Generalist grantmaking trust the John Ellerman Foundation has recruited Nicola Pollock, director of grantmaking at the Esmée Fairbairn Foundation, as its new chief executive.

She will start on 19 September.

Pollock has been at Esmée Fairbairn for nearly 11 years and since 2007 has overseen the distribution of grants up to £30m a year.  For seven years before that she devised and then implemented policy and priorities for the Foundation’s new Social Change programme.

At Ellerman she will lead the distribution of grants totalling more than £4m a year to around 180 national charities working in the areas of health and disability, social welfare, arts and heritage, conservation and overseas.

Immediately before joining the Esmée Fairbairn Foundation, Pollock was operations manager at the National Lottery Charities Board North East. Before than she held several roles within Citizen’s Advice Bureaux, including borough director in Camden.

New chair and trustee

The John Ellerman Foundation also announces a new chair: Sarah (Lady) Riddell, who has been a trustee since 2002.  She succeeds Richard Edmunds who is retiring after chairing the board for the last seven years and being a trustee for ten.

Vivien Gould has also joined the trustee board and will replace Edmunds on the finance committee.  Gould is already a trustee of the Stroke Association, where she chairs the investment committee, and of the Cobalt Appeal Fund.

The Foundation was established in 1971 as a generalist grant-making trust when Sir John Ellerman died. He had inherited his wealth from the business interests set up by his father, especially in shipping - the family business was called Ellerman Lines. Sir John and his wife Esther had no children and during their lives they had developed a huge interest in philanthropy.