Problem:  Due to the volunteer nature and reliance on past procedures, organization was experiencing high turnover of leadership, inconsistency of policy & process, increased costs, and declining revenues with ideas on how to resolve, but no real plan in place to implement these solutions.

Solution:  Internal and external assessments were conducted and new longer term Board of Directors was put into place.  Terms were increased from 1 year to 3 years and committee heads were asked to serve for 2 years in their posts and charged with mentoring an existing committee member to take over the chair position upon their exit.   All committees and processes were reviewed, revised as needed, and standard operating procedures for each were written out and digitally stored for easy access. Membership contribution were more deliberately recognized, access to information granted, and options for having opinions heard put into place.   Catch phrases to promote a spirit of collaboration were threaded throughout regular engagement points with members. Production for annual events and shows was removed as a Board responsiblity and passed on to new committees allowing the Board to focus on annual operations and long term planning. A Budgetary Oversight Committee was put into place to help create realistic annual production budgets, audit spending, and look for areas of cost reduction.  Investments were made in PR and Marketing to generate new audience and create brand recognition.

Results:  Within one-year organization went from -$80K deficit to an estimated $35K profit.   Continuity in governance was established leading to more consistency of work year over year and reduction in strain on resources.