The Network of Wellbeing (NOW) has updated its Vision, Mission and Values. Here, in the first of a series of posts, NOW’s Director, Roger Higman introduces the new texts and explains why they are so important and how we involved our audiences in drawing them up. You can also read more in this report.
Vision, mission and values statements are vital for any organisation, and especially for charities. They help to clarify the charity’s purpose, inspire its people and guide its decision-making. Each component plays a distinct role. The vision describes the ideal state a charity is seeking while the mission sets out the role it will play to achieve that vision. The values show how it expects to work.
NOW’s new vision, mission and values are the result of extensive work, including a consultation process with all staff and Trustees, in-depth interviews with some of our most committed contacts and a survey of our wider audience via our newsletter and social media. We’d like to warmly thank everyone, who responded or agreed to be interviewed.
Each part of the text was debated, examined and tested.
We hope the result is inspiring and fully reflects the world that we want to see, our role in creating it and the values that we want to embody in doing so.
Our new Vision, Mission and Values:
NOW’s vision is people and the planet thriving together.
NOW’s mission is to connect people, support projects and inspire action for the wellbeing of people and the planet.
NOW achieves its mission through events, network-building, our retreat venue Eden Rise, and community projects, such as our Share Shed – a mobile library of things.
NOW’s values are collaborative, compassionate and transformative.
We also asked questions about the tagline that we use, our understanding of wellbeing and the themes that we use to prioritise what we do.
Our tagline is building wellbeing together for people and the planet. This is reflected, for example, in our Facebook group and in the title of events we organise.
Our understanding of wellbeing is inclusive, collective, systemic and sustainable:
- inclusive, because everyone deserves to have equal access to the things that support our wellbeing.
- collective, because we can’t have wellbeing alone – our wellbeing depends upon our relationships and the communities in which we live and work.
- systemic, because wellbeing needs to be embedded in our economies, governmental policies and throughout wider society.
- sustainable, because human wellbeing relies upon the long-term health of the natural world.
We are currently focusing our work along three themes (though we will continue work on some other areas):
- Connection and Access to Nature
- Living Better Through Sharing
- Wellbeing for Changemakers
You can read more about the process we went through and the thinking behind our new Vision, Mission and Values in this summary report.
Over the coming months, we will write more to bring our vision, mission and values to life … through a series of blog posts, engaging events and interactive discussions.
Thank you for reading. Let’s continue to build wellbeing together – for people and the planet!