Aim to Boost Membership, Revenues and Relevance : New Plan to Put UK’s Chartered Institution of Wastes Management Back in the Black

The UK’s Chartered Institution of Wastes Management (CIWM) has approved a new and medium term business plan to strengthen the its core role as the professional membership body for the resources and waste sector and to return the CIWM Group to financial surplus in the short term after a challenging period in recent years.

The plan, developed and presented to CIWM Trustees by external consultant Andrew Garcia, follows a detailed market and organisation review, internal and external consultation, and close working with CIWM’s senior management team. It is designed to ensure that CIWM can respond effectively to the changes happening in the sector as it expands to embrace the wider resources agenda.

It will also help CIWM to increase its value and relevance at a time when membership bodies across the board have been hit by economic factors including austerity and modern professionals seeking a different ‘membership’ experience.

The organisation said that the plan presents a vision for it to refocus its activities to ensure it is ‘supporting, empowering and connecting professionals across the resources sector’. To achieve this, the plan proposes:

A renewed focus on CIWM’s core objective of providing value-added membership services in line with its Charter;

Developing the links between CIWM and WAMITAB to provide a cohesive service offering to a wider potential membership group;

A restructuring and rationalisation of CIWM and CIWM Enterprises to become a single delivery platform;

The development of a framework which leads to a recognised professional competency across the wider sector, which is relevant to both the public and private sector and provides credibility and status to members;

Partnership working with relevant other sector organisations and associations to maximise member benefits through a common framework with transferable competencies;

Within this common sector framework, the development of specialist modules aligned to specific sector competency needs;

More proactive engagement on market critical topics to increase CIWM’s visibility and influence;

A ‘membership for all’ approach, with clear career paths from operative level where WAMITAB provides accredited required qualifications through to CIWM’s more management focused membership grades; and

Better integration of CIWM’s regional structure into the new delivery model to underpin the key role that the regions can play in driving membership, networking and commercial activities including training.

In addition to strengthening CIWM’s offering to ensure that membership numbers and other revenues grow, the Plan also puts forward a number of targeted cost reduction measures.

Staff redeployment and potentially a small number of job losses are expected and a hold has been put on the recruitment of a new CEO until the required skillset for the role has been clearly defined in line with the new vision for CIWM. In addition, a move to new, modern offices following the sale of CIWM’s current headquarters is anticipated.

“CIWM remains financially healthy and through the hard work and professionalism of its staff, volunteers and members it continues to be seen as an authoritative and influential body for the sector,” said Margaret Bates, CIWM’s Executive Committee Chair.

“There is a lot of opportunity ahead, but the current model is not sustainable, and we have to change and gear up for the future. There are two main objectives in this plan. In the short term, we are taking action to restore the CIWM to financial surplus and in the longer term, we want to ensure that CIWM is both financially sustainable and builds on its existing strengths by making it a modern and effective membership body that delivers real value to today’s resource and waste professionals,” she concluded.

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