In October, the research team at Lloyds Bank Foundation for England and Wales published Lessons for Funder Practice, a short report that sets out eight of the things we learned as a grant-maker, capacity builder and influencer during the period of our strategy, Reaching Further, from 2018 and 2022.
The lessons and supporting evidence in the report are drawn from the programme of monitoring, evaluation and learning we ran during that strategy, alongside the reflections of the wider staff team.
As the lead for evaluation at the Foundation, there were two main drivers for writing and publishing the report.
Firstly, having been through an expansive and sometimes arduous process of review, synthesis and analysis of our internal learning in preparing our new strategy, we uncovered a lot! The strategy review was an opportunity take a step back from the intensity of our day-to-day work and reflect on the principles for new ways of working – looking backwards so that we could think rigorously about our direction as an organisation.
Secondly, we had set an intention to do more of our thinking “out loud”. During Reaching Further we invested more in our internal learning capacity – taking on a new member of staff and increasing our use of external evaluators and learning partners. This generated a much higher volume of evaluation outputs – new data, new reports – but it can be all too easy to keep the feedback loop within the four walls of the organisation, especially if our learning feels messy, or comes as the result of our mistakes and failures.
Better collaboration depends on working more openly. The report was published alongside our new strategy at an event that brought together over 200 people both online and in person.
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It will not come as a surprise – given it landed pretty much exactly in the middle of our strategy period – that the Covid pandemic shapes many of the lessons. Like many funders and the voluntary sector more broadly, our response to the crisis transformed the organisation – not by starting with a blank sheet of paper, but through a rapid reimagining of what our existing work – funding, development and influence – needed to look like in the new normal.
Although our learning was shaped by the crises of 2020, we think the lessons that emerged are principles for philanthropic action that will help funders, charities and communities respond to the next shock, given the projected impact of the cost-of-living crisis.
Some of the most important lessons emerged from the seemingly smallest changes we made to processes and criteria in our front end grant-making. The crisis gave us the opportunity – and freedom – to question old practices and the ways of working that had built up over time.
Adopting less bureaucratic and more agile processes allowed the Foundation to move more quickly, adopt more risk-positive grant-making – letting go of some of the structures of our old approach meant giving up control, but has also been liberating for staff and charity partners. Streamlining our processes hasn’t sacrificed the robustness of due diligence and quality of our learning.
Some lessons were painful. We had to acknowledge aspects of our previous practice that failed to maximise benefit to the charities and communities we want to support, and put up barriers to others.
We had published a standalone strategy for working on equity, diversity and inclusion, but the disproportionate impact of the pandemic on Black, Asian and minority ethnic communities and the Black Lives Matter movement accelerated our choice to focus initially on racial equity. It necessitated changes to our funding approach and criteria – and making a public commitment to a minimum of 25% of grants to charities led by and for Black, Asian and minority ethnic communities. In choosing to do so publicly, we had challenge from all sides - but the positive changes gave us the confidence to continue that work under our new strategy.
Collaborations unlocked new opportunities
In our work with others – funders, government, infrastructure - collaboration, partnerships and open working took on a new urgency. We recognise that collaboration isn’t always an instinctive way of working for grant-makers: our independence is an asset that can also incentivise against partnership. The pandemic catalysed new partnerships with others in new ways – both formal and informal. These collaborations have unlocked new opportunities and educated us in when to lead and when to follow.
This last lesson also brings me back to our rationale for publishing the report in the first place – better collaboration depends on working more openly. The report was published - alongside our new strategy – at a launch and learn event that brought together over 200 people both online and in person.
In our new strategy, we hope to draw a dotted line from the lessons of the pandemic to the funder practices we think will help the voluntary sector best weather the coming storms. We’re offering grant funding with radically fewer restrictions, with a particular focus on reaching smaller, by-and-for charities serving the communities most vulnerable with our blend of financial and capacity building support. We want to be a better collaborator in our own practice, and catalyse and support more collaborations within the sector.
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