The Outcome

• Ability to relate to a diverse staff and get them involved
• Engaging us in the planning or project
• Free and frank advice – ‘telling it how it is’
• Clear and attainable capability planning
• Accurate and complete capability and resource review
• Values definition with a range of staff, supported by clear goals and action planning
• Achieving the outcome with us

Working with ChangeWorks

We have always had excellent service from everyone we have worked with from ChangeWorks. Over the years PCC has developed a special relationship with Shona Mainwaring and find her knowledge, expertise and ability to relate to all members of our diverse staff to be invaluable. Shona has never failed to deliver anything but a quality outcome for us and this is why PCC has an on-going relationship with ChangeWorks based on confidence in the outstanding quality of results.

Don’t take our word….

“We have always been confident  that the outcome of the projects ChangeWorks has completed for us have been of the highest quality, rigorously researched, using the most appropriate management techniques or tools and delivered in a highly professional manner with a personal touch.”

David Rolfe
Acting Chief Executive
Porirua City Council

Our plans suggested we needed NZ$3.8 million in the next financial year to achieve our goals for that year. We were struggling to raise half of that and our current financial year operating costs were NZ$1.6 million. We were concerned we were actually developing a top heavy organisation when we needed resources at the front line supporting athletes and volunteers. We asked SPARC for help. SPARC suggested we consider ChangeWorks. We knew ChangeWorks had completed similar review work and were known for their understanding of the issues that face the sporting and not-for-profit sectors. They came to grips with our organisation quickly, challenged our thinking and delivered the results we were after. The return in the first year on our investment in ChangeWorks will be at least 600% and the impact on our effectiveness is greater than that.

The Outcome

We have implemented a new organisational structure where all but two staff are directly working on school or community sport issues with strengthened leadership and accountability for distinct work. Our stakeholders and staff are commenting regularly on the improvement. Funders are rewarding us.

We now have a clear focus on growing and supporting the core Special Olympics community through schools, clubs, volunteers and coaches and building a network of people who advocate and support the unique quality of Special Olympics for athletes. At the same time we have decreased the amount of money we need to raise while also increasing our focus on raising funds. Our attractiveness to funders has increased because we have removed layers of “national office” overhead cost while increasing focus on the people we serve.

The clear benefits in re-focusing our organisation have been:

• paying more attention to our core frontline activities
• huge cost savings – we are around 40% below the previous year’s expenditure and spending less than one third of planned expenditure while achieving plan outcomes.

Working with ChangeWorks

The key insight from ChangeWorks during this organisational change process was for us to organise around the community network we serve rather than by programmes we offer or traditional not-for-profit management roles. We also accepted that our CEO needed to be our Chief Fundraising Officer as well as the leader of our team. These insights were invaluable and it was because they knew our sector so well. We ended up asking ourselves why it had taken us this long to work it out!

ChangeWorks were direct in their advice throughout and provided huge value for us. We are extremely grateful for this.

David Rutherford
Chair
New Zealand Special Olympics 

The Challenge

YHA needed to make a substantive commitment to their people’s professional development and help support those who had self-elected for transition from front line to senior management positions. At the time there was an absence of any organisational support or systems for those who wanted to progress to higher leadership roles.

The Outcome

The clear benefits of the Leadership Development Programme have been:

• realising and better identifying true talent and leadership potential
• an investment in human capital with greater efficiency and productivity gains
• consistent behaviour that supported the wider change management process
• a deeper commitment from their people with no participant turnover
• a clear message to employees that the organisation was willing to commit and invest in their professional development
• leadership in action working on real work challenges that they could apply immediately
• leadership skills that developed them individually as people and for the organisation
• a significant improvement in organisational engagement, morale and culture

Working with ChangeWorks

“They worked hard to achieve the outcomes we were seeking and were always very responsive to our specific needs and requests. They worked in a mutually-respectful and professional manner throughout and their match of consultants to the differing participant personalities was also invaluable. I would have no hesitation in recommending them to peers and colleagues.”