“Never-Never land?” Critical Success Factors of Infrastructure – Skills,

Knowledge and Confidence

Aims of Presentation ‘my hearties’…

• The use of ‘Peter Pan’: metaphor, imagination and reality

• What is St Helens ‘Nuts and Bolts’ project?• Research methodology• ‘Critical success factors’: a process not an

end product• Where are we?: progression, stagnation and

failing

Research Methodology: The pirate has arrived!

• Rationale: “Nuts & Bolts” St Helens CVS in October 2007 obtained Big Lottery funding with University of Liverpool providing research evaluation of project - 4 year longitudinal research study: tracking change process and ‘what works’

• 120 organisations in St Helens (different sizes, nature, scope, and resources)

• Methodology: ‘Narrative Tapping’ and ‘Tracking Narrative’ • Diverse methodology:*Ongoing extensive literature search and review *Ongoing in-depth and semi-structured interviews (6 case studies)*Questionnaire (120 organisations with 44% response rate)*Focus groups (4 groups consisting of at least 8 organisations)

Preliminary Findings: Some Thematic Success Factors –

Tinkerbell’s answers

• “Committee Structures” • “Leadership”• “Business Plans” • “Funding”• “Time”• “Training”• “Partnerships”

Group Discussion of Infrastructure: Progression,

Stagnation and Failing (P.S.F)?• Progression (the character of Wendy) =

encouragement and focus on moving forward• Stagnation (the character of Captain Hook) = hinders

change, hostile and very self centred• Failing (the character of Peter Pan) =

no growth and no development, lacks skills and confidence

Q. How does your CVS assist in these 3 areas? How do you measure P, S, F? If not, how can you measure P,S,F?