#012 (October 2022): What helps when times are tough
Hello friends
We hope this finds you well and you’re doing OK in these economically and politically uncertain and difficult times.
Best self and great teams: What helps when times are tough
We know times are difficult and uncertain for people working in VCSE organisations, supporting people and communities through this cost of living crisis on top of all the pandemic (which still isn’t over, of course) asked of us. We think it can help to understand how you can be your best self and how we can work together in great teams. Our Best self and Great teams frameworks might help with this.
By best self we don’t mean some unattainable, shiny, mythical version of yourself. We mean understanding how things are for you now, what can help you look after yourself, use your time well, reflect on how things are, communicate what’s important to you, and do your best for those you serve every day.
And by great teams it’s about understanding what ingredients make a great team, how people work well together on a shared plan, how we deal with conflict and tricky conversations, and how we feel psychologically safe with each other. All even more critical when we’re under pressure.
What would help you and your team at the moment?
Lead and manage 2023: Best self, great teams and amazing together
We’re working on the next piece of our leadership framework jigsaw — Amazing together — in readiness for running a new leadership and management programme in 2023.
Our current thoughts are to run one day for each of Best self, Great teams and Amazing together frameworks with a half day at the beginning and another at the end so we can start and end well as a group. We’re thinking about running this over four or five months so it’s at a pace people can fit into their full schedules as well as to give more time for people to connect with each other, building relationships and grow their networks. As you’ve come to expect from us, we’ll be designing interactive, generative days, encouraging people to learn from each other as well as us, keeping it practical, and sharing great resources.
If this sounds like it might be for you or your team, let us know.
Things we like
01 Good day at work
New Robertson Cooper research Good day at work helps you recognise what your people need to be able to say “I had a good day at work today”. Plus how to go about creating more Good days at work and top tips to get started. Also join their Good day at work challengeweek starting 24 October.
02 Trustees week 2022
Trustees’ week is a good time to learn more about being a trustee or improving your trusteeship practice. This year it’s 7–11 November. For events and resources have a look at Getting on Board’s Festival of trusteeship, NCVO, Young Trustees Movement.
03 What next for Levelling Up?
Join VONNE at their online annual conference and AGM to hear from key voices in the region on Levelling Up on what has happened so far, what is likely to happen, and how the VCSE sector can act collectively and positively to set a new direction for our region.
04 UK Civil Society Almanac 2022
NCVO has published the UK Civil Society Almanac 2022, the latest available data on the voluntary sector’s finances and people. It’s a fascinating read and will help you understand our sector.
A few things we’re pleased about this month
We worked with Carers Trust Tyne and Wear earlier this month to start work on their new two year business strategy and to strengthen the connections and working relationships between senior managers and trustees. You can read more about their day on their blog. We love our one to one work with local organisations (we call it Reflect, learn, plan, change). The organisations and people are always deeply impressive, and the work is so rewarding and nurturing for us as well as them.
We’ve joined VONNE’s Thrive Hub with Carrie Brooks and Tom Watson. We’re all bringing the best of our work to strengthen the work of our sector. We’re working on a full launch in spring 2023. Exciting.
We ran our Leader and manager as coach programme, encouraging more people to catch the coaching bug. We’re aiming to grow a coaching culture in the north east VCSE sector so this really helps (as will our Coaching for social change 2022 event on 1 November).
What’s in our diaries
Coaching for social change, 1 November
A free event hosted by us with NE Coaching Collective all about the unique power of coaching to support individuals volunteering and working for positive social change in our region.
- share stories of how coaching has helped VCSE organisations and individuals. We’ll hear from Samantha Jones, deputy chief executive officer at Rape Crisis Tyneside and Northumberland and David Woolley, chief executive at Your Voice Counts and social change leader John Harrison
- launch a new coaching for social change offer for small VCSE organisations (turnover £250K and under) and people working independently for social change in the north east to try out coaching
- start a conversation about how we can grow and nurture a coaching culture in the VCSE in our region
North East Together: Collaborating for social change, 30 November
We’re coming back together at Newcastle University Business School for the first time in over two years for a mix of great speakers, action inquiry and guided networking.
We’ll hear about collaboration and collective leadership from Janet Whitley and Dot McLaughlin from Collective Leadership Scotland who will bring their wisdom, learning and some of their approaches to us in the north east. We have on our minds how the pandemic has affected how we collaborate and hope what we can learn from Janet and Dot will help us be super collaborators in the north east. We’ll also share the NET collaboration toolkit we’ve been working on.
And finally…
…What’s still lovely
Cheerio for now.
Stephanie, Robert, Cath, Duncan and Marie
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