2023 Strategic Plan
Advancing Equity Through Innovation in Social Service:
A Wider Circle 2023-2028
In April of 2022, we embarked on a strategic planning process, mapping out our next steps over the coming 3-5 years so that we can better serve and make real progress in achieving our mission. Now, nearly one year later, we are excited to share that plan with you.
Advancing Equity Through Innovation in Social Service: A Wider Circle 2023-2028 outlines our goals and objectives for the next five years, providing a roadmap for deepening our impact as a service provider and social change agent to progress toward our vision of a world without poverty.
The new strategy honors who we have always been as an organization, while also representing a significant first step towards sustainability, innovation, and expanded partnerships — all of which will help us make a larger impact in the movement to end poverty.
The Anchors: Our Vision and Mission
While our overarching goal as an organization — ending poverty — has not changed, a key piece of the strategic planning process was reflecting on the mission statements of the past to formulate the vision and mission statement of the future. Ending poverty is the ultimate goal of all of our work. Many other groups, partners, individuals, and others also believe this is both necessary and just.
Therefore, we shifted our past mission statement into a vision statement; with our vision being our broadest goal or dream as an organization, one that may be shared by others.
With this vision of the future in mind, we then adjusted our mission statement to reflect the work we are doing now to make that vision a reality. These new vision and mission statements serve as the anchors of our strategic plan, and will serve the same purpose for our work going forward.
Vision
A world without poverty, where people have what they need to thrive.
Mission
To advance equity in the greater Washington, DC region by fostering the exchange of goods, skills, and connections from neighbor to neighbor, and by engaging in advocacy to address the root causes of poverty.
The C.I.R.C.L.E. of Values
Critical in the strategic planning process was developing a clear and defined set of values to guide us as an organization. The resulting values form an interconnected CIRCLE:
- Compassion: Recognizing and embracing the awareness and deep understanding of the suffering of others.
- Inclusion: Creating an environment that welcomes neighbors seeking support.
- Respecting dignity: Honoring every person, regardless of their background, identity, finances, or some subjective assessment of their “worthiness” to receive support.
- Community: Building a space where there is a tangible, felt sense of shared values, goals, and identity — even if that shared identity is simply that of a “good neighbor.”
- Leadership: Inspiring and motivating others to work towards this common goal of being a good supportive neighbor, and letting the real needs of our clients lead our actions and where our resources go.
- Equity: Ensuring fair treatment and access to resources that can provide a comfortable home, spaces where everyone belongs, and opportunities to share our unique talents and gifts with our community.
Impact Goals
In reviewing the feedback from all of our strategic planning conversations, we uncovered that all the ideas, hopes, and desired outcomes boiled down to three major impact goals:
- Be a Good Neighbor: Refine and expand our innovative, client-centered services and programming models.
- Build and Sustain Community: Nurture our networks of neighbors and staff into intentional communities of action and communities of practice.
- Co-Create a Better Future: Use the power of collective community action to fight poverty and demonstrate a better way of relating between neighbors.
From Goals to Strategies
After defining our three impact goals, we worked collaboratively to define specific objectives to work toward to accomplish each goal. Each objective has its own set of strategies as well as outcomes — time-bound measures of success for each objective.
The objectives that accompany each impact goal are outlined below.
Be a Good Neighbor — Objectives
- Build a more effective, efficient, and equitable furniture redistribution program.
- Build a career support network to leverage community expertise and social capital.
- Build a client resource navigation network.
- Implement a direct cash component within long-term support services to expand client agency.
- Develop our neighborhood Hub as a space supporting community-led transformation.
Build and Sustain Community — Objectives
- Convene community stakeholders together for intentional connection, awareness building, and learning.
- Establish values-driven and sustainable partnerships that strengthen the continuum of services.
- Build new systems of coordinated response with partners to meet the needs of the community together.
- Develop pathways for volunteers to serve as public ambassadors of A Wider Circle’s mission.
Co-Create a Better Future — Objectives
- Leverage impact and outcome data as drivers for decision-making and add to the body of knowledge on anti-poverty work.
- Develop platform to amplify diverse voices of our community across venues, formats, and media channels to foster learning, engagement, and action to create change.
- Participate in governmental and community-based advocacy in partnerships with coalitions/fellow social justice organizations.
- Grow the movement to end poverty.
What’s New and What’s Next
Advancing Equity Through Innovation in Social Service: A Wider Circle 2023-2028 honors the core of what A Wider Circle has always been: a circle of compassionate neighbors, giving and receiving support in service to building up our community’s shared future.
It also provides a clear direction for our work and building on our mission, vision, and values to:
- Systematize and optimize, acknowledging our core work
- Sustain critical initiatives by partnering for greater impact
- Scale replicable models, recognizing our place in the larger ecosystem of service in the region and beyond
As we embark on the five-year journey of carrying out this strategy, we commit to:
- Measuring impact beyond process numbers
- Staying connected with clients beyond transactional appointments
- Sharing lessons learned with others
For more information, to request a full copy of the strategic plan, or to discuss ways to engage and invest in the future of A Wider Circle, please contact: Beth Makal, Communications Manager, at beth@awidercircle.org.
