​Human Lending Library launches at The British Library

Expert Impact’s unique ‘Human Lending Library’ launches in-house at The British Library, providing mentoring for social impact businesses with introductions and advice from some of the world’s most successful entrepreneurs.

London, UK 27th September 2018: Expert Impact is proud to announce that the British Library will run the first in a series of global ‘Human Lending Library’ franchises from its Business & IP Centre. Over the next year, other prestigious libraries around the world will join the Expert Impact movement, launching their very own Human Lending Libraries and building a powerful global network.

Founded in 2013, Expert Impact is a charity that helps social entrepreneurs to achieve scale, via introductions and advice from experts. The company’s flagship mentoring programme, the Human Lending Library, allows aspiring social entrepreneurs to ‘borrow’ successful Experts for an hour of one-to-one advice and the potential for long-term mentoring.

The Experts are successful founders who have scaled at least one business and are now donating their hard earned knowledge and networks to help social entrepreneurs make positive change. Experts include The White Company Founder Chrissie Rucker, Julian Metcalfe of Pret A Manger and Itsu, and Sir Charles Dunstone, Founder of Carphone Warehouse.

The Human Lending Library has already connected more than 200 social enterprises with some of the world’s most successful Founders, resulting in investment, new NEDs/board members, priceless introductions and huge satisfaction on both sides.

The impact has been huge, with social enterprises increasing in size by an average of 58% within six months of meeting an Expert. To date the Human Lending Library has helped create over 500 jobs in the UK, generating in excess of £20 million in new turnover.

Cemal Ezal, Founder of Change Please says of the programme: “Imagine getting an expert all to yourself, to address all of your biggest challenges in an hour. This is exactly what Expert Impact does. I cannot recommend it highly enough.”

Expert Impact’s mission is to support as many amazing social entrepreneurs as possible, to change the way we do business, and to address the challenges society faces today. By working with the dedicated team at British Library, and other exceptional libraries around the world, we can support more social enterprises, and facilitate rapid beneficial change.

Isabel Oswell, Head of Business at the British Library said “we are thrilled to work with Expert Impact to support the roll-out of their Human Lending Library. Over 60% of our business users are motivated by making a social or environmental impact and expert mentoring is a great way to give ambitious social entrepreneurs a competitive edge.”

Social entrepreneurs can apply to the Human Lending Library by visiting http://www.expertimpact.com/apply-now.

The British Library Business & IP Centre helps people from all walks of life to start, protect and grow successful businesses. It does this by combining the Library’s £5 million collection of business and intellectual property resources with events, support and networking in an accessible and inspiring space.

Expert Impact helps social entrepreneurs to scale with introductions and advice from experts.

_{Please feel free to use this video natively on your site or social media to publicise The Human Lending Library. The video is the first in a new series from Expert Impact called 'Expert Advice' and features John Frieda. If you'd like to use it we ask you publish it in it's entirety of 56 seconds, plus link to http://www.expertimpact.com and tag us on the relevant social media platform, all links below:}

_{https://twitter.com/ExpertImpact}

_{https://www.facebook.com/ExpertImpact/}

_{https://www.linkedin.com/company/expert-impact/}

###