Reflections on Committee Work and the Evolution of a Small Town Organisation

A long winded but hopefully useful blog for committee people.

I recently retired as Chair of B Sharp. As a goodbye, and in the spirit of Youth Music, I thought I would share some of what I've learned.

We talk a lot about the benefits young people experience when they play music together. In helping this process, adults benefit too.

This blog is about my experience of work at a committee level and aims to help leaders and committees of grassroots organisations start out. It also serves as a case study on the evolution of a small town organisation. 

While I’ve had some years of experience in leading various community organisations, I have always thought of myself as an enthusiastic amateur. I’ve attended the odd half or one day course, but most of what I have learned is through the example, conversations and mentoring by more experienced people on our board of trustees and those I’ve met through networks.

As B Sharp has grown, our networks have naturally grown too. The two rely on each other. As organisations grow, the range of expertise needed increases, as do structures for accountability and organisational safeguarding. Our networks help supply this expertise and advice, which allows us to grow, which in turn allows us to expand our networks.

Networks are about nurturing relationships with like-minded people. Perhaps the most important lesson I can share is how important it is for leaders to invest in relationships. Your learning and ability to recruit expert volunteers as ‘critical friends’ and committee members will benefit from this.

I’ve used the history of B Sharp to illustrate how one thing leads to another; is very much about process, all strengthening a structural foundation and attitude for the delivery of an organisation’s work.

B Sharp Beginnings

My involvement with B Sharp started in 2007 when my life long friend, Fran Williams asked me to be part of a new committee that would work with local young people, responding to their disaffection and make the things happen that they wanted to do. She had recently returned to Lyme Regis after many years in a varied youth and social work career. Our local youth club had closed and there wasn’t much to do in a rural area that appeared ‘chocolate box picture post card’; was part of a world heritage site; attracted a retirement, wealthy holiday and second home demographic and had a seaside seasonal low waged economy with poor public transport. Local children and young people were thought to be either ‘cute’ and perfect for Easter bonnet parades or ‘trouble’, depending upon age, and were receiving a lot of bad press.

We started B Sharp with good will and a ‘can do’ attitude, testing the waters and, crucially, involving young people in all processes, including representation on our management committee. The ideas that developed needed considerable time, good management and practitioner expertise to help young people realise their dreams. It was unreasonable to expect only volunteers to deliver this, especially if ideas and delivery were going to be sustainable over a long period of time. We needed to raise money, and more than the odd bric-a-brac/raffle/tombola/pub quiz could do. Grants were the obvious solution. To get grants, we had to have an organisational structure that gave accountability and safeguarding not only to our beneficiaries but also to the organisation itself. Structures for organisational safeguarding are the foundation of sustainability. They give transparency and confidence, especially to investors.

The first small committee was a mix of young people and community champions that had a variety of experience in working with the voluntary sector (see below), but none of us had set up something from scratch before. We sought advice from our District Council’s Arts Development officer (who sat on our committee for the first year) and decided to be an unincorporated community group – the simplest volunteer committee structure acceptable to funders – because we were experimenting and had an uncertain future – and adapted a constitution template given to us by the development officer.

Policies were few and basic – those required by funders, such as child protection. Again, we used templates from other organisations and adapted them to our needs and resources. We recognised the need for them and we followed them, but it would have been daunting to write them ourselves from scratch. Seek advice, beg and borrow templates. A bit rude to steal.

After our first general arts project funded by Awards For All, evaluation showed young people enjoyed the music element most. In exploring funding options for the follow up, we started our longstanding relationship with Youth Music. (It is worth noting that while we feel we have a really good relationship with the officers of Youth Music and they are happy to chat about things on the phone, we haven’t been successful in every funding application. The grant application assessment process is separate from the office.)

In 2008 I became Chair after our first Chair left the area.

Organisational Structure

As our work, budgets and financial responsibility grew, in 2011 we undertook a review of our organisational structure. We wanted to know if our stakeholders – young people, partners and parents etc. wanted us to continue, and if so what was the best structure for us to do so. We didn’t have the capacity to undertake detailed research, so Arts Council England (ACE) gave us a grant to resource this. We employed 2 people to help us (we knew them a little before this but our relationships really developed with this work) – both very experienced arts business managers – one was local, had experience as an ACE relationship manager and assessor for ACE grant applications, and we knew she was good through her help in a local campaign to keep our abandoned youth club in community hands; the other was a regional connection through our relationship with Youth Music and had a very good overview of sector thinking. (One is now a trustee and the other remains critical friend – especially when reading through major grant applications – evidence that one can recruit volunteers through introductions via paid work). Both have been fantastic grant application mentors to me. 

They did a thorough job, combining their strengths to give an encouraging stakeholder picture. Structurally, we had various options, such as a Community Interest Company, Ltd company with charitable status, or remain as we were – an unincorporated community organisation. We sought advice from Local Authority officers, Dorset Community Action and one of our committee members (now retired and missed) read a great deal and advised us about what each structure would give us, our subsequent responsibilities, both legally and as workloads.

We decided to be a charity limited by guarantee in 2012 because

• None of the management committee wanted to be paid.
• The individual financial liability of each trustee would be minimal.
• While we are a ‘business’ spending money on running a service and we try to diversify income to spread risk, we are not primarily trading to sustain ourselves.
• Charities have a greater access to grants and philanthropic good will.

Trustee Recruitment

A committee helps oversee policies, finances and direction of work that agrees with the aims and objectives outlined in its constitution. The membership of a committee is important to the success of an organisation. A good committee not only supports; it also challenges (in a supportive way). Members also have legal obligations, which vary depending upon the structure. Awareness of these should be part of an induction process.

B Sharp’s management committee has gently evolved – 2 have retired (and now myself) due to personal circumstances and others have joined for various reasons.

When Fran first gathered a committee together, in addition to young people, 3 adults were from The Marine Theatre (their Chair of trustees, Treasurer and manager) and myself (with our Local Authority Arts Development officer advising). The Theatre had recently become an independent trust after being an asset run for years by the Town Council (an unstable mix of enthusiasm and hostility, depending who was elected), and was eager to get young people involved in the arts, invigorating a new beginning. It was a serendipitous moment in the town’s cultural history.

Since then we have recruited from a variety of sources and networks. All of our committee have been directly invited to join us. We have tried advertising, without success. It seems that generally a relationship needs to be established first before an unpaid position of responsibility is taken up. This is more evidence that relationships are key to sustainability. Invest in relationships with all your stakeholders. You never know when they bear unexpected fruit.

The people who are the public face of your organisation are the best people to spot potential volunteers for committee and other work. Our Director has been the first point of contact for most of our volunteers, including trustees. Those at the coalface should keep an eye out for potential workers and volunteers.

Our trustee history illustrates this:

After our organisational development review which included a skills and needs analysis of our management team, we recruited one of the consultants we employed, and the parent of a beneficiary who had been consulted during the review and happened to be an arts manager of a large regional organisation. Another parent that had business leadership experience and was a commissioner for the NHS became a trustee a year later.

They added significant expertise and were very helpful in shaping

• Various policies that a charity and limited company needs – a financial reserves policy as a precaution for lean times and potential winding up, health and safety, complaints procedures, equality and diversity, a detailed child protection policy. Templates, often from their place of work were used.
• Taking out insurance policies, not just for public liability but also for the organisation and trustees.
• Financial reporting.
• Agreements and contracts for freelance staff and young people as they progressed through our progression continuum – leading to paid positions as Young Music Leaders and apprentices (our own style, not college accredited).

Without our trustees’ expertise in these areas, we would have not had such good and workable policies and without their prompting, may not even have had things like a reserves policy (something that has already paid off - we tapped into these reserves when we recently had a temporary funding shortfall due to a failed grant application).

We recently recruited 3 more trustees - one we knew through her job as an administrator for our Town Council (she was our Director’s initial point of contact with the Council) and now works for a charity recruitment agency – she is now our volunteer Company Secretary; one we knew through her work with our County Arts Development team (now the Dorset Arts Company) and connected well when she was on the same Amonite leadership course as our Director. Lastly, our new Chair, Hannah Lovegrove was recruited through social connections (both our Director and I knew her work as a local business leader and her work in the voluntary sector).

Listening to the comments and challenges of our trustees has been inspiring, insightful, full of learning for myself, and a joy to be part of. They clearly care a great deal for B Sharp, want to protect and nurture it, and put their efforts where their mouths are.

Strategic Work

From the beginning, we knew we couldn’t do everything on our own and had to join up with other organisations to share resources. This makes sense but isn’t always easy. As a Chair, I would sometimes support our Director by attending partnership meetings, while relying on her to agree the nitty-gritty details. As she organises the practical work, she has to have control over timetabling, resourcing and who will do what from our point of view. I would be there to help agree in principle the basics of what each partner would bring to the table, helping strengthen a holistic and strategic vision.

As part of that strategic vision, it helped to be kept informed about the developments in the sectors we are operating in – non-formal music education and voluntary sectors. I signed up to newsletters from NCVO (National Council for Voluntary Organisations), Guardian Voluntary, CCP (Cultural Commissioning Programme), Association of Chairs, Dorset Community Action, joined relevant groups on LinkedIn and of course, the Youth Music Network. Some have funding news as well as advice, so you can be aware of what’s available and their application deadlines. These newsletters are free and you don't have to pay to join the organisations to get them. I tend to binge on checking this sort of thing out – it is important to also keep a personal life going! Following Twitter feeds also leads to useful information – check out who follows who in peer organisations. It is worth taking a little time to do this occasionally and follow relevant people/organisations.

It has also been really useful to attend sector meetings – Youth Music grant gatherings, Music Inclusion meetings at various levels and regional/county arts forums such as Dorset Arts Together (now part of the Dorset Arts Company) - where over 50 Dorset arts organisations come together to work co-operatively and strategically within various interest groups. There is often no immediate reward; these things are like government and the wheels grind slowly, but rewards do come. We have also suggested initiatives, which regional group leaders chase up and develop, allowing us to participate later in a much larger project than we could have organised.

The Youth Music Network has been a fantastic resource. I admire so many of the insights that people share. It feels like B Sharp is part of a movement, with Youth Music a guiding light. The Network culture is really positive and understands the needs of young people, especially those in challenging circumstances. All your blogs show that good outcomes centre on building relationships based on trust and support. This applies to adult – adult working relationships too.

In attending meetings and reading newsletters and blogs, I have been able to contribute towards our trustees’ knowledge about our wider context and help shape a business plan that includes a SWOT and PESTLE analysis (Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats; and the wider Political, Economic, Sociological, Technological, Legal and Environmental considerations).

Business Planning

Becoming a charity limited by guarantee was not only a structural change; it was a statement saying we were in it for the long haul. This meant we needed a plan – not a one by one, start, stop, what next? project plan, but a long-term integrated and strategic plan that showed a way to have a sustainable future. This needed good research.

Committee members/trustees can contribute a great deal to this (e.g. all can write their thoughts for a SWOT and PESTLE analysis) but we needed someone who could spend time talking to established and potential partners, young people focus groups, parents etc. in the same way we did for our structural research. We were given funding by Dorset Community Foundation to work up a 3-year business plan. They later funded us to start strategically putting it in place.

When we were clear about what we wanted to do and our strategic priorities, the plan contributed towards the ‘evidence of need’ for our recently successful Youth Music Fund B application.

It is important to bear in mind that a business plan is a working document that will change as circumstances change and opportunities present themselves. A business plan is a flexible direction of travel.

Chair and Director Relationship

A strong element of B Sharp’s success has been the mutually supportive relationship between the Chair and Director/Chief Executive Officer (CEO). We were lucky to have been good friends for more than 30 years and understood each other well. Changing the relationship by working together has its risks to a friendship but in this case it has strengthened it. I have always thought that I am supporting her rather than being her boss. We work by consensus rather than instruction. She has the knowledge and experience of working with young people (and adults). She does the coalface work, manages, consults and develops ideas with young people and partners. I believe in her integrity and commitment. I am always at the end of a phone if needed and we spend some B Sharp time together a couple of days a week. Her strength is in relationship building. Mine is working with numbers, budgets and telling our story (I can go on a bit!). Plans often change due to partner circumstances. I often challenged the changes to make sure we will still achieve the outcomes we set out to do and that costs are in line with income. She has helped me appreciate that projects should not be set in stone, that they are about process and learning for everyone (and that is the point of them, not the format or recipe) and that there are several ways to cook an egg.

There will be a more formal relationship now that she is employed rather than freelance, but the Chair and CEO relationship is still about an attitude, mutual support and flexibility and one of the most important to get right in an organisation. See ‘A Question of Balance’ by the Association of Chairs. There is also a culture in B Sharp that we can independently seek advice from a number of sources, including other trustees and network colleagues.

Committee work

Meetings were initially light touch, reporting on progress, simple finances (we ran one project at a time, which contained all our costs including ‘core’ costs in one simple budget), and discussion about ‘what next’.

As we grew in experience and confidence, we started to develop multiple strands within projects, or run a couple of differently funded projects at the same time. While they were related and had pathways for young people and workforce development across the strands, reporting to the management committee became more complicated and time consuming – especially the finances. Finding a way to keep trustees aware of the finances yet not get bogged down in detail took time to sort out. We are in debt to our treasurer for her patience.

Different trustees had various suggestions about presentation and we tried numerous formats. Our treasurer now regularly works with our accountant who draws up our annual accounts, has had training in Quickbooks, and presents figures for project strands that show actual expenditure/income against forecasts, highlighting any significant deviations, their significance and potential problems; if there are any, (unusual) we then discuss options for adjustment.

Important but sometimes lengthy discussions about finance led to a drop off of young people attending meetings. We intend to have some meetings that will just focus on the practicalities of project work, where young people can share their experience of it and what they would like to do next. This advisory role could be before other agenda items so they can leave before the ‘boring bits’ (or stay if interested), or just gather everyone for a dedicated meeting to listen and share young people’s views. It is definitely useful for trustees to have direct feedback from beneficiaries.

The success of B Sharp is about the relationships that form between everyone involved, playing to individual’s strengths and supporting each other as a team. This is the heart of our ‘theory of change’ – change due to supportive relationships that bring out the best in people. Music is the tool to hang those relationships on. Group music making and singing is about teamwork and is a great incubator for co-operation, collaboration, confidence building, enjoyment, creativity and leadership.

This theory of change not only works for young people, but literally right across the board. Adults involved in teaching, management and our volunteers all have good stories to tell. Myself included. We learn from each other and the wider community of peers in our networks. As a volunteer, it has been immensely rewarding and the knowledge I have gained will be put to use in other areas of my life.

I’m not alone. A Guardian Voluntary blog cited a survey by Getting on Board (pdf), revealing 96% of trustees had learned new skills from sitting on a board, 73% said it had boosted their confidence and gave them experience they could take to their workplace; 38% said the role had inspired them to become leaders.

Change

Circumstances change, things evolve, people move on. Change can be imposed on us or we can choose it. Organisations need to anticipate change, respond and adapt. Some things are beyond our control and others we can do something about, or at least lessen the risk and impact of threats. It might be that the gatekeeper to a valued partner leaves and you have to start a new relationship, or a partner has cutbacks or folds. Traditional funders may have less money, but new income routes are opening with commissioning – perhaps needing outcomes that you already deliver but haven’t measured or focused upon yet. Managing change is partly about assessing and adapting to threats, but it is also about positive change, growing, increasing capacity to explore and responding to opportunities.

My intension to stand down over a year ago drew attention to succession planning. Organisations can often be built around a founder who becomes its heart and key to success. While celebrating that success, it is also a serious threat. If that person leaves or becomes ill, the organisation could be in trouble. It is important to plan for succession. While I have played a significant role in helping shape B Sharp, it wouldn’t be what it is without our Director/CEO and founder - she is the heart of B Sharp. (The name of her role is something we struggled to pin down without confusion for a long time – a jack of all trades – a freelance project manager, youth worker, participation and learning leader, ethos guider, funding co-writer and partnership initiator, yet the term ‘Director’ could be confused as a director on a company board. As I leave, we are now in a position to formally employ her as our CEO). Her loss is the biggest threat to B Sharp.

To mitigate against her loss (and others), we are gradually recruiting (as funds allow), up skilling team members and putting in place systems and data that can be accessed and used internally by the team (adhering to the data protection act), so that absences can be covered without loss of continuity, enthusiasm, ethos, integrity and excellence.

Recruiting in rural areas can be difficult. We widely advertised for a new Chair and I expected it could be a challenge to find someone reasonably local to take on a role that was unpaid yet had significant responsibility. We had no response to press, social media or other channels and I fully understand that it would be a challenge for anyone to suddenly parachute in to help lead a small but high profile and significant local community charity. Thankfully, through our personal networks, we found someone very capable and willing, and I am pleased to say that B Sharp will be in good hands after I leave. As I said, it is all about relationships! Now I can go travelling with a smile on my face.

It just leaves me to thank the B Sharp team, our supporters, Youth Music and its Network community (I have had the pleasure of meeting some of you at various gatherings and had blog discussions with others) for a wonderful personal journey.

Cheers and Tchao for now!