Appointment Brief Appointment of CEO December 2021

Reference: UATAGA

NCVO | CEO

SB

Welcome from our Chair

Stronger charities for stronger communities.

Communities are the heart of life. From local and national support services and green spaces to sports clubs, museums and the arts, they bring vital richness to our lives.

People want to come together, to make connections and help each other in every way, from our individual health and wellbeing to our collective strive for equity and our global efforts to curb climate change for a sustainable future. Through the good times and the tough they make communities stronger and face the big challenges of today. That is why we are here.

Welcome to NCVO. We are the membership community for charities and voluntary organisations. Together we champion voluntary action, the compassionate people who make a daily difference. Supporting the collective impact made across the country.

With members at the heart of everything we do, we unite to champion the remarkable role of charities and volunteers. By speaking up and supporting each other to make a bigger difference. For stronger communities. For everyone.

If you are reading this then you have already taken a step towards one of the most exciting, challenging and rewarding roles in the voluntary sector.

NCVO has championed volunteers and the voluntary sector for over a hundred years. We have a fascinating history – founding organisations such as the Charities Aid Foundation, Citizens Advice, Age Concern and Bond – and an inspirational future, continuing to grow our impact and deliver even more for the sector.

We have a diverse and growing membership of over 16,500, around 90 staff and income of £6-7million per annum. In 2020, the year following our centenary, we concluded an extensive strategy refresh. We asked one key question: What should a modern charity membership body do and how? We worked with stakeholders over 18 months to create our new strategy - Stronger charities for stronger communities.

Through our consultation, importantly, members told us that what we do is as valued as ever and that how we shape the future needed to evolve – how we amplify the work of charities and volunteers and make sure their essential work is recognised and supported.

We put NCVO members at the heart of everything we do. Through a collaborative approach, involving people with insight and ambition, NCVO is able to be increasingly adaptable, flexible and efficient and to work with others to achieve our collective goals.

Our leadership team is working to embed our new culture and ways of working – driven by our values of being open, collaborative, inclusive and ambitious - and this underpins how NCVO approaches everything it does. Culture change sits at the heart of our strategy.

Be ambitious. We have achieved much over the lifetime of the organisation and we continue to deliver. Perhaps most importantly for the future, we will be ambitious.

NCVO | CEO

SB

Ambitious for charities and volunteers as we rebuild, recover and continue to provide essential support to communities across the country. Ambitious for the impact we can bring from the way we work, guide and support.

Be collaborative. We are stronger together, making connections, using our strengths to bring people together to tackle shared problems. The pandemic has shown us the benefits that come from working together and there is greater willingness in many areas of the sector for collaboration and partnership. Understanding the challenges and ambitions of members underpins continually developing our offer in anticipation and response.

Be open. We believe in listening, learning from feedback and improving what and how we deliver. We are open about how we work and the things we learn along the way, not least in our journey towards becoming a more diverse, equitable and inclusive organisation. We have commenced a governance review to support our new strategy and will be sharing the outcomes and our learnings externally early in 2022.

Be inclusive. Importantly, we are working actively to embed our new culture, a new way of working and how it feels to be part of the organisation. We are focused on how we promote, enable and support cultural change, share our experiences and learning and work with experts to support the sector in creating a more inclusive society for all.

I am proud to be the Chair of an organisation which has so much to offer a sector which is under increasing demand and has a vital role to play. We will unite people who want charities to thrive, to champion the remarkable role of their organisations and volunteers. And by speaking up and supporting each other we can help our members make a bigger difference. For every community.

We are looking for a generous leader who can truly inspire and influence as our CEO, as we continue to support volunteers and charities to make a vital difference to society. You may not have been a CEO before, but you will be ready for this challenge.

If you think you have the passion, talent and experience, we would love to hear from you.

Dr Priya Singh

Chair

NCVO | CEO

SB

About us Our purpose

Together, we champion charities and volunteers. The compassionate people who make a daily difference. The collective impact made across the country. For stronger communities. For everyone. Everywhere.

Our mission

We unite to champion the remarkable role of charities and volunteers. By speaking up and supporting each other to make a bigger difference. Whoever you are. For every community. Join us.

NCVO is transforming the way it works. With a new strategic direction and leadership team, we work with our members so that charities and volunteering can thrive. As the country recovers from the Covid-19 pandemic and renews itself, charities and volunteering aren’t just vital support systems for communities in need – they’re at the heart of how people want to lead their lives.

We represent over 16,500 voluntary organisations, charities, community groups and social enterprises across England. We support our members by developing practical resources designed to support the day-to-day running of their organisations, saving them time to focus on their beneficiaries.

For more information, visit ncvo.org.uk

Activ8 – NCVO member since 2009

NCVO | CEO

SB

Our goals

Our values

NCVO | CEO

SB

Our Board NCVO is governed by a 12-person Trustee Board. The majority of our non-executive trustees are elected by member organisations. Baroness Jill Pitkeathley OBE is the president of NCVO.

The CEO is accountable to the Board of Trustees and will meet regularly with the Chair between board meetings.

Dr Priya Singh, Chair

Paul Breckell, Honorary Treasurer

Julie Bentley, Vice Chair

Emily Agius

Red Godfrey-Sagoo

Dr Sarabajaya Kumar

Dan Sutch

Sheila Taylor MBE

Ingrid Tennessee

Paul Buchanan

NCVO | CEO

SB

The CEO role

Role – Chief Executive Reports to – Chair & Board of Trustees NCVO employs around 90 staff, including two directors and six team leaders who, together with the Chief Executive, make up the leadership team.

We are looking for a new Chief Executive to provide strategic, inspiring leadership, vision and direction to enable NCVO to grow and fulfil its mission and strategic goals for the voluntary sector.

Our new CEO will inspire trust and confidence in NCVO by embodying our values in day to day leadership and management.

You will be a skilled and compelling communicator, able to influence and engage with a wide range of stakeholders, face to face and through traditional and social media. You will also provide generous and inclusive leadership and engagement with members and the wider voluntary sector, maintaining trust and confidence in NCVO, and ensure we are collaborative and centred on our members.

You will role model a collaborative approach across the sector including partnering with other infrastructure bodies as well as more widely.

Our new CEO will drive cultural change through NCVO to ensure it is a modern, inclusive and values driven organisation where all individuals are welcomed and supported to reach their potential.

Vitally, our new CEO will ensure that NCVO is an effectively governed and financially sustainable organisation. Our CEO will operate at a strategic level, and will have autonomy at all times, referring decisions to the Board where there is significant financial, reputational or political impact on NCVO.

NCVO | CEO

SB

Dimensions of the role:

• Advise the Chair and Board of Trustees on all strategic, policy and financial issues; • Set and demonstrate the standard and behaviours for an inclusive and values driven culture; • Strong stakeholder engagement with over 16,500 members, government and the wider

sector, and other sectors; • Overall executive responsibility for the annual budget (income and expenditure circa £6-

7million); • Director of NCVO Trading Limited.

Key responsibilities:

Strategic direction, growth and sustainability:

• Implement our new approved strategy, seeking appropriate support from the Board and NCVO’s partners across the voluntary sector infrastructure;

• Grow our impact across the sector to ensure we make the biggest difference possible for our members and the wider sector;

• Ensure that NCVO represents an excellent value proposition to member organisations through its convening power, its voice and its services; listening to, understanding and being centred on member views and needs and forging and maintaining strong relationships with them;

• Ensure that NCVO continues to effectively foster and lead thought leadership and innovation.

Advocacy and influencing:

• Practice inclusive leadership that builds and maintains trust and confidence in NCVO as a representative body and membership organisation that lives its values;

• Ensure that NCVO maintains and develops its external profile enabling it to champion volunteering and the voluntary sector effectively with all relevant opinion formers and stakeholders. Build and maintain high-level, frequent contact with external stakeholders, from ministers to every NCVO member or volunteer. This includes listening, influencing and building consensus with others and to managing reputation (both of NCVO and the sector);

• Ensure that NCVO effectively champions the voluntary sector and volunteering; • Ensure NCVO is collaborative and centred on its members in its work to push for a better

environment for the not-for-profit sector and volunteering. • Act as the senior NCVO spokesperson, required to communicate via the media, including

during crisis communications work on behalf of the volunteering community and the wider voluntary sector. Speak and present at high profile events; conversely, an ability to hold the room at the smallest village hall in the remotest place.

NCVO | CEO

SB

Development and leadership of NCVO’s culture:

• Provide inspiring and empowering leadership to the Leadership Team and the organisation, modelling inclusive leadership;

• Lead NCVO’s cultural modernisation, based upon and embedding our values – ambitious, open, collaborative, inclusive;

• Work closely with the Head of People and Culture, to nurture an inclusive, values driven organisational culture;

• Lead a culture of shared learning and co-operation, of commitment to improvement and high performance, and to the ongoing professional development of all staff.

Governance:

• Work closely with the Chair to secure appropriate input and support from the Board and to ensure that the Board discharges its governance, constitutional and legal responsibilities properly.

Opportunities and considerations for our next CEO:

• Leading the implementation of our new NCVO culture and strategy that places our values and inclusion at the core of our organisation;

• Ensuring our culture translates into the way NCVO works with external partners; • Developing a sustainable business model that balances public benefit with the need to

generate income; • Building consent to enable NCVO to act as a collective and effective voice for a disparate and

diverse sector, including members and non-members; • Adapting to rapid changes in the external environment while staying true to NCVO’s core

vision and mission.

Prince’s Trust – NCVO member since 1996

NCVO | CEO

SB

Our strategy is built around a clear mission – to help our members make the biggest

difference.

Home-Start Bolton – NCVO member since 2012

NCVO | CEO

SB

What we’re looking for Essential skills and knowledge:

• Proven leadership skills in a people focused organisation which is managing complexity in the private, public or voluntary sector.

• Demonstrable experience of successfully leading and embedding structural and cultural change in a manner which has inspired, motivated, and engaged staff.

• Demonstrable and proactive commitment to and understanding of equity, diversity and inclusion, valuing differences to make better decisions and deliver better outcomes.

• A track record of building and leading high performing, diverse teams through an inclusive and empowering leadership style.

• Relevant experience and understanding of membership organisations, networks or complex stakeholder management, where extensive external relationship or consensus building is required.

• Experience of working successfully with non-executive boards and an understanding of the role of the chief executive in effective governance.

• A creative and innovative thinker who builds support for new ideas, both strategic and tactical as required, applying strong analytical skills and clear judgement.

• A highly credible networker, communicator and influencer with high emotional intelligence, interpersonal and ambassadorial skills. Able to influence at the most senior levels and present effectively to a wide variety of audiences.

• Ability to create strong organisational and personal brand recognition through effective media and political interaction.

• Knowledge of and empathy with the role of the voluntary sector and volunteering in civil society.

• Ability to lead and inspire the organisation and the sector with openness, honesty, integrity and transparency.

At all times, our new CEO will adhere to our policies on:

• Equal opportunities; • Diversity; • Health and safety; • Confidentiality; • No smoking; • Environment and sustainability.

NCVO | CEO

SB

Terms of appointment

Remuneration – circa. £120,000

We have a flexible working policy at NCVO, but as CEO, it is important that there is regular visibility in our London office for at least two days per week. Travel around the UK will also be required regularly. We will be happy to discuss flexible ways of working including job share opportunities.

NCVO offers attractive benefits including:

• 25 days’ annual leave (for full time staff and pro-rata for part-time staff);

• the option to purchase up to 5 more days each year;

• the option to take 35 hours of volunteering leave per year;

• subsidised gym membership;

• season ticket loan;

• generous contributions to a stakeholder pension scheme;

• training and development opportunities.

‘Release, Reunification, Relief’ by Prison Advice and Care Trust – NCVO member since 2009

NCVO | CEO

SB

How to apply

Saxton Bampfylde Ltd is acting as an employment agency advisor to NCVO on this appointment. Candidates should apply for this role through our website at www.saxbam.com/appointments using code UATAGA. Click on the ‘apply’ button and follow the instructions to upload a CV and supporting statement, and complete the online equal opportunities monitoring* form. The closing date for applications is 9am on 10 January 2022. NCVO is fully committed to equity, diversity and inclusion in our sector. We want this to be reflected in the diversity of the people who work for us and we welcome applications from people from all backgrounds and identities. We particularly welcome applications from disabled and Black, Asian and Minority Ethnic candidates. As part of our commitment to employing disabled people, all disabled candidates who meet the minimum requirement for all competencies on the person specification will be guaranteed an interview. If you have access needs or require reasonable adjustments as part of the recruitment process, please let us know. * The equal opportunities monitoring online form will not be shared with anyone involved in assessing your application. Please complete as part of the application process.

‘Connecting Families’ by National Children’s Bureau – NCVO member since 1996

NCVO | CEO

SB

LONDON 9 Savoy Street

London WC2E 7EG

EDINBURGH 46 Melville Street

Edinburgh EH3 7HF

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