Localgiving ambassador, Bright Light Bright Light has announced that he will be supporting seven Localgiving groups during his tour of the UK in September. Welsh born electro-pop musician, Rod Thomas (AKA Bright Light Bright Light), known for his work with Elton John, Erasure and his stunning performance on the Graham Norton Show, has always been passionate about supporting small, local charities. As an independent artist, Rod feels a real affinity with grassroots organisations. He sees his tour as an excellent opportunity both to bring in funds and raise the profile of his chosen causes. As Rod explained: “The best thing about touring is engaging with local communities and the people who try to make a difference within them. I worked with Lewis Garland of Localgiving to find charities in each city on the tour so that I could raise awareness of their fantastic work and help them out with donation collections at each of the shows. These charities are working hard to address issues where they live and make a real difference, and I want to do everything I can to help them.” Rod has chosen one Localgiving member to support for each of his upcoming tour dates. 20th Leeds : RETAS 23rd Bristol : Borderlands 24th Cardiff: Pride Cymru 25th Manchester: The Proud Trust 27th Glasgow : Theatre Nemo 28th Birmingham : Aston Performing Arts Academy  29th London: Gendered Intelligence For each date, Rod handpicked Localgiving causes that were both close to the venue and close to his heart – these include LGBTQI+ groups, refugee focussed charities and arts organisations.  There are two ways you can donate to his causes: Donate online by clicking on the charity name listed above (this will also give you the option of adding GiftAid). Remember to let us the group know you're a Bright Light Bright Light fan in the comments box! Make a cash donation at one of Bright Light Bright Light’s tour dates (Book tickets here) In the clip below Bright Light Bright Light explains why he feels supporting local charities is so important.  Found this blog interesting? You may also enjoy: Shining a Bright Light on Local Charities Fight for the right of LGBTQI asylum seekers

On October 12th the Open University Business School launched its new Centre for Voluntary Sector Leadership in London, where they launched two new free, flexible and open learning courses on voluntary sector leadership. Full details of the launch conference and the courses are here, and some clips of the day will soon be posted on Open University Business School’s Youtube channel. What follows is a brief overview of the themes that emerged on the day, how CVSL is responding, and how people in the sector can get further involved in the debate. These are tough times for the sector – but there is a need to fight back An obvious theme of the day was that these are intimidating, tough times for the voluntary sector. Both our keynote speakers spoke eloquently about the ‘rise and (partial) fall’ of the sector in recent times, at least as far as its place within public policy. Sir Stuart Etherington argued forcefully that the sector is operating under much greater scrutiny on a wide number of fronts: over fundraising, governance, and high salaries. One audience member spoke eloquently about their organisation being almost at ‘breaking point’ due to funding reductions and lack of supports in the local environment. On the other hand, a contrasting theme reflected the sense that times have always been tough and that the sector shouldn’t necessarily accept this dominant ‘crisis’ narrative. It certainly shouldn’t become resigned to it, and should “come out fighting’. As Debra Allcock Tyler cautioned, “everyone is busy complaining there is not enough money but the voluntary sector has stopped asking for money: fewer people are asking for money and they’re asking for less. It’s a negative narrative”. She made a passionate plea for the sector to rediscover its confidence, its spark and campaigning nouse. There was a clear sense at the event that how leaders respond is important. And CVSL’s research and educational resources provide one forum for some of these discussions. But researchers need to recognise the real difficulties at ground level, particularly for the smaller organisations that CVSL is seeking to engage with. Collaboration is part of the answer, but is not a silver bullet Austerity and cuts have been widely seen as increasing the drive for greater collaboration. The voluntary sector is often a sought after partner for collaboration because of their local knowledge and connectedness; although there also be many hidden agendas at play. There is something of a consensus around that collaboration is now the name of the game; linked to doing more for less, reducing duplicative activity, and putting egos to one side. However, Siv Vangen and colleagues’ research strikes a note of caution because it demonstrates that collaboration needs energy: it has to take account of the different partners’ aims, cultures, trust and power imbalances, especially in terms of the leadership challenges and the associated anxiety and rewards. This is explored in more depth in an accompanying Guardian blog that coincided with the event. A ‘realist’ approach to collaboration acknowledges that behind the scenes you may need to: Use stealthy manipulative methods to get consensus Understand the political undercurrents and who needs to be involved But! Collaboration is by nature inefficient. Collaboration needs compromise, energy, commitment and care. Leaders need to nurture collaboration. CVSL thinks of leadership at it’s very simplest as ‘making things happen’, and the first course in particular explores this in depth. The second of the courses explores the dynamics, contexts and practices of collaborative leadership, drawing on a range of contemporary issues and case studies from the voluntary sector, so that learning takes place in an intimate relationship with lived practice. The role of trustees and the importance of diversity A clear theme of the day was the crucial role of trustees and the need to include them in dialogue about leadership development. The issue is undoubtedly complex but includes the difficulties of smaller organizations attracting trustees with a broad enough range of skills,  and the crucial role of chairs. There is a tendency to equate ‘leadership’ only with chief executives or senior managers and CVSL will be developing more work on this in the near future. CVSL is also very interested in the idea that there is a cohort of younger or less experienced leaders who need support and development. This chimes with crucial idea explored in the new courses that leadership happens at different levels of organisations. Closely related, a message that came through loud and clear was the need to work towards greater representativeness of voluntary sector leaderships at all different levels. The panel were pressed on this issue by members of the audience, and there was recognition that in some cases the sector had gone backwards on issues of gender and the presence of ethnic minority leaders at senior levels. Sir Stuart acknowledged that it was difficult to point to leaders from BME leading big charities How CVSL is responding to these issues and engaging with the sector One part of CVSL’s mission is experimenting with how online teaching and learning can be improved and done in a way that benefits the sector in these challenging times. Accessibility, flexibility and responsiveness is part of the answer but we also want to explore through dialogue with the sector the appropriate way to blend more ‘challenging’ and abstract debates around leadership with the practical, ‘day to day’ needs that organisations have for instance on governance, finance and sustainability. Also, as researchers we need to keep tabs about what is going on at ground level, over time; and that is why we are doing grounded research that explores different issues affecting the voluntary sector more broadly – eg on mental health or migration – as well as researching the leadership issues that are specific to the sector. We see this as a great opportunity to explore what works and try out new approaches to leadership development through online learning. So as participants rightly said, academic researchers need to “get out there and speak to the sector and do face to face stuff”, but also to sometimes ensure that the variety of learning resources to be broken down into ‘bite-size chunks’ so that learners can choose what is most useful to them. And we need to keep spreading the message. If you have found the issues discussed here useful and interesting there are a number of ways you can get involved. In particular, CVSL announced at the launch that it is now recruiting a Leadership Panel as a core part of its research activity. They would be delighted if you were willing to take part – the panel is designed to help the sector as well as individual leaders. Please complete this short survey to join the Panel. Found this blog post useful? You may also like:    The Power of Storytelling: Six Top Tips by Mike Zywina   Storytelling Tips for Charities by Becky Slack  5 free tools to share your organisation's story by Nisha Kotecha

Over the summer, we sent out a survey to representatives from local charities and community groups asking for their viewpoints on the current issues affecting their organisations. Our aim was to gather perspectives from as many different cause areas, locations and types of group as possible, so as to gain an extensive overview of the local voluntary sector in the UK. Report findings Today, to coincide with the launch of Grow Your Tenner, we have released the findings of this study in our first Local Charity and Community Group Sustainability Report. Its results will help to better inform the work Localgiving does to support its members and advocate for local charities and community groups. Our hope is that it will also serve as a catalyst to inspire other key stakeholders across society to engage with the sector and work together to tackle the problems it faces. The report showcases some of the fantastic attributes that local voluntary organisations share, which make them such valuable assets to the communities they serve. However, it also serves to highlight some of the pressing issues facing many groups around the country. Whilst an increase in demand for services shows no sign of slowing, many organisations are left struggling to cover core costs and unable to plan for the future. At the same time, many feel much of the general public are unaware of their work, making it all the more difficult to build connections with new supporters. Grow Your Tenner This is where initiatives like Grow Your Tenner come in. Our hope is that this year’s campaign will help to further raise awareness and support for the sector, whilst also enabling groups to develop practical fundraising skills and build lasting connections with new supporters. Over the past three years we have seen some amazing results and heard some incredible stories from groups taking part. Now in it’s fourth year, we hope that Grow Your Tenner 2015 will engage more new people with the work of the local voluntary sector and serve as a beacon for our future plans to support these vital organisations and their work. How you can get involved: Double your donation Click here to find a local charity and donate now. We’ll match your donation pound-for-pound by up to £10. Or, choose to set up a monthly donation and we’ll match it by up to £10 a month for the first 3 months. Register your organisation If you’re a local charity or community group that is not currently a member of Localgiving, there’s still plenty of time to take part in this year’s Grow Your Tenner and benefit from up to £10,000 of match funding. Simply click here to join us now. We’ll aim to get you online and accepting donations within 1 working day of receiving your completed documents, with many groups up and running the same day! For more information about Grow Your Tenner, including FAQs, please click here.  

The Grow Your Tenner Awards recognise local charities and community groups that show outstanding creativity and fundraising expertise through our annual Grow Your Tenner match fund campaigns. With Grow Your Tenner 2016 kicking off tomorrow (18th October), what better time to celebrate the fundraising campaigns that moved and motivated us in 2015. With so many campaigns and causes to choose from, deciding our winners was not an easy task.  What ultimately made these groups stand out was the way they used the skills, resources and networks at their disposal to create campaigns that punched well above their weight. The winner of each award will be sent a £50 Amazon gift voucher So, without further ado, the winners of this year's Grow Your Tenner Awards are: Fundraising Innovation : Baby Bank Network Bristol The Fundraising Innovation Award looked for the charity that ran the most effective, unique and inspired fundraising campaign during Grow Your Tenner 2015. Creative strategies to encourage donations can make a real difference to the total raised and we were looking for inspiring stories of how groups approached this challenge. The Baby Bank Network relieves poverty in the Bristol area by providing new and preowned baby items to families in need. What we enjoyed most about the Baby Bank Network’s Campaign was the way they used the core premise of Grow Your Tenner - to give £10 and have it doubled - for their own innovative initiative. Renaming their campaign #TeddyTenner, the Baby Bank Network shaped their communications  to appeal to the needs and interests of their own audience.   Throughout the campaign, they built momentum by encouraging people to donate and share photos of their favourite child’s toy holding a tenner, nominating others to do the same. Some supporters took this a step further, getting their cats and dogs involved! The #TeddyTenner campaign received £2,287.50 (including match funding and gift aid)  in just 11 days from 85 donors, spreading the message about their important cause in the process. Laura Williams, who volunteers as marketing lead for Baby Bank Network, said: "We're fortunate enough to receive hundreds of donations of items to give to people in need, but it can be a struggle to secure monetary donations. Grow Your Tenner was great for us as it gave us a valuable cash injection to help us buy the items we cannot distribute second-hand, such as new mattresses and bottle teats. We combined it with #teddytenner idea to make it a bit more fun on social media - there were some really cute photos, we'll have to get our thinking caps on again for this year's campaign." See the full #Teddytenner story here.     PR Superstar Award: Bishop Auckland Community Partnership (BACP) - Cultivate 4 Life The PR Superstar Award recognises the group that best engaged with the media during Grow Your Tenner 2015. Throughout Grow Your Tenner 2015 BACP - Cultivate 4 Life worked closely with their local and regional press  to ensure that their campaign received widespread coverage, including a front page splash in  Bishops Press and a main feature in the Northern Echo. This enabled them to reach both new supporters and beneficiaries. BACP approached local media (print and radio) at the start of their campaign with a clear angle - “we have just 30 days to save our project from closing”.  They then followed up with personalised thank yous, developing positive relationships with the local media that will put them a strong position for publicising future campaigns and projects. The impact of this funding has been huge: “Grow Your Tenner rescued our project from closure, it helped us to reach out to our Community and further afield, raising awareness about our project and highlighted our desperate need for help, with an amazing response” The campaign received £2,242.50  (including match funding and gift aid) from 30 donors. On receiving the award Julia Costello,  Cultivate 4 Life Coordinator said: “It was a wonderful surprise to open my email from Localgiving informing us that we had been selected as the winner of PR Superstar Award recognising our efforts via Media with 2015 Grow a Tenner Appeal. We look forward to receiving our Certificate which will be framed and have a pride of place and the £50 Amazon Voucher will be used as a Prize for a forthcoming raffle.   Last year was the first time we engaged in this wonderful fundraising opportunity superbly co-ordinated by Localgiving, and received huge support from Northern Echo, Bishops Press, Town Crier and Bishop FM too, the response was amazing almost achieving £3,000 in donations, these funds aided us with a lifeline, our project was on the brink of closure, so all concerned THANK YOU once again. We are most definitely taking part in this year's Grow a Tenner, this time aided with a video, which we hope to launch this week, posting onto all our media pages including Facebook and Localgiving and certainly will be involving local papers & radio too”.   Future Impact Award: The Pennoyer centre The Future Impact Award recognises the group who can best explain how the funding they had raised through the campaign will be used in a way that was demonstrable, quantifiable and emotionally engaging. The Pennoyer Centre is an education and community venue in South Norfolk. The Centre signed up with Localgiving to raise the funds to run a monthly lunch club with the aim of combatting social isolation in their community. Pennoyer Centre’s entry to the Grow Your Tenner awards brilliantly shows the impact that local initiatives, however small, can make to their communities: “We are delighted to have been chosen as the winners of the Future Impact Award for our Grow Your Tenner campaign last year. We found out about the campaign last October via social media and set about enrolling into Localgiving and then promoting the match funding campaign as soon as we could. We were thrilled that our supporters really rose to the challenge and managed to raise  £500 funding” “We are completely self-funding and therefore covering all the bills and licenses is a huge undertaking. “ “The Lunch Club does a great deal to combat loneliness and social isolation in a rural community. For example, Margaret is 79 years old and recently widowed. She can walk down to the centre for company and have a hot drink and some social interaction. Lunch club is one of the highlights  for villagers like Margaret who can use Pennoyer's as a meeting place.Margaret enjoys the monthly lunch club enormously  because she can meet with friends and socialise. This is  a great thing for someone who now finds themselves living on their own in a rural village and does not have their own transport. The great thing about our lunch club is that we have people who are comfortable with going on their own as there are familiar faces there from the centre and others they know from the village. “Our monthly lunch club has really taken off over the last year. Our lunch club now regularly has an attendance of 25-30 people per month and the group enjoy a full roast dinner with homemade pudding for £11. We had to buy a new cooker when our old one broke in autumn last year. So the Grow Your Tenner funding came just at the right time and we were able to replace the cooker. This is an essential piece of equipment for our kitchen and for our lunch club.” “In the future we want to see the club continuing at an affordable price. We want to provide the means for people to get together thus aiding social inclusion in our rural Norfolk community” “This October we are going to run Grow Your Own Tenner again. We have set a target of £600 this time. As with last year we are looking for funding to buy new chairs and also refresh our café table coverings which are worn out and in need of replacement”. In 2015 The Pennoyer centre raised £496.25 from 20 donors.   A huge Congratulations to each of the three winners - a £50 Amazon voucher will be on its way to you very soon! We also want to send a  massive thank you to everyone who took part in the awards by submitting an entry. Sustainability Survey Prize Draw We would also like to take this opportunity to thank everybody who took part in our Local Charity and Sustainability Survey over the summer. We are currently writing up the results and plan to release a report in the coming months.   All participating groups were entered into a draw to win a donation of £500 to their Cause. We are delighted to announce HELP Counselling Centre as the winners of this donation. Help Counselling Centre provides short and long-term affordable counselling for adults in west London.  Helen Stokes, Director, Help Counselling Centre has said: ‘We are delighted to win £500 from Localgiving as a result of taking part in the Sustainability Survey 2016. It’s increasingly important that local charities make their voices heard and we were keen to give our views as part of the survey – winning this prize has been a lovely bonus! It will help us to continue to offer affordable one-to-one counselling to a wide cross-section of the London community across a range of issues, including depression, anxiety, family and relationship issues and bereavement.’ Grow Your Tenner 2016 Grow Your Tenner 2016 will run from 10am on Tuesday the 18th October until the match fund runs out, or 5pm on Thursday the 17th November - whichever comes first. During the campaign one time donations made to local charities via Localgiving will be matched by up to £10; as will Direct Debits by up to £10 a month for the first 3 months. Is your group taking part in Grow Your Tenner 2016? Do you want to find a local charity or community group to support?  Get involved now: www.growyourtenner.org