It's the beginning of 2023, which means it's the perfect time to add up the numbers for 2022 to see how many hours I was able to dedicate to social impact.
In 2021, I was able to dedicate 73 days to social impact work and this year, there's been a slight reduction to 64 days (-12.3%). I think this has been for a few reasons, most notably, this year has involved a LOT of learning and academic work which has eaten up some of the time I might otherwise have used for my work with non-profits.
Learning wise, this year I've:
Completed the academic essays for a Post Graduate Certificate in Business and Personal Coaching with the University of Chester
Become a ICF qualified Supervisor following a post graduate course with Barefoot Coaching
Completed a Lego for Coaches course using Lego Serious Play
Completed the British Psychological Society CPD programme on Coaching Psychology with the School for Coaching Psychology
Qualified in the Lumina Spark Psychometric Tool
Completed a few CPD webinars with Ashridge Business School
Started the process of building my portfolio for the accelerated route to Chartered Psychologist status with the British Psychological Society
Not quite sure why I decided to cram so much learning into one year, but I think I definitely ended the year feeling like I had done more than enough! Next year, I'm going to be focussed exclusively on my chartered status, which involves completing some research, so that should keep me out of trouble.
So, anyway... The Numbers...
My governance work has been primarily with the same three organisations, and whilst I've done slightly fewer hours in 2022 as compared to 2021, I've taken on a few extra responsibilities.
In my role with the University of Manchester, I remain on the main board, Chair the Remuneration Committee, continue to be a lay member on the Awards and Honours Committee and in 2022, joined the new People and Organisational Development Committee which seems very aligned to my skill set! In 2021, UoM took a lot a extra time so in 2022, I've been keen to get things back to a more sustainable level.
I was elected to Vice Chair of Victorious Academies Trust and took on Chair of the Finance and Audit Committee as well as leading on Wellbeing for the Trust.
With the Apprentice Academy - I remain a Governor, and this year I have taken on a staffing review to build the board's governance and oversight.
The main part of my social impact work over 2022 has been delivering discounted coaching and leadership development work for non-profit organisations. Over the 35 working days dedicated to this I've coached LOADS of non-profit CEOs, in part thanks to being the preferred Coach for the Association of Chief Executives of Voluntary Organisations (ACEVO). I've also delivered Action Learning Sets, Coaching Skills Training and Leadership Development Programmes for Senior Leaders. I've supported organisations working in the following fields:
Homelessness
Youth
Women and Girls work
Domestic Violence
International Development
Organisations that support disabled people
Community Sports
Mental Health and Psychological Services
LGBT+ Communities
My most amusing testimonial of 2022 came from the CEO of ACEVO itself, Jane Ide!
I think this work keeps me very grounded and fuels my appreciation of what's happening in the world.
Whilst I don't count it in my social impact hours, this year, I've also been doing a lot more work to help new coaches; this is either through training them to be a coach with Barefoot, or through mentor coaching. I'm delighted to have finished the year as an ICF qualified Supervisor and I am sure this will enable me to support even more coaches and psychologists in 2023.
So, that's it... My year in summary. I appreciate the need is always greater than the time I have available, but I hope I leave 2022 having made some impact on the world around me. I do my best to honour my one third commercial work with the private sector, one third with the non-profit sector and one third play, but 2022 had a very liberal interpretation of play as I needed to count lots of my learning as 'play time' which I'm not sure felt like play whilst doing APA referencing in 37°C heat!
If you're keen to compare 2022 to 2021, then take a look at the blog from last January!
As always, thanks for stopping by...
* Methodology: I count direct hours of working and multiply this by 1.2 as there is nearly always additional preparation and reading time necessary. I then divide this time into half day units of 3.5 hours in order to get to my totals. Time is always rounded to the nearest half day unit for ease of presentation.