Ambitious, but grounded.
Our strategy is built around six interconnected pillars. They aren't separate workstreams: they feed into each other, reinforce each other and depend on each other. Just like the partnership itself.
What we are trying to do
The partnership exists so that organisations rooted in their own communities can take on the things that need more than one of them, and so that the people they reach have a say in decisions that affect them.
Our full strategy is published below.
Grants allow us to do more
Brighter Days is paid for work it does, and it applies for grants. The two are not in competition: unrestricted money buys time, and time is what decides how many organisations we can work alongside in a year.
Six pillars, one plan
What we're setting out to do together over the next three years.
Deepen the partnership
Most partnerships exist on paper. Ours exists in practice.
- ✓ Formalise partnership agreements with every organisation in the partnership
- ✓ A living shared skills and resource map, actively matched across the partnership
- ✓ A regular partner rhythm of practical, energising gatherings
Build sustainability for every partner
Grants are not a strategy. They are a starting point.
- ✓ A sustainability audit with each partner organisation
- ✓ Tailored, actionable income opportunities, not generic advice
- ✓ Work toward at least three months' operating reserves
Share everything
The most radical thing about Brighter Days is what it expects: real sharing.
- ✓ Compliance and governance support across the whole partnership
- ✓ A shared library of policies, templates, bid text and impact evidence
- ✓ A skills exchange where each organisation offers its expertise to the others
Amplify voices & build influence
The people in our partnership are rarely in the room when decisions are made about them. We change that.
- ✓ Working with Keele University, connecting communities to research that affects them and coordinating their involvement in it
- ✓ Genuine co-production, communities shaping research, services and strategy
- ✓ A real presence in strategic conversations with funders and commissioners
Secure physical homes
People need places. Accessible, safe, consistent spaces where communities can gather.
- ✓ Progress the community hub proposal: a home for groups to call their own
- ✓ A sustainable operating model that generates income and cuts costs for partners
- ✓ Spaces that are accessible, welcoming and genuinely inclusive
Strengthen governance & resilience
The organisations in this partnership are too important to be fragile.
- ✓ Full compliance across every partner CIC
- ✓ Hands-on governance support, sitting alongside boards
- ✓ Succession planning so no organisation depends on one person
What this looks like in practice
Five avenues we'll explore and develop with each partner, organisation by organisation.
Service level agreements & commissioned work
Statutory bodies, housing associations and NHS trusts need trusted community partners. We research commissioning opportunities and support partners to bid, negotiate and deliver.
Social enterprise & traded income
For organisations suited to it, earned income offers the stability grants never will. We assess honestly and help develop realistic trading models.
Business & private-sector giving
Local businesses want meaningful community investment beyond writing a cheque. We connect them with our network for income, in-kind support and skills.
Community fundraising & individual giving
Our communities care deeply. We help each partner build a sustainable approach to giving among the people who believe in their work.
Research & academic income
Keele is the beginning, not the end. Research brings income, resources and credibility, and keeps communities shaping the evidence that affects them.
From foundation to sustainability
Year 1 builds the foundation. Year 2 is acceleration. Year 3 is making sure everything we've built can last.
Foundation
- Formalise partnership agreements and the shared skills map
- Complete a sustainability audit for every partner
- Launch compliance support across the partnership
- Submit first joint funding applications
- Progress the community hub proposal to heads of terms
- Establish the Brighter Days brand and comms presence
Acceleration
- First earned-income and social-enterprise activities
- Secure at least one SLA or commissioned contract
- Open the community hub (subject to negotiations)
- Launch the corporate supporter programme
- Joint funding raising at least £75,000, as a partnership
- Publish the first Annual Social Value Report, as a partnership
Sustainability
- £500,000+ in evidenced annual social value, as a partnership
- Financially sustainable, as a partnership, with three months’ reserves
- Every partner with at least two income streams beyond grants
- Recognised as a trusted model for community collaboration in Shropshire
- Explore replication and network expansion beyond our geography
Written together. Lived together. Reviewed together.
This strategy was written together, and it will be reviewed together every year, honestly, and with the same commitment to doing things differently that brought us all to this table in the first place.
Inspiring potential. Empowering futures.