Consultant on Strategic Alignment and Planning

Friends of the Earth’s mission is to defend the environment and create a more healthy and just world. We are a progressive group that approaches environmental protection as a cause inseparable from issues of justice and peace. We are also part of the Friends of the Earth International federation, which connects grassroots groups in 76 countries. Our current campaigns focus on economic policy, climate and clean energy solutions, clean oceans and vessels, and safe food and consumer products.

Our organization is based in Washington, D.C., with a smaller office in Berkeley, Calif., and several other employees working remotely. We currently have 27 staff members, and 16 board members.

Summary

In September 2009, with the hiring of Erich Pica as our new president, Friends of the Earth started a transition and planning process with the purpose of moving the organization boldly into the future. Since then, the organization has planned and implemented significant changes to prepare us for ramping up the planning process. Erich has developed a vision and furthered an effective working relationship with the BOD and BOD leadership. To date, we have developed and defined the senior leadership team, restructured several key development functions, the accounting department, computers and technologies, and our program teams. The organization has also commissioned external reviews to help us assess and learn more about our development program, how we manage our website and online lists, as well as the possibilities and pitfalls of canvassing. We have begun changing the roles and relationships between FOE’s 501-c-3 and 501-c-4 organizations and planning for expanded program areas, including more active grassroots organizing. We are seeking a highly skilled consultant to help guide us through a strategic alignment and planning process.

Proposal guidelines and requirements

Proposals for consultation should be submitted by email to Julie Dyer, assistant to the president at Friends of the Earth, at jdyer@foe.org with the subject line “Proposal for consultant on strategic planning.” Proposals should be submitted no later than February 28, 2013 for consideration.

The response to this RFP should outline the proposed steps and budget necessary to meet the objectives stated in this RFP, as well as the bidder’s additional recommendations and other costs. Proposals should address the consultant’s experience in the areas outlined in the RFP, as well as his or her approach to guiding an organization’s board of directors and staff through a strategic alignment and planning process.

The final selection will be based on several factors, including experience and accomplishments in successfully guiding organizations through an alignment and planning process; familiarity and experience with environmental, economic and social justice advocacy work as well as organizing and voter programs in diverse communities; compatibility of consultant’s proposed approach to planning with our organization’s needs, existing frameworks, resources and processes; and cost/value, to name a few.

Purpose, description and objectives

We are at a turning point in history. The economic and financial meltdown coupled with global environmental threats such as global warming, water shortages, and lack of access to food, has made space for a once in a lifetime opportunity to question, and potentially change, the fundamentals of how our national and global economy relate to the environment. Very few environmental groups understand this opportunity. Fewer are equipped and willing to participate in it.

It is an organizational imperative to occupy this new space. We must create the innovative policies and campaigns that not only insert environmental and social justice advocacy into this needed debate, but help push for a broad-based rethinking of our economic systems. FOE has the leadership/vision, the boldness, the expertise and the passion to lead the environmental movement in affecting the way society and the macro-economy value the environment. And we are putting in place the steps to build an organization with the institutional strength to actively set and push this agenda.

Friends of the Earth is seeking a consultant with experience and success in guiding an organization through an institutional process of alignment and planning that results in sustainable change.

Areas of work include:

• Working to develop a plan that enhances work already done, advances integration of organizational initiatives, and continues and builds upon the strengths of organizational climate, culture, principles, brand identity, systems, and best practices.
• Working to advance alignment of board and staff with organizational plans.
• Examining and understanding the president’s vision for the organization. Exploring internal (board and staff) understandings and ideas about the organization and our
• work. Gaining familiarity with existing frameworks and initiatives. Discovering the relationships with, and perspectives of, key external parties.
• Facilitating well-balanced board, staff, and work group communication during the alignment/planning process. Working with the president, managing director, and board planning task force chair to keep the process moving. Integrating justice and diversity principles in the process. Proposing ways to integrate key stakeholders into the planning.
• Revisiting Friends of the Earth’s mission, vision and values. Having a new iteration or reaffirmation of our vision, mission and values is absolutely necessary. Helping to facilitate the program teams’ development of mission(s), vision(s) and values that are aligned and integrated with those of Friends of the Earth.
• Assisting the organization’s board and staff in determining key results areas, in establishing work groups in different areas, and in identifying goals and objectives in different areas for the short-, medium- and long-term.
• Helping to summarize and synthesize work group recommendations and to develop drafts of plans.
• Helping to ensure that the process results in a plan that is clear, ambitious, achievable, sustainable, and flexible, that provides for monitoring and evaluation of the plan’s implementation, and that can obtain board and staff buy-in.
• Helping to present the plan to staff, if requested.

Timeline for selecting consultant

• February 6, 2013 – RFP released
• February 28, 2013 – Deadline for submitting
• March 29, 2013 (estimated) – Award of contract
• April 2013 up to December 2013 (estimated) – Duration of contract term

Contract terms

We anticipate that the consultant will work with our organization for about six to ten months. We are open to proposals of varying lengths, as we realize that approach and availability could differ significantly between proposals.

Please include a proposed fee structure and/or rate in the proposal.