The latest from Whitebarn Consulting
In this section you will find current news items, links to interesting sites and occasional musings about life as a not-for-profit sector consultant. If anything catches your eye, make a comment and/or share it with others. Please also feel free to contact me about anything which you might like to see featured on these news pages.
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End of year reflections
20th December 2011
My 2011. The year I returned from a six-month sabbatical in California. The year I declined the opportunity to move back to London. The year I...
Kate O'Sullivan memorial lecture
18th November 2011
Today I attended Carmichael Centre for Voluntary Groups' coming of age celebration: 21 years of providing shared services for small charities in Carmichael House, North Brunswick Street, Dublin 7. It was by sheer coincidence 14 years to the day...
New training course: from outputs to outcomes
17th November 2011
Last month, I co-delivered, with Sheila Cahill, a course for Public Affairs Ireland on the topic of assessing outcomes and impacts for NGOs. The response was...
Monitor Institute
15th November 2011
I am very impressed by what Monitor Institute has to say on impact assessment:
"Much energy and many resources are expended each year on...
Key research into Irish community and voluntary sector needs
2nd November 2011
Are you a senior manager (or equivalent) in one of Ireland's huge number of charities, community groups, voluntary organisations, NGOs, etc? Have you completed The Wheel's current questionnaire survey yet? As long as you are independently governed and not-for-profit, you are...
Website changes
20th October 2011
Times change and as a result, we too have to change what we do. This website is no exception. Take for example the photo below, used by one of my...
SROI training ... and beyond
6th October 2011
During the summer, I went to London to undertake training in Social Return On Investment, delivered by the SROI Network. It was excellent: two intense days of learning and doing during which I grappled with concepts and methodologies that on the one hand made complete sense, and on the other hand felt complex and alien at times. A walk in the park it was not, but I firmly believe it was well worth the time and money spent.
Gauge, a Belfast-based social enterprise, is now delivering SROI training in Ireland on 18 and 19 October. These are the...
Looking for an excellent strategic planning consultant in the USA
9th September 2011
I have just completed a small piece of work for a client: a US-based not-for-profit with a staff of around 50 that has a very large global membership. This involved facilitating some...
EYV2011 Roadshow
18th August 2011
Next week, Dublin sees the arrival of the European Year of Volunteering Roadshow, a week-long festival of all...
Assessing outcomes and impacts
11th August 2011
My work is moving more and more into the area of evaluating and measuring the outcomes and impacts of the work that not-for-profits do. I consider it vitally important and...
Busy times ...
15th July 2011
But not too busy for a quick blog at the end of a Friday afternoon!
Everyone always tells me that the summer is a quiet time within the community and voluntary...
Volunteer Ireland
7th July 2011
So, the long-awaited announcement has finally been made today: Volunteering Ireland and Volunteer Centres Ireland have...
Speakeasy
3rd July 2011
Speakeasy is a brilliant 8 session course on talking to children about sexuality, run by the Irish Family Planning Association. I completed the... 21 hours
1st July 2011
Don't you just love finding academic research that backs up something you have always felt yourself? For years I have been banging on to anyone who will listen about our notion of 'full-time' employment not only being flawed, but potentially...
Maps for change
28th June 2011
I have been using the internet on a daily basis for 14 years. I can still remember the first time someone showed me the 'world...
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Special offer Solid Foundations
27th June 2011
Do you know The Wheel's Solid Foundations series of good practice guides for community and voluntary organisations? I had the pleasure of researching and writing these publications for The Wheel...
Valuing what matters
15th June 2011
Today is International Justice Day for cleaners and security workers. Trade union SIPTU marked the day with a series of events focusing on its Fair Deal for Cleaners Campaign. I attended a session with keynote speaker...
Governance code submission
7th June 2011
You are probably aware that a draft code of governance for community, voluntary and charity organisations in...
Poverty pimping?
5th June 2011
The scene is Oakland, California (where incidentally, I lived for a short while last year), but the underlying themes apply just as readily to disadvantaged communities anywhere. A fascinating reflection on...
Google grants
2nd June 2011
This is outside my normal sphere of work and may therefore be something everyone else but me knows about, but here goes anyway! I just found out about Google Grants, an in-kind donation programme...
Volunteering is ...
31st May 2011
Volunteering is an expression of ... active citizenship, participatory democracy, altruism, self-interest, rebellion, love, and much, much more. By its nature it is as varied as the individuals who volunteer.
Review of Wheel conference
26th May 2011
Today I attended The Wheel's annual conference entitled Innovating For Good. It was a very full and interesting day with good speakers and chaired marvellously by Fintan O'Toole.
Social enterprise
19th May 2011
I have spent the last two days immersed in the concept of social enterprise (which, without getting into a definitional knot, is the broad idea of balancing social purpose with...
Excellent free book on social media
16th May 2011
Resources on social media abound, but I particularly like this one produced by Ventureneer, suitable both for voluntary organisations and small business owners...
Evaluation article published
10th May 2011
The Wheel has just published an article I wrote entitled Is it time to evaluate evaluations?...
Europe Day during the European Year of Volunteering 2011
9th May 2011
Today is Europe Day. It is also the European Year of Volunteering. To mark the occasion, today's Irish Times has a special report on volunteering....
Fish fight and cycle
6th May 2011
Mysterious title? Not if you watched Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall's Channel 4 programme earlier this year, in which he demonstrated the shocking way...
Student volunteering in the UK
5th May 2011
A short film has just been published, nicely outlining the history of student volunteering in the UK. For information about the Irish experience,...
Short attention spans versus long-term causes
3rd May 2011
Powerhouse Susan Ellis tackles an interesting topic in the latest Energize Inc. update. If your work involves volunteering in...
TED talk
30th April 2011
Whenever I come across an inspirational talk on TED.com, I think to myself "I must visit this space more often". Today was such a time, when I viewed this excellent...
Mapping social enterprise
28th April 2011
The Centre for Nonprofit Management at Trinity College Dublin has just published some exploratory research into 'social entrepreneurial enterprises' in...
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Not-for-profit consultants sharing experiences
13th April 2011
I stumbled across an American web forum, which bills itself as 'Monthly Twitter Chat for Consultants to Community Benefit Organisations'. It looks quite...
Mission accomplished?
5th April 2011
Sadly, we know of many charities that have been forced to close their doors due to funding difficulties. Sometimes, however, organisations simply decide that they...
In pursuit of happiness
31st March 2011
Are you happy? Do you want to be more happy? Do you feel society could be happier? Enter Action for Happiness, a new...
Dtalk training courses
28th March 2011
There are a number of courses in the Kimmage Development Studies Centre that still...
Impact networks
26th March 2011
New Philanthropy Capital in the UK has just issued a new report (downloadable for free) about what are...
Job at Science Gallery
23rd March 2011
I love Dublin's Science Gallery: it's central, compact and sells quirky gifts, but above all it stimulates both sides of the brain with fun and challenging events and exhibitions. The SG is currently recruiting a Fundraising/Development... Mission statements
17th March 2011
I came across this post about not-for-profit mission...
New association is recruiting staff
16th March 2011
I am assuming this passed me by when I was in the USA, but today I found out about the new Institute for Managers of Community and Voluntary Organisations in Ireland...
Have any evaluation horror stories?
14th March 2011
I am currently working on an article about evaluations and how they can go wrong, either for the not-for-profit organisation, or for the evaluator, or even for the funder. Do you have any stories which you would like to share (in complete...
New Dublin initiatives
13th March 2011
I first came to Dublin as a tourist in 1991 ... and promptly had all my money robbed! It did...
Launch of Social Impact Analysts Association
12th March 2011
Increasingly, funders and the general public want to know if their grants and donations are making a true difference. Not-for-profits themselves also want to...
CSR directory
10th March 2011
I was working away on an evaluation report in which Corporate Social Responsibility is mentioned in the context of law firms, when news of a new directory to CSR landed on my...
Charities legislation for Northern Ireland
9th March 2011
It has just been announced that Northern Ireland will benefit from new charities regulation. Read all about it...
International Women's Day
8th March 2011
Today is International Women's Day. In fact, it is the 100 year anniversary of the Day....
New schools for Educate Together
7th March 2011
I just found out that Educate Together (ET) will be opening three new schools over the next two years. ET provides child-centred, co-educational, multi-denominational and democratically run primary...
Every picture tells a story
6th March 2011
On this site I have added images which visualise, hopefully in an interesting and appealing manner, the amazing work my clients do each and every day. The sliding captions highlight the small way I have helped these organisations along their journey.
As they say, every picture tells a story. The image on this page shows Marie Carroll, who won...
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