Lloyds Bank Foundation seeks researchers and experts to support the voluntary and charity sector

Lloyds Bank Foundation for England and Wales is inviting expressions of interest from researchers, digital agencies, individual freelancers or consortia. This role will work in close collaboration with Lloyds Bank Foundation and National Lottery Community Fund and members of a steering group in order to co-produce the outputs as the work takes shape.

This work has been commissioned with the belief that what is needed to reduce duplication and wasted resource for voluntary, community, and social enterprise organisations (VCSEs) is a ‘diagnostic tool’ which could be shared across funders. After much consultation and listening, we now understand that what is needed is a framework of principles, standards and data to get a common understanding of what good looks like in this field.

Below is an invitation to tender for this work. 

Project Aims

In recent years there has been a growing number of funders offering organisational development support which has in many cases lead to duplication and wasted effort due to a lack of alignment between funders. In addition, many recipients of this support have not had the opportunity to align their organisational development goals with their mission and strategy. We also recognise that VCSE’s may be undertaking organisational development work because the funder has identified a weakness, rather than because the VCSE has self-identified a need.

A focus on project delivery means many VCSE’s and funders don’t place enough importance on organisational development. As a result, VCSE’s don’t have the time, money and support they need for effective development. Even when its value is recognised and supported, the fragmented nature of the many definitions, tools including diagnostics and services in use results in inconsistency and a landscape that VCSE find difficult to navigate. 

Our ambition is for a resilient VCSE sector, where organisations are fully equipped to pursue their mission and deliver impact.

We aim to achieve this through developing a common approach to the use of organisational development and diagnostics between VCSE, funders and the people that design and deliver organisational development support and tools.

Lloyds Bank Foundation is a community grant-maker with a strategic focus on small and medium-sized charities. In addition to providing direct funding, the Foundation seek to champion the role and value of small and medium-sized charities in the voluntary sector through campaigns, research, lobbying and other policy work. Over the last five years Lloyds Bank Foundation has been providing non-financial organisational development support to small and medium-sized charities.

The National Lottery Community Fund distributes over £600m a year to communities across the UK, raised by players of The National Lottery. People use this funding to do extraordinary things, taking the lead to improve their lives and communities. The National Lottery Community Fund supports voluntary sector organisations to strengthen their organisational resilience so they can effectively seize opportunities and adapt and respond to the changing environment they work in.

Download the full guidelines and find out how to submit by clicking here.

We would love to know how you want to be involved in the project. To take part, please fill in this short survey.