Managing resources

It's been a while since I've posted - life gets complicated and busy, and so I prune my to-do list down to the bare essentials so I can get it all done. It's a theme that runs through life - so many things to get done but we have limited resources.

The Open Arms Board had a board retreat yesterday - we had another great meeting. Have I mentioned how much I love being with these people? One of our many areas of discussion was being fiscally conservative while being open to opportunity.

Open Arms has always been a fiscally conservative agency. We don't go off and do things without having a deep understanding of how we'll pay for what we do, not only immediately but also into the future. Like many of us in our personal lives - we may have a lot of wants, but that doesn't mean the world is our oyster. Sure - we cover our essentials as a matter of daily business - no crisis. But sometimes we see something that really catches our eye and we think ..... oooooooh, THAT would be nice! ... and then reality hits and we add it to our wish list for more research and consideration.

We at Open Arms have a long wish list. There is so much need out there, and we could do so much more to help women and their babies in our region. But we are thoughtful about how we grow and what new programs we take on. As an organization, we've met most of our goals from our strategic plan five years ago (and changed direction where it was appropriate as well) and our strategy has worked well for us. Now we're back planning for our future for the next few years. It's an exciting time and quite frankly, I think we're an extraordinary organization with great staff doing great work. It's easy to want to reach far in our goals. But we are sticking with what works: careful growth, thoughtful and intentional decision-making, and fiscally responsible management of programs and agency. I think it's a great balance of high goals and caution, and with this process, we're excited to think about where the agency can be in five years.

Oh - and we had our newsletter come out today. We're working on a website where we can archive these and when it's up and running, I'll post a link to our past newsletters. Do you want to be on our mailing list? Send us your email address and we'll add you (don't worry, you can remove yourself at any time)! info@openarmsps.org