Dame Mary Marsh explains the Clore Social Leadership Programme and its success over the past two years.

Two years after the Clore Social Leadership Programme opened for its first applicants, the opportunity is here again, for Fellowships starting in 2012. The annual online application process is now open until 2 June. Aspiring social leaders from across the UK are encouraged to apply.

This is a unique opportunity to get access to an individualised programme of leadership development that is fully-funded by our generous supporters. The existing 30 Clore social fellows have already begun to demonstrate its value and its potential to make a significant contribution to the wider social sector; just what I hoped to achieve when we started.

This first period has been an intensive phase in my own leadership journey as the founding director of the Programme, after eight years running the NSPCC. The Programme began at the end of 2008 as a new initiative of the Clore Duffield Foundation. Learning from my own experience, and that of many others, we created a framework for social leadership that has determined the qualities and potential we seek to develop. It draws on ‘best in class’ leadership development across all sectors, and is increasingly seen as relevant to the development of values-based leadership in any context.

We have been clear that our focus is “to identify, connect and develop aspiring leaders in the social sector who are working for the benefit of individuals and communities across the UK”. The aim is to find exceptional individuals who will be taken through a step change in their own progression as social leaders; as several of the first fellows have said, the Programme had been ‘transformational’ for them.

Wider outcomes

The investment can only be justified by the wider outcomes that are now emerging from the engagement and contribution of Clore social fellows. For example, of the first fellows to complete the Programme, Neil Mapes is already having an impact on the approach to the care of dementia sufferers. Joe Ludlow undertook his secondment at NESTA working on a project to demonstrate the role of the proposed Big Society Bank. As part of his fellowship, Joe also produced some valuable research published by New Philanthropy Capital into the contribution large charities can make to smaller ones.

Two fellows have recently started new and challenging leadership roles in the sector. Kate Lee is now chief executive of Myton Hospices, the largest hospice group in the UK, and Caroline Beaumont is director of services and business development at Reach, the volunteer charity. Another fellow, Rowena Lewis is undertaking her secondment working as executive lead for the independent Philanthropy Review.

As intended, the fellows are drawn from a very wide range of backgrounds, interests and experience from across the social sector, and learn a great deal from each other. Amongst those first appointed for 2010, backgrounds included financial inclusion (Toynbee Hall), volunteer service charities (Attend, African Prisons Project), social finance (Venturesome), social enterprise (Bang Edutainment, Dementia Adventure), large charities (Barnardo’s, British Red Cross, the Children’s Society, Action for Children), campaigning charities (Prison Reform Trust, Fawcett Society) a disability charity (RNIB) and the public sector (Youth Sport Trust).

The second group appointed for 2011 include fellows who come from Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland. The diversity of the wider fellowship has been extended by community engagement (Citizen’s UK, Bolton Council of Mosques, Comas in Scotland, Study Support and Play in Gloucestershire), research (IPPR, Barnardo’s), the Jewish community (Tzedek), students unions (King’s College London Students Union), housing (First Housing Aid and Support, NI), and finance (FD at Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation), as well as media, disability, work-based learning and fair trade. The wide range of Clore Social Fellows personal and professional perspectives includes roles in campaigning, fundraising, service delivery, strategy and start-up.

The Programme has always sought to demonstrate good practice through its own approach which aims to not only provide an example to the fellows but also to the rest of the sector. This includes living by our values which are courage, passion, diversity, respect and focus.