Mandate

Building on the input received in the visioning process (see Visioning Document September 2012) create a four-year plan that includes a review of core operations, identifies funding needs and appropriate revenue sources, both for ongoing and project-related needs, and projects a budget approach to ensure financial stability for the long term. This plan will include an evaluation of the amount of the Leaders Guild fee and whether it needs to be increased in the coming years.

Background Information

Mission Statement and Core Operations (as of 2014)

1)     Support the work of the Guidance Council

• Providing administrative and financial resources to support work of the Guidance Council in carrying out its responsibilities for:
• guiding leaders and mentors by encouraging their spiritual expansion and personal development
• supporting learning opportunities
• setting guidelines for certification and for mentor acknowledgements
• recognizing mentors, and
• upholding standards of conduct and human relationship that are in keeping with the mission of the Dances of Universal Peace.

2)     Provide resources and support for members of the Leaders Guild

• Maintaining and continuing to enhance a highly functional website in multiple languages containing key resources to support Dance leaders and mentors who are Leaders Guild members.
• Administering the Leaders Guild and extending services to the community of mentors and leaders in support of the Dance leader’s journey.
• Linking and informing Leaders Guild members through semi-annual e-newsletter communications, and sponsoring an e-group as a forum for discussion about matters related to Dance leading.

3)     Link the worldwide community of participants in the Dances

• Maintaining a multi-lingual website providing general information about the Dances of Universal Peace and links to all regional Dance-related websites and resources worldwide.
• Maintaining communication with the leadership of Dance Regions through telephone conferences, email, and regular e-newsletters.

Financial Analysis

Four-year summary of key areas of sources and uses of funds, balance sheet showing reserves.

The foregoing tables show DUP International’s shift over the last four years from a Seattle-office, publishing oriented non-profit to a home-office based, internet-oriented service organization. Leaders Guild fees collections have increased steadily over the period while the cost of building and maintaining our website has come down from early year investments. Sales income has declined steadily over the last four years as the remaining inventory of DUP CDs, booklets, tapes, etc, has declined. These materials are no longer required because they are now available to Leaders Guild members through the website.

Employee wages have remained steady over time. DUP International employs three part-time individuals plus the Guidance Council chair to carry out core operations. The Executive Director is responsible for the overall health and direction of the organization, including planning, fundraising, administration and assistance to the board of directors, website maintenance and development, and communications to the Leaders Guild. The Office Assistant maintains office records including bookkeeping, coordinates with Region leaders for collection of Leaders Guild fees, files reports and invoices, pays bills and general office oversight. The Community Coordinator maintains the leader data base, records level changes and new leader data, and sends information to leaders to assist them with accessing resources on line. The Guidance Council Chair organizes the work of the Guidance Council, formulates initiatives and projects to further the transmission of the Dances, keeps in communication with senior mentors about mentor acknowledgements and assists mentors with questions about the Leaders Guild Guidelines and certification requirements.

Dances of Universal Peace International

Balance Sheet - December 31, 2013

DUP International ended 2013 with approximately $41,000 in unrestricted cash assets.

Leaders Guild Annual Snapshot

Here we present a year-over-year presentation of Leaders Guild membership broken down by Region and category as the basis for analysing and projecting trends. This data is critical because Leaders Guild fees are a significant proportion of DUP International’s sustainable revenue.

While the table shows a decline in overall numbers, the number of active (paid-up) Leaders Guild memberships has remained fairly stable over the four years. A concentrated effort was made in 2012 to clear from the database records of those who had ceased leading the Dances and were no longer interested in being part of our teaching stream.

Leaders Guild Membership as of December 31, 2013.

More clearing of data base records of individuals took place in 2013, with a total number of 73 (116 total end-dated minus 43 who moved up to “certified leader”) leaders end-dated at the level of “mentored leader”. The pie chart insert illustrates the distribution by category of the current Leaders Guild membership (total 1,064).

Discussion and Recommendations

The Planning Committee considered the above background information along with input received from others during the past year of reflection. We asked ourselves:

• How appropriate are DUP International’s current mission, focus, services, and modes of operation?
• Are there services we are providing that are not meeting the intended need?
• Are there gaps in what we offer?
• Are there areas in which we could be doing better?
• Do we have any sense of how satisfied these groups are: the Guidance Council? Members of the Leaders Guild? Region leadership?

In summary, we examined whether are our current core operations coming close to fulfilling our mission, and whether there are areas where significant developments are still being called for as we look ahead for the next five-year period.

Mission

In our view, the current Mission of DUP International is appropriate and does not need to be amended.

Support for Guidance Council

The Guidance Council has affirmed that, for the time being, the direction and scope of its work will remain as it is. Therefore, there are no changes foreseen in DUP International’s administrative and financial supports for the work of the Guidance Council.

Support for Leaders Guild

The programs offered by DUP International to members of the Leaders Guild appear to be meeting the needs of this body, as much as we are able to understand those. An area that seems to us could benefit from additional attention is Leaders Guild communications. While the existing e-Newsletter (now semi-annual) prepared by the Executive Director is of high quality, it seems to have only a 50% open rate, according to statistics generated by Constant Contact. This is high by industry standards, but seems considerably below what we might like to achieve for the Leaders Guild. Further, communications technology is a rapidly developing area, and perhaps features like blogs, teleconferences, webcasts, and video channels would be effective in achieving greater coverage of our communications, as well as more participation by Leaders Guild members.

Recommendation: Create a Board communications committee (with membership including volunteers from the Leaders Guild who are not Board members as well as the Executive Director) to provide focus and leadership in this area.

Support for the Worldwide Community of Participants in the Dances

The resources being in place to “link the worldwide community of participants in the Dances” seem appropriately focused and resourced. However, the function of Dance Regions appears to be in flux, possibly because of the extensive services that DUP International has developed over the past four years. This, along with the communications technology that facilitates direct contact with Leaders Guild members wherever they are, has precipitated discussions in some parts of the world as to the need for and focus of a regional organization, since they can be expensive to administer and maintain. As one example DUP North America has recently stopped requiring annual membership dues, and in the process passed back to DUP International the task of collecting Leaders Guild fees.

It seems important for DUP International to have an active presence in all parts of the world in as an investment in maintaining cohesion within the Dances of Universal Peace. Because the Dances are experienced somewhat differently in the variety of cultural and linguistic settings in which they are practiced, there is also potential benefit in sharing local information widely so leaders can learn from each other and do not become isolated.

Recommendation: Create a Board worldwide network committee (including volunteers from the Leaders Guild from various parts of the world who are not Board members as well as the Executive Director) to concentrate in this area.

Ideally, benefits could include greater cross-pollination as well as a stronger sense of the whole Dances of Universal Peace community. However, the early activities of the committee would be exploratory, gathering information on the existing worldwide community and its emerging needs. It is not possible for the global Dance community to gather physically, but are there useful possibilities for keeping connected in other ways?

The Gap between Ongoing Revenues and Ongoing Expenditures

Leaders Guild fee revenues at present fund only about 60% of the ongoing expenses of operating DUP International. The revenue shortfall has been met largely through accumulated reserves, and as well through a one-time fund-raising campaign conducted toward the end of 2011. The Leaders Guild membership data indicate a more-or-less steady state in overall numbers, with no reason to project growth that would generate higher fee revenues. It is necessary, therefore, to review the amount of the annual Leaders Guild fee: ongoing revenues need to increase closer to the level of ongoing expenditures in the next five-year period, or DUP International will cease to be sustainable.

 At the same time, expenditures need to be reviewed to determine what reductions can be made without jeopardizing the sustainability of ongoing programs and services. During DUP International’s start-up period (from late 2009), many new developments and projects were necessary to devise and implement the range of services and supports that now exist. With the completion of these start-up projects later in 2014, DUP International’s resources can be fully devoted to maintaining what has been built.

The Planning Committee reviewed three scenarios for budget levels over the next four years: A more-or-less “stay the course” option, a bare-bones option of reducing the budget to one requiring only Leaders Guild fees to maintain, and a “middle-of-the-road” option.  A key consideration for us has been maintenance of core operations and some capability for implementing new initiatives, while cutting back (particularly on the time of the Executive Director) from the levels of this past four-year developmental phase. Here is a projected budget scenario assuming a reduction of the Executive Director’s time to 12 hours/week beginning in 2015 (down from 18 hours/week at present) and an increase in Leaders Guild fees to $36/year beginning in 2016.

This course of action would require a fundraising drive in 2014-15 to build reserves for maintaining the organization over the next four years. This scenario represents reduction of dependence on prior reserves than we have had in recent years. Alternatively DUP International could raise approximately 6% of its budget annually and maintain reserves at current levels.
Recommendation: That the Board approve a reduction in the contract of the Executive Director to 12 hours/week (for 46 weeks/year) effective January 2015, along with other measures to re-focus DUP International toward maintaining current programs, with reduced capacity for undertaking new developments.

In the long run, Leaders Guild members need to take responsibility for funding the lion’s share of the annual expenditures, since it is those members who benefit from the services being provided. It seems realistic to raise a small proportion (e.g. less than 10%) of the annual budget through regular donations, but otherwise, the revenues need to be raised through increasing Leaders Guild fees. An important consideration is providing adequate notice of fee increases.
Recommendation: That the Board increase Leaders Guild fees by 20%, to USD$36 per annum, effective January 1, 2016 (implementation date subject to feedback from Regions).

It will take considerable time before the expenditure reductions and fee increases will be fully in effect. During the transition, we recommend raising funds to rebuild reserves and support initiatives such as further website development. The strategy of re-focusing around maintaining services could mean that the capacity to meet emerging needs will need to be added from time to time in the future. It must be remembered that DUP International’s capacity to develop and implement the current range of programs and supports came largely from years of previous healthy financial results. Having built the current organization largely through drawing down reserves accumulated from previous years, it seems prudent now to assure a similar legacy as we move forward.

Recommendation: That the Board conduct a fund drive in 2014-2015 to raise $20,000 to support general operations and future projects (details to be determined).

Donations from Leaders Guild Members
While Leaders Guild members collectively contribute to DUP International’s financial sustainability through the payment of their annual fees, some may also be willing to provide additional support in the form of donations. Since DUP International is otherwise a fee-for-service organization, creating an active donations program can help cultivate an atmosphere of generosity. Because not all Leaders Guild members are expected to have the financial capacity to pay the full amount of the annual fee (especially in some parts of the world) the Fee Support fund, with its new provision for what amounts to a sliding scale, is an obvious project into which a donations program could be channeled. Ideally, the total quantum of fee support requested annually will be fully offset by donations from other Guild members. Donations beyond that threshold will augment general revenues toward the long-term financial health of the organization.

Recommendation: That a request for donations be implemented as part of the process of acknowledging payment of annual Leaders Guild fees for all members, to be implemented beginning in North America.

Implementation in other parts of the world will require discussion with leaders in those areas. Implementing an annual communication acknowledging payment of Leaders Guild fees could be beneficial in raising the profile of DUP International in areas where the Region has been the main point of contact.

Governance
Throughout the past four years, the Board of DUP International has consisted of five members (plus the Executive Director). There has been only one ongoing committee, the Administrative Committee comprising the President (who is also Chair of the Guidance Council), the Vice-President, the Secretary/Treasurer, and the Executive Director. The Board has set the total number of Directors at seven and left two positions vacant.

Recommendation: Increase the size of the Board by one member effective April 2015. Assign one Board member to head up the new Communications committee, and one to head up the new Worldwide Network committee, with other members of those committees to be recruited from the Leaders Guild membership. (There could be a second Board member on each committee too.) We recommend that the frequency of Board meetings be reduced from five times per year to quarterly, with committees to meet at least once between each Board meeting.

The above recommendations recognize that re-focusing DUP International as more of a maintenance organization requires a similar shift in the functioning of the Board. In particular, the clarity around objectives and programs opens up greater possibility for involving larger numbers of Leaders Guild members as volunteers. This could become a useful means of finding and orientating future Board members.

Relationship with Sufi Ruhaniat International
Emphasizing the inseparable connection between the Dances of Universal Peace and the Sufi Ruhaniat International – the Dances being one of the core concentrations within the Ruhaniat – has helped bring about greater harmony and understanding within the community of Sufi teachers, the great majority of whom are also members of the Leaders Guild. Continued efforts in this direction, including the recent addition of a DUP IN Board member to the Board of SRI, could open up further ways of working together that could benefit both organizations.

Most Leaders Guild members are also Ruhaniat mureeds, in which case there is affiliation with two organizations: DUP International and the Sufi Ruhaniat International. DUP International’s choice of a fee-for-service funding model, with only modest efforts toward soliciting gifts and donations, reduces the potential that the two organizations will be working at cross purposes, given that the Ruhaniat funds itself largely through encouraging generosity and donations from mureeds. In any event, a healthy, thriving world-wide Dances of Universal Peace community – one that carries the vision and transmission of Murshid Samuel Lewis – is surely what we all wish to nourish and sustain.

Summary
Dances of Universal Peace International has succeeded over the past four years in charting an effective new course with a refocused mission and goals, programs and services and funding strategy. We believe that this plan will help to consolidate the work that has been accomplished while increasing Leaders Guild fees to a level more on par with the services being rendered to the Guild. This plan moderately reduces our staff resources and support to a prudent level for the next period of development without harming core operations.

May 23, 2014