ARK Resettlement Services

The Challenge

ARK Resettlement Services (ARKRS) is a supported-housing charity for people transitioning from the criminal justice system. The organisation celebrated its tenth anniversary in 2024. Over the last decade, it has grown from an idea to a charity with a turnover of around £1million.

This growth means ARKRS is moving from a phase characterised by entrepreneurship and opportunism, into a time of greater organisational stability and operational maturity.

They asked NPC to help them develop a new strategy for this exciting new era.

The Approach

We supported ARK Resettlement Services (ARKRS) through the strategy development process.

This started with insight gathering, conducting a review of internal documents and interviewing staff and stakeholders to build up a picture of ARKRS’ needs, challenges, and opportunities.

This process surfaced key strategic themes and priorities including organisational effectiveness, scope of service provision, profile of ARKRS in the external landscape, and financial stability. So we facilitated internal consultations around these priorities.

Workshops for ARKRS staff and board members were supported by digital tools. From these discussions, we determined the priority level and required resource for each of the strategic priorities.

We also supported ARK Resettlement Services to identify and resolve questions of identity, core purpose, and direction. This made it easier for them to make vital strategic decisions.

The Result

The strategy development process offered a valuable space for the organisation to step back, reflect on recent progress, examine current needs and priorities, and consider future direction.

The outcome of this process was a detailed five-year strategy for ARK Resettlement Services (ARKRS) that balances both structure and flexibility and short-term and long-term plans.

We also worked on producing a detailed strategy implementation plan for Year 1.

‘It was absolute pleasure working with NPC on our strategy for the next 3-5 years. As we embark on an incredible journey to the next decade, this document will be vital in shaping the future of our organisation. The strategy process helped us to not only reflect internally but also challenged our thought processes, it helped us gain valuable external feedback as well.’

Kingsley Bempah, CEO