To be or not to be................a CIC?

During the course of my studies at Middlesex I have continued being part of the day to day running of a Theatre Company (The New Community Arts Academy) as Artistic Director.

Administering (not the most exciting part of the organisation but important) 

Over a number of years of being a solvent but an unconstituted charity it became evident that due to a lack of volunteers, with time to spare. In addition a key member of our management team and the voluntary treasurer became seriously ill. After tremendous canvassing through questionnaires, meetings , word of mouth – we had no alternative to move the group into thinking about becoming a CIC (Community Interest Company).

The process this took for me, as the person tasked with looking into it and reporting on it took a number of forms;

I downloaded all the appropriate literature available and immediately canvassed the opinions of people and organisations we regularly have dealings with and are familiar with our work.  Namely The Chamber of Commerce, Gumptions Centres (John Sims & David Robertson – Brown) who advise and locate businesses and have previously helped with sponsors.

I contacted Childuk an organisation used as a positive case study by the Government department of a successful CIC. I spoke to one of the two Directors there. He told me the pro`s and con`s and felt with there model they had made the right decision – he also felt that perhaps we would be too, in allowing two to three Directors the ability to make decisions in the best interests of the organisation.

I presented my findings on both options to our board meeting and it was carried unanimously.

I then went to all our members/parents  individually and explained the rationale behind looking at a change of  model for the group.

I had also looked at an alternative option, which was to become a committee managed  registered charity. I used as a case study The Chicken Shed Theatre Company. It was apparent that the board at The Chicken Shed was made up of very highly experienced and recognised figures from the business world and theatre, a lot of them. Our situation was quite different with only two or three committed and qualified leaders to take us forward.

We called a vote on the whole thing at our AGM which was carried 100%

I took in all of this an impartial view, although it could be argued I had an interest, there simply wasn’t anyone else to take it on.

The Group goes from strength to strength and we have as large a membership as we have ever had. We evaluated our last production and the satisfaction rating was higher than for anything else we have done.

We continue to attract bits of sponsorship and funding  that is required to be evaluated and meet set outcomes. Ive lost count of the number of meetings ive attended, garnering support from bodies such as The Rotary Clubs (I presented to them using a powerpoint package similar to but better for video clips slidedog).

Just food for thought for anyone thinking of embarking on such a journey – its frequently rewarding but a hard and thankless task at times.

 

Good Luck