Barnardo’s chair and a trustee for eleven years, Hilary Keenlyside, quit the board last week less than two months after the charity’s chief executive Anne Marie Carrie also left the organisation.
The two departures leaves the children’s charity with interims in both its top leadership roles. Deputy chair Judy Clements has stepped up as interim chair and deputy CEO Peter Brook is caretaking the chief executive post.
A statement on Barnardo’s website says that Keenlyside cannot continue in the role because of personal work commitments. She runs her own management consultancy.
“She is unable to devote sufficient time to the next important phase of the charity’s development,” the statement said. Keenlyside left on 10 July after two years in the chair. Before that she also spent two years as vice chair.
The statement also reveals that Barnardo’s has a “new CEO on the horizon” following Anne Marie Carrie’s decision to depart in May. No reason was given except that she was planning to start her own consultancy.
During the last two years, Keenlyside and Carrie led their respective teams in developing a new strategy for the organisation.
Battle with Unison
However, the charity has become locked into negotiations with the union Unison in recent months over plans to close its average salary pension scheme to future accruals by existing members. The pension fund has a deficit of £83.9m.
In March Unison accused the management of “not acting in a spirit of co-operation or a fully transparent manner” and of merely satisfying minimum statutory requirements rather than embarking on a genuine, constructive member consultation over the pension scheme plans.
The charity and the union have also been working together to draw up a collective agreement in respect of the implementation of a new Operational Delivery Model (ODM) which will support the strategic business plan.
The ODM is planned to run until March 2016 and the agreement states that Barnardo’s will seek to ensure compulsory redundancy is “a last resort in every situation”.
It also states that: “Barnardo’s and Unison commit to work together between 12 June and 11 July to explore the options for and agree protection of pay in situations where a job change may require a potential salary reduction for an affected staff member.”
And under ‘performance management’ it states: “In recognition that retention of contracts/funding streams is often dependent on us achieving output and outcome targets, significant work is required to consider how best to design an approach to setting team and personal objectives.”
