RESET – Mentoring process for the development of Siena’s cultural organisations

Since the end of 2020, the Fondazione Monte dei Paschi di Siena has contributed through Reset to supporting local cultural organisations that have been thrown into crisis by the pandemic.

Reset was entrusted to Dinamica, a network of consultancy agencies in which BAM! is a partner together with Ideazione and Melting Pro.

The process was divided into several phases that saw progressive strategic mentoring aimed at analysing the needs of the community and responding to them with support, sharing and empowerment activities.

A rich and active cultural context such as the province of Siena requires continuous listening aimed at closely supporting local organisations. Starting from these premises, it is possible to create a synergic network between the various players, aimed at sharing development visions, ideas, resources and planning to achieve growth and sustainability objectives for the entire community.

The project was divided into several phases:

Phase 1 – Self-assessment, 2020

At the start of the process, the organisations involved were asked to complete the self-assessment questionnaire created by Dinamica.

This made it possible to identify the local needs and requirements on which to base subsequent activities.

Phase 2 – Planning and themed meetings, 2021

A number of meetings were then organised to align Siena’s organisations with respect to issues, development fronts and innovative projects in the culture sector. The organisations were mentored as part of a process to build the foundations for their own development project.

Phase 3 – Practice community and coaching, 2021

During this phase, BAM! and the Dinamica network set up a practice community among the participating organisations. At the same time, the first coaching, training and empowerment courses got underway in order to address the training and capacity building needs of those involved.

At the end, five winners were selected from among the final projects, which received an additional contribution from the Fondazione Monte dei Paschi di Siena to implement the outlined activities.

Phase 4 – Structuring of the practice community, joint projects and coaching, 2022

During the fourth phase, the practice community development process continued through themed meetings and coaching. These flowed into five joint projects, made up of groups of participating organisations, supervised and supported by the Dinamica staff.

The five presented projects then obtained further funding from the Fondazione so that they could be implemented.

An additional phase is under development and will take place in 2023.

Cover photo © Raimond Spekking / CC BY-SA 4.0 (via Wikimedia Commons)