTI+ SMEs not only recover from the pandemic but thrive as LGBTI+ businesses by profitably tapping into supply chains. In particular, BBBEE Codes and the ins and outs of doing business with corporates will all be addressed at the Summit.
The outcomes that will be focused on are better understanding of the BBBEE codes relating to ESD pillar, understanding how to access the corporate supply chain, the ability to evaluate one’s own business readiness for corporate supply chain interaction and, ultimately, a healthy increase in the number of LGBTI+ owned businesses participating in corporate supplier development programmes this year.
PLUS. was launched on 17 May 2017 as a response to a consultation conducted by The Other Foundation. This focused on business owners and individual service providers who agreed that there was a need to support LGBTI-owned businesses through a business network or chamber of commerce.
Affiliated with US National Gay & Lesbian Chamber of Commerce (NGLCC), America’s leading LGBT+ business growth organisation, PLUS is now addressing the scarce employment opportunities and discrimination in the workplace that are harmful to the wellbeing of LGBTI+ people. In particular, the provision of valuable opportunities to learn, network, do business and prosper will help contribute to the redress of past structural and economic injustices, as will the provision of education and mentoring to LGBTI+ and allied businesses and professionals.