5723 Courses

This half day course provides participants with the knowledge and skills to write a simple but effective business plan for their organisation. It considers aspects of why business planning is important, what background research is needed, what subject areas to include and how to monitor progress against the business plan. For in-house courses the session could be extended to a whole day with participants spending the afternoon working on a first draft of a business plan.

This half day or whole day course is designed for those who are new to either working in or with the voluntary and community sector, including staff, councillors and committee members working in statutory agencies. It will help you understand how the sector works, the various legal forms of organisations, issues of governance and sustainability so that you are able to work more effectively in partnership with the sector and understand its funding needs. The half day course covers the basic information; the longer course can include further subjects such as the use of volunteers and typical issues that face trustee boards and management committees.

This half day course is designed to help participants who need to write or revise policies and procedures for their organisations. It will help them to develop effective structures for the writing and design and ensure that they meet key legal and good practice requirements on some of the most important policies such as health and safety, equal opportunities and financial procedures. It will also look at the process of consultation and implementation so that the policies obtain “buy-in” and commitment from staff and volunteers.

This half day course is designed for new treasurers, general trustees and management committee members or staff who work in smaller organisations to understand the basics of how to manage the finances within a voluntary or community organisation. It covers all the essential issues ranging from drawing up a budget to ensuring that the organisation has sound financial procedures.

Often your recruitment and induction processes determine whether you retain your staff and volunteers. A poor induction often leads to a lack of productivity and motivation. This half day course is designed to help participants ensure that new staff receive a comprehensive and welcoming induction so that they can settle into their job or role quickly and with confidence. The course can be run as a one-off session or can be incorporated into a series of sessions on managing staff.

A half day course for those who find themselves taking and presenting minutes for different kinds of meetings. The session will provide practical tips on how to write minutes that are clear and more concise and how to save time during the minute-taking process. It will be a useful session for both novice and experienced minute takers.

This half day course is designed to help relatively inexperienced managers and supervisors to manage their staff effectively. The course can be run as a one-off session or can be incorporated into a series of sessions on managing staff. Alternatively it can be run as a day session and incorporate elements of the Managing the Difficult Staff member course. The course can concentrate on managing paid staff or (for voluntary and community sector organisations) can include aspects of supervising and supporting volunteers as well.

This half day or whole day course is designed to support both novice and experienced trustees in providing effective governance within their organisations. It considers their roles and responsibilities in general before looking at particular areas in more detail. The half day course covers all the essential information; the whole day session includes specific exercises and case studies to develop the participants’ problem-solving skills.

PQASSO (Practical Quality Assurance Standard for Organisations) is a quality standard designed for the voluntary and community sector. Organisations can choose to use the criteria as a self-assessment tool or can go on to external accreditation and gain the Quality Mark at one of three levels, all of which are recognised and approved by the Charity Commission. This half day course provides an excellent introduction to this quality standard, which is now used by some statutory authorities as a pre-requisite for funding.

This half day course is designed for new treasurers, general trustees and management committee members or staff who work in smaller organisations to understand the basics of how to manage the finances within a voluntary or community organisation. It covers all the essential issues ranging from drawing up a budget to ensuring that the organisation has sound financial procedures.