Employment guides help clear the path to diversity

[THE Chartered Institute of Fundraising has published a series of recruitment guides to help the fundraising profession to become a more equal, diverse and inclusive profession. The Change Collective guides have been produced to help the sector consider the actions and decisions they can take to achieve a more diverse fundraising workforce. The guides include an additional element to reflect on recruiting during the coronavirus crisis.

Each guide has been developed with expert advice from recruitment agencies and equality, diversity and inclusivity (EDI) consultants, and draws on the lived experience of fundraisers.

Reflecting on her own experience, Martha Awojobi, director of JMB Consulting, said: “I have always loved being a fundraiser; we inspire people to invest in social change and be part of a collective solution to some of the most complex social issues of our time. We shouldn’t be afraid to speak about our past failures when it comes to equality, diversity and inclusion. In fact, we should be the ones showing other sectors what inclusivity truly looks like. All it takes is honesty, humility and hope.”

The four guides are: • Hiring Managers: A guide on where to start on an EDI policy, creating an attractive company culture, recruiting, and progression for your staff members. • Small Charities: For organisations who are recruiting their first fundraiser as they make the investment pay off to keep running their services. and to a lesser degree, ponies – in Britain and Europe who have suffered neglect, cruelty or maltreatment or who are at risk of such treatment.

In addition to rescuing such animals from undesirable situations, within the financial and practical constraints prevailing at the time, they work to try to change attitudes and to educate donkey owners into better practices. For example, since 2016 they have been assisting associates in Kenya to achieve those aims for the working animals there.

Since its establishment in Cornwall, NEDDI has operated a sanctuary specifically for distressed donkeys. In 2001 the sanctuary moved to just the other side of the channel, where the resident donkeys enjoy more space and pasture than would otherwise have been possible.

Its policy is to try to offer actual, hands-on help to the animals in need, and to restore them to the maximum possible degree of fitness. Once brought back to full health, new homes are sometimes sought for the fit animals.

Where full health cannot be achieved a safe home is offered to the donkey for the duration of its life.

NEDDI is a comparatively small organisation with limited resources, and relies heavily on support from animal-lovers. A bequest will enable more donkeys to be freed from pain and misery. q

• Job Seekers: For those interested in a job in fundraising, working for a charity with a cause they are passionate about, who have taken a break and are looking to return to work, or are changing career. • Recruitment Agencies: To support recruitment agencies as they get their client organisations to consider EDI in their recruitment.

Peter Lewis, chief executive of the Chartered Institute of Fundraising, said: “The well-established lack of diversity in our profession, with too few BAME and disabled fundraisers, is a systemic weakness which the profession needs to address.

“We need leadership from trustees, chief executives, directors of fundraising and human resource professionals who not only embrace the importance of EDI for themselves and for their fundraising teams, but accept that it is critical to delivering their organisational objectives.”

In a blog published alongside the guides, Elizabeth Balgobin, interim head of EDI at the Chartered Institute of Fundraising, said: “It’s a formidable suite of resources – those blogs and resources released during lockdown are good and useful, but the guides give you all that and more.

“I strongly encourage you to share the guides with your colleagues, share with those outside of fundraising, share with people looking for work or a change of career. Together we can owe it to our causes.” q

This sanctuary helps donkeys from Britain, Europe and beyond

[ESTABLISHED IN 1990, NEDDI offers care and safety to donkeys –

make fundraising a more diverse and inclusive profession – we

Aiming to bridge the gap for those with clefts

[CLEFT is a charity focused on providing permanent, sustainable ways to improve cleft care both in the UK and overseas. Its tagline ‘Bridging the Gap’ illustrates the three aims of physical joining, improving information and linking care across countries.

A cleft is a congenital birth defect which happens in the womb when the component parts of the upper lip and the palate fail to join properly.

There may be a cleft just of the lip, just of the palate, or both. They can be one-sided (unilateral) or double-sided (bilateral).

It is known that one in 700 babies in the UK are born with a cleft. The figure is higher in Asia – particularly so in people from the Far East. It is estimated that 250,000 babies throughout the world are born each year with a cleft.

A core principle of CLEFT is to invest in research projects that study the cause and treatment of clefts. When it comes to clefts, there is still so much that is unknown.

The progression of knowledge and understanding of clefts is therefore a key component in improving the methods used by surgeons, speech therapists and other medical professionals, to treat and provide quality, long-term care for all those born with clefts, both in the UK and overseas.

All donations and gifts in wills help to further that research. q