Cricket for Good

Making cricket accessible to people with disabilities

Having completed some really interesting projects with sports organisations focused around Football, Rugby and Skateboarding we’ve now begun a really exciting piece of work with Durham Cricket Foundation.

The top flight club, based at the incredible Riverside ground in Chester-le-Street has big ambitions for the future. Responding to new initiatives by the English Cricket Board the DCF is keen to grow its community programmes in terms of reach and impact. Goodlabs have been appointed to support the board and leadership team through the process of formulating a new strategy, rooted in insightful stakeholder consultation.

In addition we’ll help the Foundation to analyse and interpret data from their wide range of community activities in order to produce a new Impact Report to be published alongside the new strategic plan in 2025. There’s so much going on all across the age spectrum and all around the region. We’ve already been pleased to see a really strong inclusion agenda through which cricket is opening up all sorts of connected opportunities for groups of people who often feel left out.

To find out more about the Durham Cricket Foundation click here.

Children's Community Strategy

Every once in a while we’re approached by an organisation that, pressed by circumstances beyond their control, requires a piece of work done really quickly. This was the case when we were recently asked to support Wallsend Children’s Community, an initiative of Save the Children UK, to write a new strategy.

Supporting charities to create strategic plans is core business here at Goodlabs, using a tried and tested ‘impact-first’ approach. Engaging stakeholder groups, holding away days and co-creating ambition statements, objectives and goals are all part of the process. What made this assignment different, and challenging, was fast-tracking the process to take place over a six-week period.

Fortunately, on this occasion we had the ability to make room in our schedule, and the client was impressively flexible too. A good deal of prep work had been done which we were able to quickly consolidate in order to gather pace and hit initial milestones. As the project progressed a real sense of momentum developed that led to some great ideas emerging as a result of synergies that might not have been achieved had we not been so against the clock.

The final draft of the strategy, which centred around 4 headline objectives linked to 11 organisational goals was ultimately signed off bang on time.

If you’d like to explore how we might help you with a new strategic plan drop a line to: strategy@goodlabs.uk

A new strategy for a new chapter

We were really pleased to be able to support Emmaus Northeast with the development of their new strategic plan. An introduction was made via Lloyds Bank Foundation as part of our work on their ‘Enhance’ programme.

Emmaus Northeast is part of the wider Emmaus Federation which supports people who have been through significant hardships. Here in the North East the local arm of the charity supports a therapeutic residential community of ‘companions’ all of whom have faced many years of serious hardship. For many this has meant periods of homelessness, addiction and imprisonment.

The new strategy was needed following a period of substantial change including the arrival of a new Chief Exec, the welcoming of several new members to the board of trustees and not forgetting, the radically shifting post-covid operating environment.

As always, one of the highlights was the opportunity to facilitate an away day for the leadership team and trustees. Along with working through the important strategic decisions for the future it was also an excellent opportunity for the trustees to get to know another better and to align their new roles around key strategic priorities.

New CEO Ruth Parker reflected on the experience as follows:

“I was put in touch with Matt Wilson through Lloyds Bank Foundation as a highly recommended facilitator for Board Strategy events. The timelines were tight yet Matt made contact vey quickly and proposed his plans for the event. I wasn’t disappointed, the event ran so smoothly with Matt guiding board discussions throughout the day. I was particularly impressed with his professionalism and how much knowledge he had of our charity - he’d clearly done his homework and had a real awareness of the challenges and risks we faced. The work did not end there, Matt continued to support me in editing drafts of the plan which has been very well received. All the trustees have commented that they would like to work with Goodlabs again in the future. Thanks from all of us at Emmaus North East, your support was greatly appreciated.”

Listening to service users

Durham County Carers Support is a fantastic charity that we’ve had the pleasure of working with on a number of projects over the past few years.

Supporting charities to create new strategic plans is one of the “bread and butter” things we do at Goodlabs. Every new strategic plan is unique and interesting in its own way. What made this project particularly enjoyable was the commitment of Durham Carers to involve its service users in the strategic planning process. There was a real determination to design a method of engagement that would be both meaningful for the Carers participating as well as insightful for the charity.

Goodlabs designed and facilitated the process which involved live events in the four corners of County Durham. A lot of miles were covered that week but it was absolutely worth it! Whilst the same process was followed in each location it was fascinating to see emergence of some key local differences along with common themes. All the content generated was written up in headline format and fed into an Away Day for Trustees and key staff. Equipped with fresh insights from the frontline a range of strategic priorities for the future could be devised.

CEO Jenni Wood commented:

We’re really thankful for the support to review and develop our new 5 year Strategic Plan. It involved facilitating workshops with groups of Carers over a tight timescale. This was followed by meetings with staff, volunteers and trustees to scope out priorities and outcomes. Our new plan which clearly sets out our vision and aims for the future was produced efficiently and arrived on time. I can’t recommend Matt and Goodlabs highly enough.

Engaging Stakeholders on Purpose

Photo credit: Wokandapix at Pixabay.com

It’s been great to have the opportunity to work with Action Foundation again, this time supporting their new CEO to take a fresh look at the charity’s Purpose.

Transitions can be challenging times for organisations but Newcastle-based refugee and asylum support charity Action Foundation have been handling the handover of their senior leader extremely well. Looking to the long term their new CEO felt it important to take a fresh look at the way the vision and mission of the charity are understood and articulated. Via our mutual friends at Lloyds Bank Foundation we got together to consider what this process might mean.

It became apparent that having separate vision and mission statements wasn’t necessarily helping strategic clarity. At Goodlabs we’re seeing more and more of our clients opting for a single, powerful statement of Purpose. Once it was agreed that this was the destination the task was - how to get there?

Goodlabs were tasked with designing a Stakeholder Lab format that would engage staff, volunteers and service users in exercises designed to generate and refine the key ideas that form the essence of the charity. The Labs would be repeated up to a dozen times over a one month period with groups in Newcastle and Sunderland, as well as online. Probably the biggest challenge was with language, as for many participants English wasn’t their mother tongue. Hats off to the team we worked with who ensured that everyone present was able to fully engage and offer meaningful contributions.

Following successful delivery of the schedule of Labs we supplied an insights report summarising the key ideas that emerged and setting up the SLT for the remaining in-house task of wordsmithing their final statement.

“Wonderfully helpful” was the feedback received from the client.

We’re happy with that :-)

Working with Lloyds Bank Foundation

We are thrilled to announce that Goodlabs has become a consultancy parter for the Lloyds Bank Foundation. LBF is one of the most respected and reliable supporters of the charitable sector. Through its various grant making programmes in supports many hundreds of charities every year with almost £20 million of financial assistance. One of the special ways in which Lloyds seeks to make a difference is through a package of support known as ‘Enhance’. This support is directed not towards frontline charity services but rather to the strengthening of the charitable organisation. Essentially, the Enhance programme is founded on exactly the same ethos that Goodlabs is: helping you to do good better. Charities in the Northern region who are in receipt of LBF funding now qualify for packages of consultancy support from Goodlabs. The work we deliver within the Enhance programme will include our core offer around Impact Management culture and systems, our full range of Lab formats, plus bespoke services in the area of developing Strategic plans and broader Organisational development support.

Click here to find out more about the Lloyds Bank Foundation.