1 Year as CEO
I have been POW Thanet’s CEO for 1 year today and to say it has been a whirlwind is an understatement!
We have just received news that we have been successfully awarded funds from Arts Council England! It’s about 40% of what we need for the year but we are so excited to start planning our 9th annual International Women’s Day Festival in March 2024 and we’re even thinking about our 10th anniversary in 2025…
One year in post actually equates to 96 days as I am part-time (as is the whole team). That’s only 5 months of a full-time job which blows my mind when I think of what we’ve achieved!
19,500 people participated in our Festival this year. We’ve got an Audience Development Plan and are working on a Three Year Strategic Plan that’s ambitious but so exciting. We moved into a new office in Ramsgate (above The Modern Boulangerie so the smell of baked goods haunts us!). We recruited a new Board of Trustees who are so passionate, supportive and hardworking. We said goodbye to Francesca, Katie and Danielle and hello to Alex, our new Communications Director.
We tried new ways of fundraising (the sponsored sea swim will return on 8th March 2024 - put it in your diary) and reviewed all of our policies to make sure they reflected our new values. We can now say we have a year-round programme after participating in Margate Pride this summer and with our two events scheduled for Autumn (sign up to the newsletter here to hear more!).
So what have I learned?
The POW team are some of the most creative, hardworking and passionate people I have ever met and I’m really grateful they’re so good at their jobs.
Thanet is held together by incredible voluntary and charitable organisations - Porchlight, Oasis, Citizens Advice Bureau and Age UK come to mind but there are so many of them - and that we are all struggling with essential funding needed to keep going and frankly spending too much time fundraising when we could be serving our audiences.
Our audience loves our work and wants more - our evaluation shows that while we are hitting top marks for inclusivity and connection to the arts, we need to focus on activism and raising awareness of gender inequalities which is our aim for the next few years.
I need support - over the year I have had mentors, the Trustees, the team,friends and other CEOs offer me wisdom and a hug and honestly it’s been needed! This role is ever changing and my confidence has taken a hit at times but there have been wonderful people there to pick me up.
This next year I want to focus on raising the visibility of POW’s work, finding ways to generate our own income and ensuring that we are really serving our four key audiences.
My first post (read here) mentioned the Lionesses’ recent win at Wembley and it feels fitting that we celebrated (and cried over!) their incredible achievements at this summer’s World Cup. Our work is more important than ever and I’m so excited to see what the next year brings. Thank you for your ongoing support.
Rosanagh x
