Executive View
Page 4
Notes from the Chair
August saw the introduction of new light-weight coins and the withdrawal of the familiar 5c piece. The Reserve Bank worked closely with the Foundation and the Association of Blind Citizens of NZ (ABC NZ) to come up with a coin design recognisable by touch as well as sight. We are delighted that the Bank has taken a collaborative approach to coin design and hope that manufacturers of electronic and household products, so much part of our lives these days, might also see that good design benefits the whole community and is a sound marketing strategy.
In this issue we celebrate the achievements of six Foundation associates recognised in the recent Queen's Birthday Honours list. The single feature that links all these recipients - Linda Beck; Eddie Low; Elizabeth McRae; June Ombler; Gordon Sanderson and Noeline Tainui - is their passion for education and research, personal development, and a fair and just society.
In July the unified blind community met with the Ministry of Education and Ministry officials about interminable delays in resolving funding and staffing issues holding back the quality and quantity of teaching available to blind and low vision students. As far back as October 2004 the Ministry publicly acknowledged the need to re-configure resources to fill the gaps in blind education. A six person working group between the Ministry of Education and BLENNZ is now examining the detail of how blind students might get an equitable, as-of-right, education. The eventual outcome of the group's work may not be apparent until July 2007. However the Minister directed Ministry officials to report back to him in September. Our students must be given the same education available to sighted students. And please remember, blind students generally have to work twice as hard to achieve half as much.
Before June 2007 the Foundation will have a new three year strategic plan to drive its development. All stakeholders including Outlook readers, are invited to contribute ideas. A preliminary discussion paper will be available from mid September. Phone Ruth Bijl on 0800 24 33 33 with your thoughts on the Foundation's future, or please attend planning meetings in your area between 25 September and 5 October 2006. We want to hear from you. You can contact me on 09 372 6929 or d.mckenzie@clear.net.nz.
Page 5
Chief Executive's View
The media sometimes still call us the Foundation FOR the Blind; we will forgive them because the stories themselves are almost always positive. But our Board and Senior Management never forget we are OF the Blind.
The bedrock of the change from "for the blind" to "of the blind" is ensuring that our consultation with members is ongoing, consistent and fruitful - that we know what members need and focus our services in those areas.
I was incredibly heartened earlier this year when the Senior Management team and I, as well as several Board members, attended nine Regional Forums right across New Zealand. Every single forum was a positive experience. Members, staff, Community Committee members and volunteers asked questions and gave us deserved compliments, constructive criticism, and some excellent ideas.
At the end of the forums, I had a great feeling of unity - we are absolutely all working together - and everyone is doing their best to ensure that blind, deafblind and vision-impaired people get the services they need, as of right. We continue to encourage input from more members - through forums and the AGM, voting in elections, commenting on our draft strategic and business plans, etc. We also continue to seek innovative, new ways to consult. With direct input from more and more members and our consumer organisations, we can remain confident that we are on the right path.
New Year Opportunities
We are now in a new financial year. Through a huge team effort, our staff have achieved most of what we set out to do in 2005/2006 and are well down the track in terms of delivering against the Strategic Plan.
As Don McKenzie mentioned we will soon begin working on our second, three-year Strategic Plan, and I again encourage members to get involved. This new fiscal year will see the advancement of several key projects:
- The trial of a digital download capable player, which will affect how we deliver critical library services in future
- Implementation of the Volunteer Services Review
- Completion of three service delivery pilots, and then
Page 6
- implementation of what we've learned about the best, most efficient ways of delivering key services in today's challenging environment.
Staff Survey
In addition to holding staff meetings up and down the country - which I attended along with other Senior Managers - we recently conducted an in-depth, confidential Staff Survey over our intranet (which is the "internal" part of our website, if you will).
Here are some of the highlights. We are of course concerned about the last bullet point.
- 98% strongly agree, agree, or tend to agree their work is valuable and worthwhile (all these numbers are the totals of "strongly agree, agree, and tend to agree")
- 94% say they really enjoy their job
- 90% believe the Foundation has a clear vision and purpose
- 80% would recommend the Foundation as a good place to work.
- 34% agree that their pay is about right for the work they do
The Foundation is the primary service provider of vision-related rehabilitation to our 11,500 blind, deafblind and vision-impaired members. This rehabilitation is done by RNZFB professionals, mainly in one-on-one sessions. Despite our best efforts - and largely due to under-funding by Government - we have fallen further behind in staff salaries.
We are trying hard to retain our professional staff, and to attract new staff. Staff love working here and helping members, but they also have mortgages and children and life costs. We will do our best to improve salaries and to ensure that staff know how much their efforts are appreciated. We have to attract and keep qualified staff to deliver services that members need.
Clearly, there is pressure on us to boost our fundraising efforts, like in the upcoming Blind Week, and with Government.
I'm tempted to write a long tribute to Geoff Warne, but since there is a nice story about him on page 17, I will restrain myself. Geoff, our CFO, is leaving the Foundation after 16 years of service. In many ways he has been my right hand. He is a genius in accounting, passionate about our vision and mission, and a true pleasure to work with. Our loss is the gain of the the Leprosy Mission International, which he will head. On behalf of our members and friends, I bid Geoff farewell and Godspeed. We will all miss him enormously.