FOCUS FEATURE
CHARITIES
The changing face of
charities
Can a mix of competition and collaboration drive forward the not-for-profit sector?
Business Network Editor Nathan Fearn analyses how charities are reacting to a difficult economic environment and looks at how they are adapting in order to survive and thrive.
Very few aspects of life are seen as certainties. Death and taxes often talked about as the rare exceptions to the rule. You could very easily add charities to the list. Described
in the Cambridge Dictionary as ‘an organisation that has the purpose of providing money or help to people who need it, or that does something useful for society’, it’s difficult to find a period of history that hasn’t required such organisations. Equally, it’s hard to envisage a time in the future that they will not play an important role locally, nationally and internationally. In fact, the history books suggest that official charities
have been present in some form or other in the UK for nearly 900 years. One of the earliest recorded is the Hospital of St Cross,
in Winchester, founded by Bishop Henry de Blois, a grandson of William the Conqueror, in 1136. The UK’s landscape has changed beyond recognition in
the many intervening centuries that have followed, yet the Hospital of St Cross, despite now being a tourist attraction, still provides support to individuals to this very day. If the social climate for charities has changed immeasurably
down the years, so have the conditions they operate in. Whereas charities of old were arguably seen largely as
acts of altruism, today they are big business. A look at recent statistics certainly backs this up. Government figures from September 2016 indicate that,
in total, there are 166, 311 registered charities with over 10,500 based in the East Midlands. The Institute of Fundraising’s (IoF) Autumn 2016 parliamentary briefing document states that the combined income of voluntary organisations is estimated to be £39bn, with the top 100 fundraising charities alone raising £9.5bn from a country that, statistics suggest, is the most generous in Europe, with 67% of people having given to charity in the past year. Further to this, charities in the UK employ over 800,000
people, 62% of whom are employed on a full-time basis. So the evidence firmly suggests that charities are here to
stay and that their roles in society are as prominent as they ever have been. However, business is business. While reputable charities undoubtedly exist for all the right reasons, the fact of the matter is that it’s a crowded marketplace governed by the necessity of raising funds and there’s only so much to go around. In that respect, competitiveness within the voluntary sector is arguably just as important an aspect of day-to-day life as it is in the rest of the business world and,
30 business network December 2016/January 2017 Charities in the UK employ over 800,000 people
in current economic conditions and uncertainty, it is likely only to intensify in the years to come. So how competitive do charities have to be and how do
they ensure they get their share of the so-called generosity pie and why has it become such a necessity? To address the latter question first, post-recession Britain
has undoubtedly felt the effects of an economic downturn, which in turn has seen state-allocated funds much harder to come by. The reality is that the Government has less to give to local authorities which, as a consequence, has meant that the local authorities have had to, and continue to, cut their cloths accordingly. While the vast majority of charities are run as businesses,
funding from bodies such as local authorities have been crucial to a charity’s ability to operate effectively. In many cases, this source of funding has all but dried up. The changed/changing climate hasn’t just affected
funding streams. The current financial climate has resulted in cutbacks and issues that are all-encompassing. From FTSE 100 companies to families, money is being watched a lot more closely.
‘While charities face a squeeze on both central funding as well as communities and individuals able to support them, the requirement for their services continue to increase’
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