Looking back/ Looking forward

My mindset is always about seeing how far I still have to go, but coming up to the end of the quarter its quite useful to look back to the start of the year to reflect on how far we have come.

We had our plan at the start of the year and we are on track to achieve some targets, but not others. We have some rabbits to pull out of hats over the next fortnight and we are looking at 'to-vc or not-to-vc' to help us grow at a much faster rate. In some respects we are completely 'at' where we wanted to be, in others we still have a long way to go and the interesting question as I write this is why I think some goals have been achieved and others have not. I don't have an answer just yet - that'll be my thought to mull over as I head to the pool for an end of week swim.

At the same time I think my focus has gone from 'surviving' to thriving and over the last few weeks we have started taking steps to build up our reputation as the best people working in the area of behavioural change, business engagement in the community and life-education for young people and their communities.

This thought process has been helped not only by Caroline, but also by having a few other great, super-experienced people come into our orbit and helping me to expand my thinking. Its sometimes easy not to see the wood for the trees and making sure I have people who I see regularly who can help me see the wood is invaluable. What is starting to become clear is that we will only achieve what we want by building a team of people who can help us...in the same way that we talk to our students about creating a 'success team' we are starting to build ours.

So, with the first three months of the year gone I would give us a 6/10 - not bad, but not great - but with some of the foundations we are laying I am excited about what the next quarter will bring.

The cusp...

The 3 weeks have been all about 'firsts' - the first time we have run programme 'x', the first time we've had a 'celeb' visit one of our programmes, the first really substantial funding application, the first pitch for a programme involving not only students, but their parents and teachers. Its been exhilarating, illuminating and challenging and we have learnt so much.

So many of the things we have talked about over the last 24 months are actually starting to happen and as a result it feels like we are moving into a new phase of expansion. We know that what we do works and is setting the standard for the market - at least that's what everyone is telling us - and now its about resourcing and finding great people to help us fulfill on our vision.

No doubt Caroline will have some great pointers when I see her later today. Its invaluable having people to talk to who have gone through this process and who can help navigate the tricky waters to hopefully avoid hitting the rocks.