Charity Strategy - A Simple Strategic Plan Template For Charities

Charity strategy can be time consuming, so I've created a very quick and simple to use charity strategic plan template that works for all charities and non profits.  You can also use it to quickly test your existing charity strategy and scope the underpinning business, budget and risk management plans.  There are charity strategy FAQS at the end.

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Step 1 - Defining Your Charity Strategic Plan Objectives

To define your charity strategic plan objectives, imagine that you are 3 to 5 years in the future. What do you think were likely to have been the most critical external issues that impacted on your work? Taking into account your organisational strengths and weaknesses, how effectively do you think you will have been able to respond to these external opportunities and threats?

In light of the above, what will you have achieved and how has this has impacted on your mission and stakeholders?

Step 2 - Your Charity Strategy

What difference will this have made in terms of achieving your charity's strategic aims?

• This is the impact you aim to achieve.

What will you have achieved to get there?

• These are your strategic plan objectives.

What capabilities will have been required to make that happen?

• The organisational capacity and skills you will you need.

How did you resource this?

• Your underpinning finance and income generation strategies.

What will you need to achieve next year to make the above happen?

• Your annual business plan objectives.

What will you need to achieve to resource this?

• Your budget and income generation plan.

What challenges will you face and how will you address these?

• Your in-year risk management plan.

Reality Testing Your Charity Strategy

None of us can know the future, but to what extent were your answers above based on the best information you might readily access and how realistic were they?  Ambition is commendable, but setting strategic targets you can't achieve is planning to fail.

Developing and, as yet, unknown global, national and local issues will have potentially huge impact on all of us. Doing what we've always done isn't an option and how your well organisation has prepared for these may well be the difference between success and failure.

So, a final question to ask yourself. If I'm leading my organisation, but not doing strategy, then who is?

Create or Improve Your Fundraising Strategy

This toolkit with give you a simple practical process to create your fundraising strategy and plan, to increase your income.

How Charity Trustees & Management Can Achieve Even More

A registered charity ourselves, the CEF works for any non profit, not just charities.

• Funding Finder - with categories for Core Cost Funding and Small Charities & Community Groups.
• Help Finder – find anything for free, including companies that make financial donations and raffle prizes.
• Data Finder – for fundraising bids & research, impact reporting, planning and campaigning.

Plus, 100+downloadable funder lists, 40+ policies, 8 online health checks and the huge resource base.

Quick, simple and very effective.

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To access help and resources on anything to do with running a charity, including funding, click the AI Bunny icon in the bottom right of your screen and ask it short questions, including key words.  Register, then login and the in-system AI Bunny is able to write funding bids and download 40+ charity policy templates as well.

Charity Strategy and Strategic Plan FAQs

• What is a charity strategy.  A charity strategy brings together internal strengths and weaknesses with external opportunities and threats to create a longer-term plan to ensure your charity remains sustainable and delivers its charitable purposes.
• Who sets the strategic direction of a charity? Strategy is a key governance activity, and it is the trustees who must set the strategic direction for the charity.
• Who is responsible for charity strategy?  Trustees are ultimately responsible for strategy, although the planning is often carried out by the CEO and the involvement of staff and volunteers is key to delivering a successful strategy.
• What are the objectives of a charity strategic plan?  The objectives of a charity strategic plan are the key financial and non-financial objectives, in each year of your strategic plan, that you must deliver in order to achieve your overall strategy.
• What should a non profit strategic plan include?  Non profit strategic planning should include an assessment of your internal strengths and weaknesses, external threats and opportunities and bring these together into a SWOT and a deliverable plan with objectives, including the resources and capabilities needed, financial projections and timelines and responsibilities.
• What is a non profit SWOT analysis?  A charity SWOT analysis brings your fundraising internal Strengths and Weaknesses together with your external Opportunities and Threats together to create your strategy.
• What is a non profit PESTLE analysis?  A charity PESTLE analysis looks outside your charity to identify risks and opportunities. It is an acronym for Political, Economic, Sociological (Society), Technological, Legal and Environmental which helps you think about and identify the key issues.
• How long is a strategic plan for?  The timeframe for a non profit strategic plan could be 10 years or more, but is more usually 3 to 5 years.  In recent years, there has been such huge uncertainty that strategic plans now tend to be closer to 3 years.
• What is a business plan for a non profit?  A charity business plan (or annual or operations plan) is what a charity plans to deliver in the coming year, including objectives, milestones, timescales, resources allocated and who will be responsible for each.  Effectively, it's Year 1 of the charity's strategy.
• What is a STEEPLE analysis for charities?  STEEPLE is an acronym for social, technological, economic, environmental, political, legal, and ethical factors, which helps you think about and identify the key strategic issues in the outside world that may impact on your charity. Some use PESTLE instead.