FW: [asha-wide] Looking forward into 2013

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Hi all,
Wish you very happy new year!!!
Please read forwarded mail and reply.

Regards,
Asha Mumbai
www.ashanet.org/mumbai/
-----Original Message-----
From: Coordinator, Asha
Sent: 03/01/2013 7:50:26 am
Subject: [asha-wide] Looking forward into 2013

Dear All,

Wish you and your families a very happy, prosperous and peaceful New Year
2013. I hope this year will give us more opportunities to expand our work
and reach more kids in need. As we begin this New Year, I just wanted to
touch upon a few things that I am seeing as pressing needs that we need to
work on as an organization this year.

There's nothing new about the fact that volunteer bandwidth has been an
acute pain point for most chapters in Asha for some time now. We are really
at a point where this bandwidth issue has started to impact not only our
fundraising ability but also our ability to keep the existing number of the
chapters and projects we currently have. What we need is a concerted effort
to expand our volunteer base. We need all chapters to actively campaign to
bring on board additional helping hands. Let us all discuss this issue in
the coming few weeks and come up with a coordinated plan that we can act
on.

In a related effort we are in the process of putting together a publicity
team that will help produce some good publicity / campaign material that
all chapters can use to expand and engage their volunteer and donor base.
If you or anyone in your chapter has ideas that you would like to share or
see being implemented, please reach out to me. IMO, volunteer strength is
by far the most pressing need of the hour for us all.

Also this year, we will be trying to get the organizational audit done in
the first quarter. The audit team so far has put in a lot of effort to get
things lined up for the audit (which will start in the next few days). I
request all the chapters (especially the treasurers and coordinators) to be
on the look out for any requests for information from the central team.
Your prompt response to data requests will be highly critical in ensuring a
successful completion of the audit. Successfully completing the audit is
not only important to ensure donor confidence in us but also opens up
avenues for us to extend partnership with various foundations etc. Besides
it will give us back our four star rating with charity navigator and other
reputed rating agencies.

Among other important things we will also be looking to give our website a
good makeover. Be on the look out for an email from the web team for a
pre-release version that you can play around with and provide feedback.

Also, this will be year for Asha 22 conference. This will be a great chance
to recharge our batteries and remind ourselves about why Asha exists and
the importance of the work that gets done through Asha.

There are too many important things on the to-do list that I would like to
talk about, however I don't want to make this email a thesis dissertation
either. But before I sign off, I just want to say one thing. Asha is what
it is because of folks like us all (reading this email) who roll up their
sleeves every day, step forward to make a commitment for Asha and deliver
upon it. Sometimes it might seem a little daunting given the lack of
helping hands around but that is something that we will hopefully fix in
the near future. The smiles that we put on kids’ faces is what makes it all
worthwhile though. Isn't it.

Thanks to everyone who made Asha happen in 2012. And lets rock 2013. Happy
new year once again.

Regards,

Rajeev