Facilitating the formulation of a new strategic plan

Background
The Actors’ Benevolent Fund, set up in 1882, provides support to professional actors and stage managers who are in need. In recent years the charity has been through seismic change and Action Planning has helped with a range of services, including newsletter design, recruitment and governance training.

The most recent requirement was to run an awayday to introduce a new strategic plan, initiated by newly appointed CEO Alison Wyman. The brief was assigned to Action Planning Associate Consultant Felicia Willow. 

Brief
Felicia was asked to facilitate an awayday for the Board and leadership team, with the aims of identifying aspirations for the future of the charity, and for trustees to shape the strategy and future direction.

Process
Felicia worked closely with Alison to discuss what she wanted to get out of the day. “I knew the sorts of areas that I wanted the Board to talk about, but Felicia was really helpful in how we could do that, eg exercises to stimulate ideas and discussion and keep the energy in the room.”

Ahead of the day, Alison had had some discussions with her co-Chairs, sharing her thinking, which they helped to shape. The three sub-committees had also met to start talking about the future, so Felicia and Alison were able to incorporate some of their thinking into the awayday plan.

On the day itself, Felicia kept the programme moving and energy levels up with questions and exercises designed to encourage openness and connection. Questions like “what each individual could do to encourage a positive culture within the charity” opened up some lively discussions and helped delegates to bond.

“It felt like we really connected,” said Alison, “relationships were built.”

Outcome
“We came away with four strategic goals agreed and our mission, vision and values agreed,” said Alison. “I wanted high-level agreement on the strategic goals, and that’s allowed me to write up a strategic plan and financial framework to take to the Board.

I thought the day itself went really well. It was good to have someone else facilitating it because I could then enter into the conversation, rather than thinking about the logistics. I felt there was a very high level of energy.

Some people commented that it was one of the best awaydays they’d been to, which I would agree with. It felt like everybody was really hungry for change and really open to it and everyone was very aligned. It made the conversations very productive because everyone was on the same page. We had some very open, very frank conversations.

Insight
When I design and run awaydays, I think a lot about energy levels, different personality types and the ideal outcomes. Energy and enthusiasm can flag when sessions are too long, or too predictable or too samey, so I build my days around doing different things in different ways, using participatory activities to encourage everyone to contribute, and making sure I think about things from the perspectives of different personality types (I’m a qualified MBTI facilitator).

Time-keeping is also really important, as is knowing when conversations need to run a little over, so running a day can be an exercise in organisation and flexibility combined, and being able to know when to move things around and when to move things on.