Ohio Energy Project Sees Challenges as Opportunities

THE NEED

The Ohio Energy Project (OEP) has delivered expert energy education resources to teachers, students, families and partners since 1984. OEP empowers teachers and students through experiential learning that impacts Ohio schools, homes and communities. In addition to the challenges of pivoting to virtual programming due to COVID-19, OEP is preparing for the future with a development plan focusing on diversifying their partnerships in Ohio and beyond.  They are also reinventing themselves based on their strength as a STEM education provider. 

OEP asked Milepost to help them lay critical groundwork as they embark on achieving the following goals:

1. Reshape existing programing and explore new programming
2. Develop a strategic plan for a reimagined OEP
3. Establish a new value proposition and supporting messaging framework
4. Focus and redirect efforts and resources

OUR APPROACH

As OEP prepared their staff and board to contemplate their programmatic and funding challenges with creativity and courage, Milepost’s approach was to begin their strategic revisions through a facilitated SOAR (Strengths, Opportunities, Aspirations, Results) workshop and provide next steps as a self-guided process in preparation for their annual board retreat.

The main objectives of the SOAR workshop were to:

1. Reframe challenges as constructive, growth-oriented opportunities
2. Create an upward spiral of thought, action and behavior
3. Encourage creativity and out-of-the-box thinking
4. Guide strategic thinking toward possibilities, without interjected negatives
5. Establish OEP’s potential
6. Unify and equalize all voices

THE RESULTS

Milepost’s deliverables for this project included:

• Pre-workshop SOAR survey for staff and board members
• Facilitation of a two-hour SOAR workshop for approximately 20 people
• A post-workshop report containing SOAR survey responses by individual, SOAR workshop exercise results and SOAR vision statements
• Presentation of recommended exercises and tools for translating final SOAR results into actionable organization goals and directives 

OEP leadership was delighted to learn that the staff and board had similar goals for the organization’s next steps. It was clear there was unity. OEP’s staff was empowered to move forward with strategic planning knowing they were fully supported. The board reported feeling like they had made more progress in two hours than they had in much longer past strategy sessions. There was consensus around the path forward and a strong sense of togetherness following the SOAR exercise, which equipped OEP with the tools to tackle their challenges with strength and purpose.

OUR ROLE

• Change Management
• Facilitation
• Strategic Planning
• Training & Team Building