Collective thinking on future strategy
CLIENT
Abound Communities
SECTOR
Independent and assisted living; Aged care
DATE
May – August 2024
Challenge
After many years of continuity, significant leadership changes occurred at Board and Executive in 2023. New leadership judged the their Strategy and associated frameworks were insufficiently robust, and did not enable clear decision-making on partner and project opportunities. Additionally, the Board had significant appetite for innovation and a desire to move to a model of co-creation between Board, Staff and Residents.
The desired outcomes included that
Directors, staff and residents have co-created future scenarios for Abound
Directors have interrogated scenarios and built a strategy that can drive action and decision-making towards a chosen ideal future
Response
I designed and implemented a process including:
3x residents workshops to discuss hopes, issues and possible futures, framed around three potential scenarios I developed with the Chair and CEO
Interviews with members of the Executive
Designed and facilitated a joint Board-Executive strategy retreat, in which we
discussed internal and external context, with a talk and Q&A with Tom Symondson, CEO at the Aged and Community Care Providers Association
applied a Value Growth model to develop future scenarios
heard the current organisational context from the Executive
shared honest and open viewpoints on current and future challenges, particularly new regulatory frameworks, changing demographics and emerging social and medical needs in the aging population
Results
Constructive collegial relationship development between Directors and Executive
Consensus on the value of co-creation with residents
A clear assessment of future opportunities for growth
A clear strategic response to the current contexts:
Executive to focus ‘inwards’ on organisational renewal over the coming year,
Directors to support Executive in this work, and lay foundational policy and stakeholder connections to enable Executive action ‘outwards’ next year
Client Testimonial
The Chair collected feedback from multiple Board members, including
the process worked well
he was very astute with the governance issues
had a great combination of knowledge, experience, and capacity to apply both
new people especially seemed comfortable to speak and discussion generally felt open, including openness to disagreement
it both released and contained our thinking in practical ways
