Execution eats strategy for lunch

- Jim Schleckser

Recently, the Senate committee on Charity released their recommendations. Since the charity sector is founded on the belief in social change, it is not surprising that many charity leaders had different ideas about which recommendations should, or should not, have been included. What was extremely surprising was that the recommendations came with no execution plan.

What?

The range and scope of participation is impressive.

The Senate committee had 160 witnesses, 90 briefs, and visited 24 cities. Think for a minute about the number of hours that went into this – every single speaker, every single submission spent several hours preparing thoughtful, and thorough, information. Each presenter travelled to offer their thoughts. And by all accounts, those thoughts were carefully recorded, analyzed, and compiled into a thoughtful set of recommendations.

And then the baton got dropped.

The charity sector is good at doing less with more. As strong as these recommendations are, the sector cannot execute any of them on our own. We cannot pass legislations, we cannot change policy, we cannot provide direction to Ministries. Yet, the plan contains dozens of recommendations based on countless hours of work, that will go precisely nowhere as of now.

However well-intentioned this process was, it is disrespectful to those who presented their well -constructed ideas, those who volunteer and work in the charity sector. Most importantly, this means that those who rely on the services of the charity sector are not being given the best possible situation.

Canadians deserve better. Canadians deserve an implementation plan.

Ann Rosenfield is the Editor of Hilborn Charity eNews.