Life’s already really tough, but worse is coming. The Government and the Charity Commission have both published their strategies for us; where's ours?

There are 3 key strategic factors at play and, it's not about whether these will happen, but how negative the impact will be; there isn't an upside to mitigate the impact.

It's bad already - we already face huge challenges. Demand continues to rise, for most, income is flat and nearly 20% of charities are 'struggling to survive'. Results from the Charity Sector Data Store support this and, even more worryingly, indicate that this is being compounded by a lack of realism in planning and target setting.

It's going to get worse - we are plagued by scandals and subject to greater public scrutiny than ever before. The Government response has been to increase regulation, in a sector that's already heavily regulated and staff hard pressed. Unsurprisngly, this is having a negative impact on our ability to deliver. Admittedly, there's a huge amount of guidance available, but it's produced by dozens of different organisations and can be hard to find; many can't.  

Equally, the scandals have exposed widespread, very serious issues and some have been going on for years. Sector leaders were aware of this, but failed to act. It's no longer whether these issues will impact on fundraising, but to what extent. If we don't now address these, the news could potentially be very bad and the flagship launch of the IDO sector's response on 18 October appears to have fallen short of what we were all hoping for. A 'double whammy', in that we're becoming less able to deliver operationally, with the funding we have, whilst also becoming less able to raise the funding we need.

And, it could get very much worse - we face a 2nd 'double whammy'. The last recession hit charities doubly hard by simultaneously increasing demand and driving down income. The next may well be on the horizon. If Brexit proves to be the trigger, at best it’s going to be bad for the sector, but it could be disastrous.

A perfect storm? None of us can know what the future holds, but we potentially face operational delivery hampered by increased regulation, recession driven increased demand for services and plummeting income from a combination of a recession and falling public trust in charities. A perfect storm that could become a race to the bottom. We need to do more, do it better and do so urgently, but without additional resources. That’s a huge ask of already overstretched charities.     

To do so, we must use the limited resources we have ever more efficiently. We are driven by passion, but our inefficiency is a well-known weakness. In part, due to a lack of board/executive skills, in often very small organisations led by unpaid volunteers, but also inappropriate cultures in some and the hollowing out of core services in others. 

The Charity Excellence Framework was created to help turn this weakness into an opportunity to respond to the challenges we face.  

With charities already overstretched, it had to be very low cost/free, easy to use and low workload. It also had to be people, not process, focused and link users to the resources they need, be available to everyone UK wide and highly flexible, to accommodate the huge diversity of organisations. 

These findings became the design objectives of the Charity Excellence Framework. It exploits low cost digital technology, with each phase designed to build on the previous one, to enable rapid development, whilst keeping cost very low. The result is an ambitious, but achievable plan to support frontline charities in meeting the challenges we face.

Phase 1: Digital Mentor – achieving more, reducing workload and improving finance

A free online toolkit for trustees and senior teams that is low workload and very easy to use. It creates a unique framework to meet the individual needs of each charity, optimises reporting for its specific priorities and links results individually to relevant free resources, using its 3000+ links to material produced by 100+ organisations.

It takes 2 mins to set-up, each of the 8 questionnaires 30, and from the interactive dashboard it’s no more than 2 clicks to reach everything. If you haven't yet joined our community, sign up now at Charity Excellence Framework. You'll not only be helping your own charity, but also (anonymously) contributing data that will help the whole sector, see below. 

The Data Store. Is now live – the system enables overall sector performance to be monitored using the interactive dashboard, with a query system for in-depth analysis, using 100 criteria. Over 4 years, 1000 organisations would create a database of 3.5 million pieces of data.

Exploiting the data. It is proposed that a working group of sector leaders be created. Not to create more work, but to use the data to better understand gaps and needs, so that resources can be focused more effectively and coordinated to avoid duplication. The system will need more users, before the data is fully robust, but it’s already identifying opportunities. Additionally, as the system links people to the resources they need, it will enable increasing numbers of people to find and use the resources produced. It’s not about replacing what is being done already, but rather maximising its impact.

Web Based Access. Access can be given to any organisation, with the data displayed tailored to their various member groups. This would require a total of about £3k in developer costs to create the functionality to do so.        

Stakeholder questionnaires have been created and mapped to the core system to create digital shareholders. Giving them a real voice and enabling charities to be much more sensitive to their needs. The system assesses critical soft issues, such as culture to help ensure issues are identified and resolved, before becoming the problems we read about in the Media. The developer cost would be circa £5k.

There are no UK wide qualifications for senior staff that cover all aspects of charity activities and most programmes are expensive. The CEF has been designed, so that it’s structure, content and resources could be used to create a low cost, online, work-based learning qualification for CEOs UK wide and includes a Fit-to-Practice accreditation framework. It would ensure that those who lead as CEOs have the capability and personal qualities to do so, and provide appropriate professional recognition for those who do. 

There’s no one solution, but the Charity Excellence Framework was specifically created to provide the tools and data to play a part in that. This isn’t about asking for money, but rather an invitation to sector leaders to take ownership of the CEF and use what it offers to create and collectively lead a strategy for us. The way forward for the CEF will be decided by those who accept.