The charity sector should develop its own version of the successful Teach First programme to support emerging leaders, the Leadership 20:20 Commission has recommended.
It has also suggested that student loans be written off for graduates who work in civil society for at least five years after completing their course.
The ideas are just two of a long list of recommendations published by the Commission yesterday following several months of preparation.
Commission chair Richard Doughty and two other members presented the recommendations at a meeting of the All-Party Parliamentary Group on Civil Society and Volunteering at the House of Commons. MPs in attendance included Baroness Jill Pitkeathley, David Blunkett and Alun Michael, chair of the All-Party Group.
There are five broad recommendations, accompanied by some specific ideas for implementation. In summary, these five are:
- Increase the diversity of civil society leadership by, for example: a targeted support programme based on the Charity Award-winning Teach First; writing off of student loans for those who work in civil society for five years; and encouraging headhunters and employers to look ‘outside the box’ when drawing up shortlists.
- Bring together networks of emerging leaders to allow them to provide input into civil society responses to changes in the wider environment.
- Devise a sector-wide development framework. This would include providing aspiring leaders with training and mentoring, and development opportunities outside their own job such as trusteeships and non-executive board posts. It would also involve continuing professional development and building this into appraisals.
- Persuade funders and commissioners to require leadership development and monitoring as part of the criteria for awarding grants and contracts.
- Actively encourage workforce mobility across all three sectors to encourage cross-fertilisation of good practice and ideas.
Baroness Tanni-Grey Thompson, president of the Commission, described the recommendations as a “systemic solution to supporting emerging leaders”.
The Commission now plans to appoint 'champions' to flesh out the detail of each recommendation and take the ideas forward and see them implemented. The champions might be organisations or individuals – Skills Third Sector has already been announced as the champion for recommendation three, the sector-wide development framework.
The Commission, which is independent but was put together by the NCVO, first met in April 2010. Early last year it ran an online consultation to gauge people’s thoughts and opinions about the future leadership of civil society.
At yesterday’s launch, Lord Best asked at whom all the recommendations were aimed. He said: “Is this the NCVO seeking to persuade others to fund the NCVO to do more stuff around leadership? I’m not sure at whom all the recommendations are addressed.”
Doughty replied that the Commission was not representing NCVO, and that the recommendations were deliberately aimed at a broad group of stakeholders – “current sector leaders, umbrella bodies, funders, government, and those who have good relationships with the sector”.
Alun Michael MP said he was a little surprised there was no reference to the Compact in relation to recommendation four, and floated the idea that strengthening the Compact might convince government funders to ensure that basic elements of leadership development are observed within contracts.
He also suggested that non-government funders might sign up to a code of practice around a commitment to leadership development in funding awards, which would then apply pressure to government funders to do the same.
Doughty replied that the Commission had deliberately not been too prescriptive in spelling out how each recommendation might be achieved, as that would be the task for each champion.
However, the idea for an equalities champion - recommendation one - did not attract much support when Doughty first aired it at a panel debate of women leaders earlier this year.
