The Welsh community have been named as one of the most generous nations. We are more likely to donate money and volunteer than people in the rest of the UK according to the Charities Aid Foundation. But whilst we are givers, there’s evidence to show that the local charities that we support are less forthcoming about taking. UK-wide grant givers like Garfield Weston Foundation say that Welsh charities don’t avail themselves of support and funding to the same extent as charities in the South of England, for example.
Paul Sartori Hospice at Home has bucked that trend. The Hospice at Home Service provides end of life care directly into the homes of Pembrokeshire people who are living in the later stages of any life-limiting illness and wish to die at home. Whilst we meticulously make plans for service users and their families, we recognised that we also need to focus our attentions on ensuring that we are in a position to support end-of-life care in the community long into the future.
Paul Sartori applied successfully for a year of leadership coaching from a team of carefully-matched business leaders and £6,500 in unrestricted funding through the Weston Charity Awards when the Awards were launched in Wales in 2017.
The business leaders that were connected with Paul Sartori included Eunice Shang-Simpson who works in law as an international arbitrator, Elaine Lyon, a self-employed chartered accountant, Felicity Perry, who works at a global investment management firm, Andrew Macpherson, a business management consultant and Caroline Fry, the project leader. The business leaders respectfully challenged us to look at better ways of planning the charities future. Together, we identified ways to work more effectively as a leadership team. Inviting external scrutiny required us to open ourselves up in a way we haven’t previously done but it never felt too probing or judgemental. One big win is that we are better at using our forecasting methods to our advantage and making plans to our current activities to support any future shortcomings.
Stepping aside from the day to day to plan for the future is a lesson we have taken with us and have now built into the Senior Teams schedules.
To mark the opening of the Weston Charity Awards to small charities in Wales, the Garfield Weston Foundation has published its third annual Small Charity Leaders Insight Report which shines a light on the attitudes and concerns of the ambitious and stretched people at the helm of vital community services. The responses of Welsh charity leaders to the UK-wide survey reflect some of the challenges faced by Paul Sartori.
An overwhelming majority of charities in Wales (87%) say they face more uncertainty now than in previous years. Yet, in a show of strength, two thirds (67%) of small charity leaders in Wales expect to help more people in 2020 than in previous years.
There are 417 charities in Pembrokeshire who will be eligible to apply for this transformative opportunity from now until mid-January. Charities are the essence of the Pembrokeshire community spirit and provide vital support to our families, friends and neighbours, and it would be great for other local good causes to benefit from the Garfield Weston Foundation Leadership Programme as we have.”
Applications opened 2nd December 2019 and close 10th January 2020. To apply visit www.westoncharityawards.org