Legacy Futures and The Elischer Foundation announced this year’s picks.
A new cohort of mentees has now been selected to take part in a 12-month mentorship programme designed to support fundraisers in developing their careers and working towards positions of charity leadership.
Spearheaded by Legacy Futures and The Elischer Foundation, the programme assigns mentees with their own mentor – each one a senior leader in the sector. Mentees meet regularly throughout the year with their mentors who support them in their development pathway, benefit from quarterly learning sessions with expert speakers and are introduced to last year’s programme graduates for further support and networking.
This year saw a record number of candidates apply – three times as many as normal. More mentees than ever were also chosen to go through the programme. This year’s cohort is 19-strong; seven more than the previous year.
Out of the 19 chosen, 6 are legacy fundraisers.
Ashley Rowthorn, CEO of Legacy Futures, says: “Congratulations to all the selected mentees. The Leaders of the Future programme is an excellent opportunity for participants to gain the knowledge and contacts that will help them become inspiring charity leaders.
“That almost a third of this year’s intake is from a legacy background should be welcomed news for the sector, as it means the leaders of the future will have a solid understanding of the importance of legacies – key for helping to secure and stabilise organisations. In previous years, we haven’t seen enough legacy fundraisers following leadership pathways, so it’s a very positive step that that’s now starting to change.”
One of the selected mentees was Viet Anh Hua, legacies manager at the London School of Economics and Political Science.
Also joining this year’s cohort is Ruchika Jayatilaka, who moved to New Zealand from Sri Lanka amid the civil war. It was then, with her first volunteering role, that she found her passion for connecting community skills and needs to find solutions to make a meaningful difference for everyone. For the past 22 years, she has been working as a fundraiser in various roles doing that - bringing people together. She is now a bequests and major donor specialist at the Mary Potter Hospice.
Laura Swan, interim director of The Elischer Foundation, says: “Pooling our resources with Legacy Futures on this initiative has meant we’ve been able to invite even more fundraisers onto the mentorship programme. Mentees have come from all over the world, including the UK, Australia and New Zealand, and represent many different types and sizes of organisations, from education and the arts to cancer research and humanitarian aid.
We’re fortunate to have some very high calibre mentors on board who are selflessly sharing their years of experience and expertise for the benefit of the sector and the next generation of leaders, and to them we are enormously grateful.”
