We planned to grow our membership and income by being a vibrant, influential and inclusive organisation through five projects.
2017-18 facts and figures
Grow projects
| Action | Summary of progress for the year | Complete/not complete |
|---|---|---|
| New membership categories We will continue to develop new membership categories through research with potential new members and develop supporting qualifications. We will continue to grow our membership of the Student Associates category and develop our services by providing a tailored package of support focussing on online content, bespoke events and volunteering opportunities for our future members. We will look to add 120 new accredited paralegals and 500 new student associates by 31 October 2018. | We grew our Accredited Paralegals membership by 122 this year to a total of 552 and now have 2024 student associates. | Complete |
| Membership retention We will introduce revised protocols aimed at retaining members based on feedback from those who have given up membership over the last year. The target is to obtain an overall 10% reduction in lost members across PC holder, non-practising member and roll-only subscriber categories compared with 2016/17. | There was no reduction at all, with an overall 1.5% increase in solicitors on the Roll. | Complete |
| Massive Open Online Course (MOOC) We will develop an Introduction to Scots Law MOOC for students intending to study law and members of the public interested in learning more about the law aiming to attract a minimum of 100 students in the first year. | Content for the MOOC has been developed. However, a decision was taken not to incur the cost of using an external platform when the Law Society was on the cusp of purchasing its own Virtual Learning Environment (VLE). The new VLE was not operational by year end and consequently the MOOC could not be launched. | Not complete |
| Non-core income We will continue to grow our non-core income, monitoring progress throughout the year against targets set in each area. The aim is to achieve overall non-core income growth (excluding investment gains) of £300,000 in 2017/18 compared with the previous year. | Final total for non-core income is £2.107k against a budget of £2.095k, a positive variance but 8% short of the ambitious target set. | Not complete |
| Joint commercial venture We will produce a business plan covering several potential commercial services, aiming to have invested in at least one further joint venture to create future non-core income. | Full business cases for investment in two potential commercial services were completed during the year, one was submitted to but not approved by our Board and the other did not satisfy the final stage of our internal controls. | Not complete |
