Strategic Direction

We will ensure that we have operational processes in place to exceed our clients’, moral owners’, funders’ and donors’ expectations.

Our goal is to build a transformative and results driven management culture focused on achieving a 100% satisfaction rate among our moral owners, clients, funders and donors. Our work should fit into the lives of our clients, rather than our clients fitting into our work. We must strive to understand the full picture of our clients’ needs and to create the right relationships to best
support our clients in achieving their goals. Our clients, moral owners, funders and donors have a
valuable perspective that can help guide our growth and our work. We must have the right processes in place to ensure fiscal stability and quality assurance throughout all of our programs.

We will be an exemplary steward of funds, demonstrate a strong quality-minded culture, and actively engage with our clients, moral owners, donors and funders to ensure satisfaction.

Our clients will think of us first when they have a problem to solve. We will achieve this by delivering on the following:

  • Listen to our clients and families, assess their needs and develop appropriate action steps with them. This will include implementing a standard process across our programs to help ensure that we can meet the needs of our clients or direct them to the resources that can help. A Client Engagement task force will be formed to develop the processes for managing our clients across the organization and to ensure goals and actions are in place to measure our success.
  • Critical to achieving this strategic objective is our ability to understand our stakeholder satisfaction with our services and outcomes. We must be able to effectively respond to their feedback and direction. Our Client Engagement taskforce will also develop a client, funder & donor feedback loop to measure satisfaction and to strengthen our overall listening approach.
  • We will be nationally recognized for our quality. We will build an organization-wide Quality Assurance department that ensures we are in compliance, audit-ready, quality focused, and continually improving our services based on regular quantitative and qualitative data analysis.
  • Our work is inherently risky, but we take care to monitor and mitigate that risk through our risk management approach. We will expand our focus in this area to engage all staff in effectively identifying, monitoring and mitigating risk throughout the full organization.
  • Our work is complex and highly regulated. We must effectively leverage technology to improve our record keeping and maintenance processes to ensure we are efficient and effective in servicing our clients.
  • Our partnerships are critical to how effectively we serve our clients. We have strong relationship management skills and are known for our collaborative approach. We will formalize our relationship management processes to ensure that we are developing relationships consistently and effectively across the full organization to better serve our clients with the full complement of our service offerings. This will allow us to be actively engaged with our communities and partners, helping toward creating vibrant communities.

We will ensure we have the right processes, people and tools in place to maximize our impact with our clients.

Our goal is to become an Employer of Choice in our communities – evidenced by our progress
towards a 100% employee satisfaction rate. We know that our environment will change and that we will be blessed with new opportunities to serve. To be prepared for those opportunities, we must be nimble and able to handle quick additions, changes and shifts in to our program focus.

Ultimately, to ensure that we most effectively serve our clients, we must do all we can to create the best environment for our employees. We will achieve this by delivering on the following:

  • Implement a comprehensive talent management system, including enhancing our branding,
    recruiting, onboarding, training, employee engagement, and succession planning approaches. This
    will include best practices related to systems, processes, tools, and behaviors.
  • Ensure our performance management and compensation approach sufficiently ties our
    performance against agency and personal goals to reward, via fair and consistent pay practices for
    all. This will include best practices related to systems, processes, tools, and behaviors.
    2017-2020 LSF Strategic Plan
  • Support the LSF Board efforts to strengthen the overall governance, board recruitment, and
    onboarding process of new board members and relationship with moral owners.
  • Ensure that we are leveraging technology efficiently and effectively throughout the organization to
    ensure effective and efficient work environments and improve the services we offer to our clients.
  • Continue enhancing our internal and external communications to better connect our work across
    lines of service and geographies, inclusive of driving a single LSF culture across the organization.

Ensure we are well positioned to be responsive to urgent needs and to organize scarce resources for the most effective results.

Our goal is to add $10m in new funding per year. To be in the right place, we must actively engage in our communities through legislative involvement, advocacy work with – and on behalf of – our clients, actively monitoring of trends, and maintaining a keen focus on the evolving needs of our client base. We must also actively pursue opportunities to improve the services we offer clients, while being good stewards of our funding. This requires a keen focus on resource management to ensure we are adequately prepared to positively impact the lives of those we serve. And, it requires a proactive approach to partnerships and collaborative opportunities to serve people in need.

We will achieve this by delivering on the following:

  • We must critically and continually look at the services we offer to ensure that the services we provide are generating outcomes consistent with our mission and vision. We will implement a strategic portfolio management approach to allow our leadership team to effectively assess each program and to determine if we should maintain, grow or refocus it.
  • Our ability to effectively manage our budgeting, forecasting and fiscal review processes is paramount to our ability to best use the scarce resources we have to serve our clients. We will continue to improve our capacity in this arena through enhanced reporting, transparent discussions, and a prioritization process for managing discretionary funds.
  • Our organization has grown tremendously over the past five years. To maximize the services we offer, we must become better and implement organization-wide grant acquisition. We will build an organization-wide opportunity management and grant acquisition process to ensure we are maximizing our opportunities to best serve the communities where we operate.
  • We are often faced with opportunities for expansion through acquisition, merger or other partnerships. We will establish a standard due diligence process to evaluate such opportunities and protect our valuable funds and resources.
  • The world of human services is complex and ever-changing. We believe we have a unique perspective on the needs of our clients and their communities. And, we believe that we have a moral imperative to help our legislative process use the funds they have to best serve those needs.
  • We will expand our advocacy work to help ensure we are positioned to help clients as legislative priorities and funding streams shift.
  • Our business model is one of a public provider. Yet, to achieve the vision – particularly creating vibrant communities – we must expand our funding streams to better engage the communities we serve. We will develop a comprehensive donor engagement plan, grow our donor base and seek additional unrestricted and targeting revenues.
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We are committed to diversity and inclusion to promote a culture where we celebrate our differences. Everyone feels included in our mission of bringing God’s healing, hope, and help to our communities. We provide vital human services to Florida’s citizens regardless of age, race, sexual orientation, ethnicity, background, or belief system. We also want to do everything we can to promote diversity, equity, and inclusion within our organization. We seek to maintain a constant state of self-reflection, listening, and openness. While ensuring all voices are equally heard, spaces are safer for those experiencing systemic oppression and lack of access. With that goal in mind, we created a task force with folks from all over our organization which comprises our Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion committee, to continue this work beyond today’s challenges.