Write the Ends (or Goals)

A vast amount of volunteer time was devoted to writing the Ends Statements that we are using this year to guide our work.  (These Ends Statements are in the first section of the Governance Document that you can link to from the Governance webpage.) However, as soon as we put them to use, we realized that they need some adjusting before we move ahead next year.  And how did we put them to use? 

The Executive produced a work plan (this is also linked on the Governance webpage as the “2010-2011 Executive Work Plan”) for the year that was based on the Ends Statements.  As soon as he attempted to do that, we all saw that some of the finer points in the Ends Statements (we haven’t yet figured out any sensible thing to call the bulleted points under the major Ends Statements in the Governance Document though we’re working on it) were redundant, misplaced or hard to enact.

Still, we were mightily impressed at how beautifully the basic system has worked so far.  We have Ends that we’re aiming for, and we have the entire staff along with the volunteer groups that they lead, heading for those Ends.  And every month, the Board gets an update from the Executive on the progress he and his staff are making on the Work Plan.  So far, so good.