On Saturday, 4 September, the Diocesan Volunteering team, alongside experienced parish finance officers Chris Bradley and Jackie Jones, hosted a conference to support and equip treasurers, bookkeepers, and those with financial responsibility in their parishes. The day was attended by 31 parish officers and featured talks and workshops on topics including using accounting software and working with the Charity Commission.
The purpose of the day was to explore how the Treasurers role could be made as supportive as possible, and this was done through workshops, information sessions and talks given by parish finance officers and the Diocesan Finance and Generosity & Giving teams. The topics were based off answers to a survey which had been sent out in advance of the conference, aiming to establish the most important areas requiring support.
All attendees commented that they had found the day useful, and a post-event survey revealed an average ranking of 8.6/10 for the event.
The Volunteering team hopes that the event is the start of a process to support treasurers through designing new resources, developing mentoring and befriending support from experienced treasurers, and hosting webinars to share knowledge and find solutions to problems.
You can access the slides, handbook and handouts for the conference at the link below.