Case Study - Organisational and Revenue Review

The organisation

We were recently invited to visit an established and successful community centre in the East End of London. They have a well documented track record for delivery and within the local community they are held in high regard. They operate the usual range of community services from child care, after school and homework clubs, to adult literacy and numeracy classes, access to the Internet, advocacy and safe refuge.

Our involvement

During our first visit we used a number of formal and informal tools to assess and review the organisation on site. One of the formal tools we used was a Red Ochre diagnostic questionnaire, the results of which can be shown in written and graphcial formats. We also made use of structured interview techniques, and also informal opportunisitic and ad hoc interviews with a variety of stakeholders as they were dealing with the organisation through a normal working day. We have found this tends to show the gap between the perception management have of how their employees and stakeholders view them and the reality.

During the course of our initial visit and immediate follow-up our activity included assessment, evaluation, review and critique of:

• Organisational structure
• Management strucuture
1. Staffing issues
2. Trustee issues
• Marketing and communications function
• Fundraising strategy
1. Earned revenue planning
2. Revenue diversification
• Legal and Compliance
• ICT, security and Operational Continuity

Although the community centre in question was well governed with a solid organisational basis and succession planning we identified a number of issues that bore further scrutiny:

• An overlooked earned-revenue opportunity that was able to begin generating revenue within one working week of our initial visit
• Fundraising options not considered in the strategic plan that bare closer examination and offer exciting potential for long-term sustained funding generation
• Operational Continuity and Disaster Recovery issues were identified for further discussion at a later date
• ICT security and compliance issues were identified and mitigation procedures set in place

Robert Foster