An ending, and a new beginning

Today, we have advertised the role of CEO for Little Village on The Guardian and CharityJob. Nearly five years since I set the organisation up, I have decided to step down from the role of Chief Executive, and we are starting the search for someone to take my place.

I won’t be going anywhere until the new CEO is safely in post, meaning I’ll be here to see the new year in. So I’ll save my reflections on the last five years for another time, as what I want to write about today is what it means to ‘leave well’. So often this seems to be something we struggle with in the charity sector.

Much of my thinking has been shaped by the experiences I’ve had of working for other founders leaving organisations where it didn’t go so well. I have seen some real car crashes in my time. Founders who needed to watch their organisations crumble without them, to confirm how indispensable they were. Founders who bad mouthed the work, the Board, or the team the minute they stepped outside the door. Organisations where the Board went into inexplicable meltdown and recruited entirely the wrong person to replace their founder.

Like gremlins on my shoulders, these stories lurk and whisper in my ear about how easy it is to leave badly. So what does it mean to leave well? I offer four thoughts here, and I would love to hear your stories of times when the departure of a leader has gone well too.

Don’t wait for a crisis

This has not been a decision that I made overnight. In fact it’s been brewing for almost exactly a year now. I’m lucky enough to work with a shithot coach (thank you, thank you, Paul Hamlyn Foundation for recognising the value of this and paying for it). Last July, I asked her how or when founders know that it is time to move on. I had a hunch this was something I needed to explore.

We worked on this question for months. The huge headline I took away from our conversations is that the time to leave is when things are going well — not when there’s an imminent fundraising crisis, or a dysfuntional team, or a problem with the work. I want Little Village to survive and thrive without me. I have given time, energy, emotional commitment willingly for the last five years. I really don’t want it all to come crashing down the moment I creep out of the door.

Instead what I want is for whoever steps into my shoes to have the best possible chance of succeeding. That would be a legacy I could be proud of. I’m sure there will be moments when I find it incredibly painful to see Little Village continuing to grow and evolve in my absence (“HOW CAN IT SURVIVE WITHOUT ME?” etc etc), but that’s my problem to deal with. Little Village has never been about particular individuals — it is about the incredible movement we’re building, as our name suggests.

Create an amazing team around you

Part of leaving well is being ruthless about promoting and developing people who you believe are better than you. Leaving before you’ve done that is a very risky business, and it’s been a huge part of my work this past year. I’m surrounded by people — staff and volunteers alike — who bring vast experience, empathy, and skill sets I can only dream of to our work. I struggle to believe I’ll work with a team like this ever again (in fact, losing this team is the biggest sadness I have about my decision).

Specifically, over this last year, I’ve spent a lot of time building a senior team. We now have brilliant people overseeing our operations (3 hubs, 1 satellite, 1 warehouse, and another hub gestating) our programmes (supporting families, building peer-based support opportunities, and our systems challenge work), our finances (we’re turning over £1m now), our people (27 part-time staff, a fifth of whom are parents we’ve previously supported, plus 380 volunteers), our communications work (Channel 4 News, i-paper, BBC Newsnight and a royal endorsement in the last 5 months alone).

I hope and believe that the effort we’ve put into building this team will help to smooth the transition that’s coming up. I know this group will provide continuity to the wider team, as well as crucial support and cover as the new CEO gets their feet under the desk (not that we really have any desks, but you know what I mean).

Get your Board in order

We’re lucky at Little Village to have some incredible Trustees. Some of them were part of the initial founding committee. One of them was our first ever co-ordinator. A couple continue to volunteer now on a regular basis. But they are great despite the system of charity governance, not because of it. The pain of working with arcane charity governance is the subject of another post. But there’s nothing like the task of appointing a new CEO to reveal in black and white the strengths and weaknesses of a Board.

Responsibility for this appointment rests solely with the Board — risking an immense loss of insight and expertise from the team that are immersed on a daily basis in the organisation, with a deep understanding of what it needs to flourish. Thankfully our Little Village board have the good sense to realise just how vital it is to involve the team in the recruitment process to find our next leader. But it scares me to see how easily a Board could decide not to bother with staff involvement.

All of which underlines how important it is to ensure your Board has the right mix of skills, experience and perspectives (ideally including people who have run organisations and brought in money). Board members need a deep understanding of the mission and values, as well as the operations and finances, of the organisation. Never forget that this is the group of people who ultimately will decide the leader, budget and strategy of a charity, and make sure you are confident they have what they need collectively to be in this position.

Know yourself, and your limits

When I was little my mum criticised me for never finishing things (yes, I’m still having therapy for that one four decades later, thanks mum). While it was no doubt just a throwaway comment about some abandoned art project, I’ve come back to it repeatedly over this last year as I’ve been thinking about leaving Little Village.

And what I can see now is that I need to reframe it: it’s not that I’m bad at finishing things, it’s just that I’m really good at starting things. My energy comes from pioneering and charting new paths, and bringing people with me. I’m at my best when I’m telling stories that help people to connect what they’re doing to the bigger picture. I’m impatient; I move quickly; I love finding fellow travellers.

All these qualities make me less good at other things: systems, processes, detail. We need a leader now who knows how to help a staff team create these things as we grow. Big ships take longer to turn. So it is in organisations. Of course it’s still possible to be nimble and responsive even as you grow. But a larger organisation means that programmes are bigger, and need more time to bed in. It means that it takes a little longer to ensure everyone on the team is in the same place, and that our lifeblood — our values — shows up in every interaction and element of our work.

My personality means I’m best as a captain of a pilot boat, not a big ship. And, given where we are, I believe we now need someone at the tiller who has a different pace to me. This isn’t false modesty. Its based on some good self-knowledge, and it is grounded in a deep desire for Little Village to be led by the person who is going to make it thrive. That has been me; now it needs someone else. I am excited to see who shows up.

This is an ending, and it is also a new beginning.

It’s fair to say that lots of the team have been very surprised at my news. The most common response I’ve had has been ‘Wow, I wasn’t expecting that, I’m shocked.’

We’re wired to be wary of change. It can shake our identity and make the ground on which we stand feel less firm. But I believe that transitions — in work as in life — don’t have to be a crisis. Even if that’s what they feel like when you’re in them, it turns out that more often than not, they are a source of growth. Transitions can be an opportunity to let go of things that aren’t so helpful any more, and to extend and grow those things we need more of.

I have to say, I am truly confident that we’ll navigate this transition just as we’ve navigated other difficult shifts (hello, Covid) recently. We are resilient because we are a network and a movement as much as we are an organisation. Little Village has never been about the individuals who make up our community. It has always been about the power of acting together. My departure from this role will not change that.

I want my successor to be amazing. I want them to succeed. I will do everything I possibly can to help them shine. They’ve got an incredible job waiting for them right here. If you know someone who you think we should meet, please drop us a line.