Charity Conference Season

Summertime heralds the charity conference season, and I’ve attended two in the past weeks: the Chartered Institute of Fundraising (CIOF)’s National Convention and the Third Sector Conference.

The CIOF National Convention is a regular for me: I can’t remember how many years I have been attending! Sometimes I lead discussion groups – but not this year: Minerva’s current workload precluded this, alas.

One of the CIOF’s best features is the Opening Plenary sessions, where presentations are given by distinguished and interesting people from outside the CIOF. This year was no exception: on the day I attended, this was TV presenter, marine biologist, and former Royal Marine Monty Halls. It’s not all fundraising – but it’s fascinating to hear a story like his and – even for fundraisers – there are lessons to be learnt.

The Third Sector Conference was a first for me, and it didn’t disappoint. Casting its net wider than fundraising, we listened to such diverse speakers as Catherine Johnstone CBE (CEO of the Royal Voluntary Service), Paul Latham (Director of Communications and Policy at the Charity Commission), and Francis Shaw (Director of Operations at The Fore).

Francis’ contribution was particularly valuable for small charities. Not only can small charities benefit from grants and other support from The Fore, but Francis’ panel group also addressed a key issue for cash-strapped small charities – Cross Charity Collaboration. Francis urged small charities to get in touch and collaborate with the “big hitters” – the latter may be more interested in the views and solutions of small charities than the former might think.

Small charities are traditionally wary of working too closely with their large national and international peers, for fear of being overwhelmed and subsumed into a large organisation. Many years ago, I was a non-executive director of a small local charity which was approached by a large regional one working in a similar field on the basis of “collaboration”. However, it soon became clear that they wanted to take us over and enable our healthy bank balance to improve their challenging financial situation. We backed out – sharply !

Times change – and collaboration today is a different proposition. As Francis Shaw said: “A lot of the problems that larger organisations are trying to solve are stuck in the grassroots.” Indeed – and many might well benefit from the grassroots experiences and knowledge of small charities throughout the UK.