Momentum (May 25)
The first few months of our Strategy have been even busier than I expected. When we launched, I had a niggling worry about how we’d keep the momentum going but in true Fife Gingerbread style, the pace hasn’t slowed.
I’m really keen for our Strategy to be a living, breathing document that is always evolving. And, thanks to funding support, we’ve had the space to make that happen. These blogs will never capture everything that’s going on, but I hope they offer a glimpse into how we’re working to prioritise support for families in Fife, while also influencing policy and practice in meaningful ways.
A few highlights from May include…
This year, we invested in a new Business Development Manager post. This is a key step in our longer-term goal to build a creative and sustainable fundraising architecture. In a world where funding is increasingly competitive and the pots are shrinking, this work is crucial. We’ve had a bit of fun too, working with one of our amazing volunteers, Kelly, to plan the production of Fife Gingerbread candles!
We also had a fantastic session hosted by Pilotlight, where we worked with staff from Amazon to explore how we can evolve our corporate partnerships. The focus is shifting from traditional fundraising and volunteering to deeper, long-term relationships centred on impact. This session provided lots of inspiration and ideas to develop.
In my role as Chair of the Third Sector Employability Forum (TSEF) executive group, I attended the SLAED conference, which was packed with valuable insights. I particularly enjoyed workshops from Public Health Scotland on their work with OPFS around lone parent positive pathways, and another session exploring Child Poverty Pathfinder areas, with standout examples from Glasgow and Clackmannanshire. These conversations sparked fresh thinking about how we can take a more joined-up, values-led, multi-agency approach here in Fife. So, I naturally now have pestered key people locally to book meetings share the learnings and opportunities.
Shortly after the conference, the new Programme for Government landed – cue a flurry of excitement and emails as we worked to understand what it all means. The mention of a ‘national model’ around employability has certainly piqued interest and curiosity!
In our ‘bread and butter’ work of supporting families in Fife…
We’ve been developing a Quality Assurance framework that we’ll be testing this year. It’s an important step in helping us confidently evidence the impact of what we do.
We also held a staff development day which is always a highlight because no matter what we throw at them the team come together with enthusiasm and lots of laughter to contribute. Stepping away from the busy day-to-day to reconnect with the bigger picture. We explored key themes like partnership working, upstream thinking, and fundraising, and we’re excited to take those ideas forward.
Don’t forget to follow us on social media, and if you haven’t seen it yet, there’s a great video about the Strategy that’s well worth a watch to get a sense of our aspirations.
We’re excited for what’s ahead and so grateful to everyone helping bring this Strategy to life, one step, one family at a time.