2014 - Strategy for Growth

board members: Alexander Proctor (president), Marja Pentikäinen (vice-president), Sofia Westerlund (vice-president), Ada Aadeli, Säde Kanervisto, Riikka Nieminen, Jenni Röynä

2014 was an important year for EYP Finland in building sustainable organisational operating models. EYP Finland focused on routinely organising top quality events, raising funds for activities, the professionalisation of the organisation’s governance, and strategic development. The celebratory 20th National Session took place in Vantaa, and for the second time we organised four Regional Sessions in Helsinki, Savonlinna, Salo and Oulu.

The board of EYP Finland held a training for the Head Organisers of the year’s events for the first time and began using a guidebook created to direct and support event organisation. All this with good effect: EYP Finland had never had as equally successful events as in 2014. The training of 12 Head Organisers for a period of 10 months in combination with the effective guidebook was widely adopted in the organisation, and it has become the model for organising events by every subsequent board.

Different partnerships with public and private actors had become more

and more crucial for the expansion and professionalisation of the organisation. EYP Finland was still operating with a limited amount of funding and its volunteers were stretched to a limit. Further growth and establishment required more funding. In 2014 EYP Finland fundraised a record amount of money which enabled us to hire two project workers towards the end of the year. However, the organisation needed a full-time Secretary General in order to be able to focus on future development. In 2014 eyes were truly set on the future. In the spring, we established a working group to form the first long-term strategy for the organisation. The result of the working group was EYP Finland’s Strategy 2015-2017. With the help of the strategy, EYP Finland could commit to long-term goals which would take the our activities forward and further advocate organisational development with a broad set of concrete and measurable success indicators and guidelines.