Passion drives most Main Street organizations, which makes it easy to get off-track and to be spread too thin. Work plans provide focus for efforts, as well as a means to evaluate activities to ensure progress. All of your activities should have some relation to your strategic plan. If you are working on it, be ready to clearly describe why and how it furthers your strategy. Community transformation takes years of focused, incremental action.
Work plans help boards prioritize action based upon capacity, coordinate incremental steps, and ensure that the end goal remains well-rooted in the strategic plan. Local work plans also help inform the work plan for the Colorado Main Street Program as a whole, and are required by the Department of Local Affairs to be an official Colorado Main Street community.
With Main Street’s incremental approach utilizing volunteer equity, a deliberate and tenacious approach is necessary to stay on track. Work plans provide goals, help motivate volunteers, identify when to celebrate successes, can help in fundraising for signature projects, reduce confusion and conflict, and help keep a handle on workload.
In creating your work plan, be sure to:
- Understand your community vision and market
- Define transformation strategies based on local goals and needs
- Determine a list of projects that could help you achieve your strategies, including existing efforts
- Prioritize projects
- Flesh out your projects with tasks, deadlines, responsibilities, costs, and performance measures
- Board reviews the work plan with input from committees or task forces
- Adopt the work plan and get to work!
Starting up a program can be a big challenge. Look to kickoff efforts with projects that will have a notable impact, but are relatively easy to execute. For example, beautification projects are quick to accomplish and make a big visual impact in downtown.
Tours of other communities and conferences can be great sources for new ideas for Main Street; however, each program needs to consider whether the innovative idea and additional workload fits within the mission of the organization. When visiting with other programs, try to meet a variety of representatives for a broad perspective. Networking with other programs’ board members provides an opportunity to discuss problems and solutions — you are not in this alone and there are many resources to help you!
Organize your regular board meeting agendas to highlight activities related to primary goals in the strategic plan. Include updates (preferably a written brief provided in advance to save time) from any committees and/or task forces to facilitate real-time discussions to move initiatives forward.
A Great Work Plan
An annual work plan lists all of the things that need to be accomplished in the following year. Describing the necessary actions will help ensure that, despite all of the distractions that come your way, you will make great strides.
- Transformation Strategies/Goals: Highlight the end results you are seeking in broad terms.
- Objectives: Provide instructions for reaching the goals.
- Projects: Specific initiatives that help implement the mission.
- Tasks: Specific list of individual actions needed to complete a project.
- Costs: Identify funds and other resources needed to accomplish tasks.
- Who: People or groups charged with completing tasks.
- Deadlines: When each task should begin and end.
- Performance Metrics: How do you know you’ve achieved the goal? Be specific!
Colorado Main Street has many resources to help structure activities efficiently. Visit the website for a handy work plan template or contact Colorado Main Street about work plan facilitation services.
Although work plans are due to Colorado Main Street in January, they may be turned in at any time prior to that date. Work planning should occur when it makes the most sense for your program, which might be coordinating with your municipality’s budget cycle.