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Practical governance for volunteer committees and not-for-profit organisations. Hosted by governance consultants Kate Hartwig and Kate McPhee, each episode tackles one topic — clearly, honestly, and without the jargon. Short enough to finish before your coffee goes cold.
The Committee has been in its strategic planning session for three hours. They've got a long list of things they want to do, more events, new programs, better partnerships, and a shiny new website.
Kate H:Has anyone worked out why?
Kate M:Don't be silly. There's no time for why.
Kate M:They're already onto their third sheet of butcher's paper, Kate.
Kate H:Oh, well, in that case. However, eventually someone asked the big question. So what's our vision? Silence. Then a brave Committee member takes a deep breath and has a go:
Kate H:To be the leading organisation in our sector delivering excellence through innovation, engagement and strategic leveraging our membership base to maximise opportunities and create meaningful outcomes across the region.
Kate M:Yeah, wow. Did they write that themselves or did they swallow a management consultant?
Kate H:Oh, sounds very impressive, doesn't it? It's got all the right words in it. But here's the problem. Nobody in the room can explain what it means, including the person who said it.
Kate H:So the Committee has spent three hours planning what they're going to do without knowing what they're trying to achieve.
Kate H:Yep, pretty much. Before you decide where you want to go, you need to know why you're going there. And that starts with purpose. Welcome to The Committee Room.
Kate H:Welcome back to The Committee Room. I'm Kate Hartwig.
Kate M:And I'm Kate McPhee. We help volunteer board and committee members of small, not for profit organisations who feel overwhelmed, frustrated or just plain stuck to get their organisation back on track, meet their legal and compliance obligations and work better together.
Kate H:We are continuing our Planning with Purpose series. Last episode we looked at why planning matters and helped you work out what kind of plan your organisation needs right now. Today we're getting into the building blocks of a strategic plan. We'll start with purpose and values, move on to your vision, then look at the foundations, strategic pillars and goals that help turn that vision into a reality.
Kate M:And a quick note before we start, this podcast is for general information on best practice governance for small to medium associations. It is not legal advice. Righty o, let's get cracking. So back to our Committee and their three sheets of butcher's paper.
Kate H:And that's where a lot of committees get stuck. They jump straight into the list of things they want to do without agreeing on the reason behind activities or the principles that should guide their choices.
Kate M:So before any organisation decides where it wants to go, it needs to be clear about why it's here, why it exists. That's its purpose statement. So your organisation's purpose is linked to the objects in your constitution and they should stand the test of time. It explains why your organisation exists and what difference it exists to make. Some organisations use the word mission instead. Terminology varies, so be clear about what you mean and use that term consistently.
Kate M:For example, a community arts association might say its purpose is to make creative opportunities accessible to people in our community. That tells us why the organisation exists and is closely tied to its objects. It doesn't list its programs or explain how it will deliver them.
Kate H:Those decisions come later.
Kate M:Next comes your values. Now these are the principles that guide how your organisation behaves, how you make decisions and how you work towards your purpose. Almost every organisation has a list that goes something like this, integrity, respect, excellence, innovation, yada yada yada. And they're all lovely words, but the problem is that many organisations put those words on a wall or on the website and never actually do anything with them.
Kate H:Genuine values need context and evidence. Write a sentence or two about what each value means for your organisation specifically and then test it. Can you point to a recent example of the organisation living or demonstrating that value? For the community arts organisation we talked about last week inclusion might be set as one of their values. A recent decision that supports that value may be that they have put grab rails in the bathrooms or installed wheelchair access into their main room.
Kate M:It's not just wheelchairs either, Kate. Of course it's people who use walkers or are pushing babies around or just have a dodgy broken leg and are on crutches. These are all things that support the idea of making their physical facilities more accessible to support their value of inclusion.
Kate H:And putting money aside in the budget to do it. That's another really important aspect.
Kate M:So if you can't find an example in your organisation, it might mean that your value is aspirational rather than something that you are consistently demonstrating. So in other words, it's just a wish. It's not actually a value, at least not yet. And it's fine to have an aspirational value as long as you recognize that gap and are actively working on it. Otherwise, that value is just a decoration, and decorations don't guide decisions.
Kate M:And listeners, we're going to assume that you've taken the time to have a quick look back and a look around your organisation before you start this next step.
Kate H:So your purpose says why you exist, and your values guide how you behave. With those in place, you can ask the next question: What is the future you are working towards? Your vision describes the future your organisation aspires to create. It answers the question, Where do you want to be? Not How you'll get there. That comes later. A great vision is short, clear, memorable and genuinely inspiring. Most importantly it's about the what not the how. Now the moment you use words like by or through you may just have crossed into the how. So take this one for example: "to be the voice of our sector by growing our membership and through strategic partnerships".
Kate H:Now everything after the by is the how, so strip it back. Just "to be the voice of our sector" is much closer to a vision. Otherwise, it's just a work plan masquerading as a vision.
Kate M:So listeners, here's a couple of tests. Could someone read your vision statement and understand what your organisation is trying to achieve without knowing anything else about your organisation? Or could a committee member say your vision statement from memory?
Kate H:For our Community Arts Association, a good vision statement could be "a community where everyone has the opportunity to experience and participate in the arts". Now notice how that describes a future rather than listing workshops, exhibitions or partnerships. Google's founding statement was a good example of "what" not "how". It used to say to organise the world's information and make universally accessible and useful. No mention of technology, no search engines, no algorithms, there were no hows, but it accurately described what the organisation was trying to achieve.
Kate M:Sometimes a vision comes with a really big ambition attached to it. So, people sometimes call that a BHAG.
Kate H:Big, hairy, audacious goal. Which is a terrible name for a really good idea.
Kate M:So a BHAG is a goal that's big enough to make the Committee a little bit nervous. You know that kind of goal where someone says, could we really mixture of, like, half terror and half absolute excitement.
Kate H:And for a small volunteer organisation, that can make a real difference. People will give up their Saturday for something they believe in and want to work towards. They won't give it up for a long list of what you already do.
Kate M:So for the arts organisation, Kate, an example might be within ten years, we'll own our own community art space. It's bold, it's specific, and everyone in the room can picture it.
Kate H:Although, of course, if your organisation is struggling to get the newsletter out on time, buying a building might be a bitof a stretch, but that's what BHAGs are all about.
Kate M:Exactly. Exactly, Kate. So a big hairy audacious goal should stretch you,not snap you. It doesn't replace your vision or the practical goals that move you towards it. It gives everyone something to aim for.
Kate H:And not every plan needs one. Sometimes steady as she goes is exactly right.
Kate H:But if all your organisation's strategic plans are starting to look very much the same year on year with just the dates changed, it might be time to think bigger. Come on. You can do it.
Kate M:Kate, let's talk about some of the vision nightmares that we've seen. You know, those vision statements that are too long, that mix the what and the how, or are so generic could belong to just any organization. To be the best we can be tells you absolutely nothing. To make a meaningful difference in our community could be any organization. A vision has to say something specific about what your organisation is actually trying to achieve.
Kate M:So here's a practical tip. In your planning session, don't try to wordsmith the vision as a group. Gather the key words and phrases that matter.
Kate H:Brainstorm them, debate them, even argue about them, then agree on the core ideas, and then let someone draft the final statement afterwards. 12 people writing one sentence is how a ten minute job turns into a two hour argument about the word vibrant.
Kate M:So with your vision in place, so the picture that everyone's working towards, the next question to ask is what do you need to support it? And the answer is two things. You need your foundations and you need your strategic pillars. Let's start with the foundations.
Kate H:These are the things that underpin everything you do. They affect the whole organisation and they are intended to be broad in scope. And here's the good news, Kate. They are basically the same for every organisation governance, finances, and people.
Kate M:So governance is your systems, your policies, your processes, and so on. Finances are your physical and financial resources. So people are the skills and the capacity that your committee, your volunteers, your staff bring to your organisation. If any one of those is weak, everything you try to do on top of it gets harder and harder.
Kate H:If your governance is weak, decisions get made in the car park, nobody's sure who approved what, and the same old arguments keep on coming back and back and back.
Kate M:If your finances are weak, there's never quite enough money. You know, the equipment's held together with duct tape, and every new idea falls over as soon as someone asks how it could be paid for.
Kate H:And if your people don't have the necessary skills and capabilities, you tend to get the same three people doing everything. They're tired, nobody else knows how things work, and when one of them leaves, a whole chunk of the organisation goes with them.
Kate M:So before you get excited about a big new program or a big new project, make sure you've got the people, the money and the systems to hold it up.
Kate H:Now the foundations are quite separate from your day to day activities. Governance isn't a program you run for members. Governance is what makes it possible to run any program at all. So it doesn't compete with your other priorities. It sits underneath all of them and supports them.
Kate M:So let's move on now to the strategic pillars. These are the broad categories that hold up everything your organisation does, usually three, sometimes four. And this is often the hardest part of the whole process.
Kate M:Now your strategic pillars need to be broad enough to hold your organisation's strategic work, but specific enough to say something about who you are. So an example, a domestic violence organisation might have intervention, prevention and influence. A community organisation might have our people, our assets and our community. Or people, places and possibilities.
Kate H:A community sports association might choose something like on the field, off the field and in the community. All of those are good choices.
Kate M:They're fantastic choices, Kate. I love them all.
Kate H:And don't expect to get them right first go. Draft them, work through the rest of the plan, then come back and make the necessary tweaks. When you get the right combination, you'll know. You just know that that fits your organisation. Everything fits together and nothing feels forced.
Kate M:Once your pillars are settled, then each one needs goals. Now remember goals describe outcomes, not activities. So for our arts association, a goal might be 'to increase participation among people who currently face barriers to taking part'. Now a 'hold four networking events' is an activity, not a goal. Activities belong in the operational plan, which we'll talk about next week.
Kate M:When a strategic plan drifts into activities, the Committee drifts into management and the plan stops doing its job.
Kate H:So for each goal, you need a few strategies that will guide how you get to that goal. Now again, these are not operational, but they will set the big picture and give you an overview of the types of programs that you might develop.
Kate H:So different strategies but same logic. So each strategy supports a goal. Each goal sits within a strategic pillar, and the pillars support the long term purpose and the vision for this period. That's how the pieces connect.
Kate H:And remember that if the strategy isn't supporting the goal, the Committee needs to ask why it's being considered.
Kate M:Absolutely.
Kate H:So let's bring it all together. Start with your purpose. Why does your organisation exist?
Kate H:Your values guide how you behave and make decisions. Your vision describes the future you're working towards. Your foundations support everything you do. Your strategic pillars organise your priority and your goals describe the outcomes you're aiming to achieve to support your purpose and achieve your vision.
Kate M:And remember each goal is supported by two or three strategies which are not activities. Strategies are the approach you take to achieving your goal, not the specific things you'll do. So the strategic plan we've covered today tells you what you're trying to achieve. Your operational plan or plans, which we'll cover next week, say how you're going to do it. So, Kate, the whole point is to have plans that an organization can actually use that are really crystal clear, not plans that sit in a folder unloved or on a shared drive or buried on a website gathering dust in three different places.
Kate M:And a plan only works if people can see it and get behind it. Not just the Committee, but your members and your volunteers. Your staff if you have them, your partners and your sponsors. If the people doing the work can't tell you what the plan is trying to achieve, you've got a document, not a plan.
Kate M:But when you get it right and everyone's pulling in the same direction, you know, that's when the really good stuff in organisations happens. That's the stuff that warms the cockles of our heart. And really, Kate, that's why you and I do what we do, isn't it? Absolutely. Years of strategic planning and committees and policies and procedures and structures and organization charts is about helping organisations pull this stuff together to make that really good stuff happen for their communities and their members.
Kate H:And true confession time Kate, there was a time back in the day before anybody really heard of strategic planning, we didn't have a plan, you had a calendar of activities. And I look back at that now and think, God, I could have achieved so much more for those organisations if I'd had a roadmap of where we were going instead of simply a calendar of activities.
Kate M:Exactly.
Kate H:Probably more than anything else in your governance toolbox, planning matters.
Kate H:Here's your challenge this week, dear listener. Can every person on your committee explain your organisation's purpose, values and vision? Ask them at your next meeting. If you get blank looks or a long pause or five or 10 different answers, it's time for a whole new planning conversation. And if your organisation needs a strategic planning facilitator, someone independent to guide the process so everyone on the committee can take part, that's something Kate and I both do regularly. In our workshops, we use a simple framework that pulls all of this together on one page.
Kate H:Details are in the show notes.
Kate M:If you've got a governance question you'd like us to tackle on the show, the contact form is at thecommitteeroom dot com. Au, or you can contact us through our WhatsApp group, and all of those details are on that same page. We would love to hear from you.
Kate H:If today's episode was useful, please subscribe or follow wherever you get your podcasts and share it with someone on your committee or another committee. Show notes are at the committeeroom.com.au.
Kate M:Next time, now that you know where you're going, it's time for your organization to ask, how do we get there? So we'll cover operational planning using the sticky notes method and project plans and targets that are numbers, not hopes, And we'll talk about keeping your plans alive and kicking and enthusiastic and energetic right across the year. That's episode 29, Making It Happen.
Kate M:Until then, I'm Kate McPhee, Kate two.
Kate H:And I'm Kate Hartwig, Kate one.
Kate M:And this has been The Committee Room. Remember...
Kate H:You don't need good luck if you've got good governance.