ABSTRACT
The Young Women's Christian Association (YWCA) is one of the largest and oldest women's organisations in the world. Established as the YWCA in England in 1855, the YWCA in Australia is now a largely secular organisation. It has a federated structure, and YWCA Queensland is one of its Member Associations. During the last century, there were dozens of YWCAs all around Australia: charitable, grassroots, membership organisations that performed a hugely valuable volunteer role in the communities they served. The Chief Executive Officer (CEO) recognised that her task was to produce cohesion and coherence out of what felt at times like chaos; for this she would need buy-in from all key stakeholder groups: staff, members and their representatives, and external parties. The CEO saw that—even before considering external stakeholders—YWCA Queensland was already an organisation with an identity crisis. The identified challenges needed to be addressed together; there was not the luxury to address one at a time.
