OUR APPROACH

The way we work

We know that there will be many charities out there receiving a first-class service from their suppliers. However, we have also seen enough evidence of poor quality and high costs to convince us that we should offer an alternative approach. Consequently, we see no value in simply ‘joining the club’ and just providing the same services in the same way as some of the established providers.

We felt there was room for a different way of doing things. We know it will not suit everyone but we believe there may be some trustees and senior managers of charities who share our frustration and concerns.

Our first challenge was to try and find a way in which we could work with the charity sector to provide our services as efficiently and cost-effectively as possible.

One of the things we try and do is to limit the amount of time we take up ‘chatting’ to your people. We will of course come to an initial meeting with you in order to understand your issues and decide whether we may be able to help. However, after this initial discussion we try to keep to a minimum the amount of time your people have to spend explaining things to us. We do this for two reasons:

• Firstly, we recognise that especially in small to medium-sized charities, your time is precious and your people may simply not have the time to sit there answering question after question about your organisation.

• Secondly, it’s an expensive way of working to spend hours and sometimes days at your premises talking to your people in order to get information that can be obtained in other ways.

• Consequently we spend more time on ‘desk research’ that we can carry out from our own premises and to a more flexible timetable. That way, when we do get together, our meetings are designed to be extremely focused and productive.

“It can’t be that simple” we hear you say, and surely “there has to be a catch”. Well actually, it is quite simple but yes, there is a catch – but hopefully only a small one. Depending on the nature of your enquiry we may well ask you to put together an ‘Information Pack’ about your organisation. This will not be an onerous or time-consuming task because we only ask for information that you will already have in your organisation – items like an organisation chart, job descriptions, accounts or any marketing material. This simple initiative can significantly reduce the amount of time taken up with your people and help us to build our understanding of your organisation in a cost-effective manner.

More Choice

We can also offer another way of saving costs, which may be suitable for some clients depending on your particular circumstances. The nature of our business means that we have periods when we are extremely busy and other times when we have spare capacity. If you can be flexible on timescales we could udertake your work when things are not so hectic. This helps us to manage our time more effectively and allows us to pass on this benefit to you in the form of lower fees.

Again, another simple solution that may not suit everyone but it could be of real benefit to some clients.

Success Fees

We have looked at how fees are charged in the industry and it seemed to us that they are rarely linked to success. We offer what we believe is an innovative fee structure where a part of our overall fee will be a ‘success fee’, which is only paid at the discretion of the client. This approach provides a genuine motivation to make sure that any work we undertake meets its objectives and proves successful for both parties.