At the Centre of the Local Community
Strategic plan 2014 – 2019 (2017 review)
Content
Chairman of Trustees’ Foreword / Introduction /
Overall Strategic Objectives /
Our Challenges /
Key Success Indicators /
“Volunteering and a strong voluntary sector are inextricably linked with the health of local communities.”
Maldon & District CVS champions the work of voluntary sector and volunteering organisations working within the district and surrounding area. We support, connect and represent those organisations and individuals in our local community that each day make a difference to the lives of local people.
If we are to support organisations and individuals and empower them to achieve and contribute to their full potential our organisation, Maldon & District CVS, must be able to deliver services to them at the highest level.
As a Board of Trustees we understand the strong partnerships will provide a solid foundation for reciprocal understanding and respect across sectors. We are committed to be a central conduit for our members in that regard. We recognise that statutory and health partners share our aim for strong healthy communities with people helping people and identify a key role for Maldon and District CVS to facilitate, develop and deliver.
The Strategy set out in this document aims to outline the role Maldon and District CVS must play in championing the value of the local voluntary sector and community and our commitment to working in partnership to support health and happy communities.
Dr Sara Ketteley
Maldon & District CVS Chair
Introduction
Maldon & District CVS has a proven history of developing, nurturing and managing community projects.
Through this the organisation has learned much, retained its integrity and links to the local community and will use the knowledge gained to inform its future strategy.
Maldon & District CVS is respected and trusted by service users, local influencers and those working in local and regional government. We are committed to nurturing a thriving local voluntary sector and an ethos ofvolunteering that is recognised and actively supported by the community and local statutory agencies.
The strategy will allow Maldon & District CVS to:
- Meet the needs of members and the wider local community.
- Be at the heart of the local community.
- Pursue excellence by benchmarking against and taking a lead role in best practice (continuous learning and improvement).
- Maximise limited resources.
Ensuring that Maldon & District CVS is viable and fit for purpose by developing and maintaining highly valued and credible services that are focused on the needs of local communities and are targeted on excellence and continuous improvement is vital to our future. We will achieve this through effective governance and management, well-motivated staff and developing partnerships that support the work we do.
Overall Strategic Objectives
- Governance Maldon & District CVS is a capable organisation with effective governance offering value for money in delivery of voluntary sector infrastructure support services. Committed to continuous improvement, effective use of resources and collaboration.
- Finance Maldon & District CVS is financially responsible complying with all requirements as set down by the Charities Commission and Companies house. Focus is given to effective cost management and income generation opportunities.
- Representation Maldon & District CVS enables effective representation of the voluntary sector to a range of strategic partners though:
- active engagement and dialogue with commissioners
- remaining appraised of local sector provision and priorities
- continued participation in strategic forums
- Profile Maldon & District CVS and it’s projects are accessible across a range of communication platforms to a variety of audiences including the local community, sector partners, statutory agencies, local dignitaries, key post holders and member groups. The impact of our service is recognised and valued.
- Wellbeing Maldon & District CVS works pro actively to support the growth and development of healthy, happy communities. Working in partnership with statutory agencies to identify local priorities and deliver community led solutions.
- Support Maldon & District CVS provide high quality, responsive and bespoke support to local voluntary sector groups to ensure they are well managed, informed and capable.
Our Challenges
Changing Focus
As funding landscapes change for both the voluntary sector and statutory agencies value for money, fiscal savings and delivery against identified priorities begin to carry increasing weight with commissioners and strategists. Where much of our monitoring has been output based around levels of support, new approaches mean a change in our focus to effectively demonstrate the impact of our work against priorities. This presents a challenge for us to develop a new way of working potentially allocating more resource to following up, monitoring and case studies which must be managed against an impact on delivery.
New relationships
Fostering relationships with key post holders and local dignitaries will be a key part of our objective to establish ourselves as relevant to the delivery to local priorities and critical to part of the commissioning and delivery system to help with Essex public sector commissioning and demand management challenges. This is a challenge as officer and members change and commitment to building ongoing relationships at both staff and board level is vital.
Maintaining partnerships
At times of change there is a risk for organisations to look internally and adopt a self preservation approach, however key to thriving in a changing environment where resources are limited is often partnership working and collaboration. A key challenge is to maintain the balance between open transparent partnership working across sectors, ensuring we do not succumb to mission drift and our key areas of delivery are recognised and respected.
Increasing income levels
As an organisation that repeatedly sets a deficit budget increasing levels of income must be a key objective and remains a challenge. A project based approach has been successful in both supporting the needs of the community and bringing income into our core delivery. The challenge presents itself in translating this into longer term stability and maintaining a balance for staff resources which become stretched as more projects are delivered. Reviewing all income routes, projects and strategies is an ongoing priority for the board.
Member involvement
As a member based organisation we are keen to welcome more input from our members on our service delivery and at board level. Annual member surveys provide us with information on the key themes where they are looking for support or have concerns however increased involvement at a strategic or board level is sought. There is a challenge to foster increased involvement with members who already have increased pressures within their own operational spheres.
Key Success Indicators
- Financial targets relating to both income and expenditure have been met or exceeded.
- 100% of trustees have undertaken training relevant to their role.
- Member groups are actively involved in shaping services and have representation on the board
- An effective monitoring framework records our impact against identified priorities and levels of delivery
- Feedback on services to our members is positive and included in promotional avenues.
- M&DCVS is a central and respected part of key partnerships such as ECVS and Volunteer Essex
- M&DCVS has a strong marketing presence through a range of media
- M&DCVS staff and board are known to and respected by key stakeholders
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