Fundraising Now 2024 - Speakers

Rob is an award-winning trainer and the author of several books, including The Fundraiser Who Wanted More and Win that Pitch. His podcast, Fundraising Bright Spots has been listened to more than 150,000 times.

As a fundraising trainer for 18 years, he has helped more than 50,000 fundraisers. His clients include Amnesty, Ashgate Hospice, Cambridge University, Shelter and UNICEF.

George joined DSC at the beginning of 2017 and, having previously led the sales and customer service teams, moved into training at the start of 2020.

He trains in Management & Leadership, Fundraising, Personal Development, Project Management and Wellbeing. He has extensive experience in helping organisations make positive changes to how they approach social change.

He is also qualified as a Mental Health First Aider, with additional time spent studying Psychosis. The favourite part of his role is knowing that the work DSC performs has a major impact on both the charities and individuals that we are able to serve.

Lindsay Tilston Jones recently became the new Head of Community Fundraising at Shelter, leading a team of successful and ambitious community fundraisers. Lindsay is celebrating her 25th year as a professional fundraiser in 2024, with a varied career which has always featured Community Fundraising.

Lindsay has worked at a variety of small and large, local, national and international charities. Lindsay also sits on the Board of CIOF national convention, is a mentor for The Girls Network and volunteers for her local community board. She is passionate about her home region and lives with her husband and very cute cats.

Bertie helps organisations of all sizes develop their online presence, transform their digital culture, raise money online, improve engagement with their audiences, select the right technology, and pilot AI projects.

He has over 20 years’ experience in digital (and an indelible French accent). Bertie started his career in the charity sector at British Heart Foundation where he established the first online team. He then joined Breast Cancer Care, where he implemented a range of online tools to support beneficiaries.

After 11 years in-house, Bertie started working as a freelance consultant. Over the past 12 years, he has worked with over 140 not-for-profit organisations around the world.

He's currently working with local Minds, Unicef Austria, Ada Microfinance, Dementia UK, Family for Every Child, Michel Angelo Foundation, World Vision Austria, AAP Spain and Race Equality Matters.

Robert is a consultant and trainer experienced in Social Impact Measurement (SIM), Social Impact Management, and Social Return on Investment (SROI).

Previous projects include co-developing SIM methodology which has been applied in the UK and by the South Sudan Development Agency, conducting SROI analysis for local authorities in London, and impact reporting for organisations including The Young Foundation and Clinks.

Robert has delivered training and spoken at conferences nationally and internationally for clients including the British Council, NGO Management Switzerland, and the World Bank.

Robert, a published author, writes frequently on the subject of SIM and is particularly interested in how organisations create, quantify and share different types of value.

Andy King is an award-winning storyteller. In July 2022, Fundraising Magazine named him ‘the most influential fundraiser in the UK’.

Andy’s passion is helping charities tell their most important stories to those with the power to change the ending. This has led him to kickstart corporate partnerships programmes from a standing start to a value of £450,000 per year in 18 months. He has also transformed existing approaches to go beyond ‘logo-led’ fundraising with St. John’s Ambulance and UNESCO.

Having worked with charities of all shapes and sizes, he is keen to create the tools that will work for you.

Jess Crombie is a researcher and scholar working as a Senior Lecturer at UAL, and as a consultant for the development and humanitarian sector working with organisations such as the UNHCR, DEC, Red Cross, Save the Children and UN WFP. In both contexts Jess utilises almost two decades as a senior leader in the charity sector to explore the ethical complexities in storytelling and find practical ways to navigate this responsibly. Her research focus is investigating the potential for power shifts by seeking out the opinions and ideas of the people who share their stories with INGOs around both process and portrayal.

Jess commissioned and co-authored the ground-breaking research ‘The People in the Pictures’, and later ‘Who Owns The Story’ and founded and now co-chairs the Bond sponsored 'People in the Pictures working group', set up to bring about sector wide change towards more ethical practises in the creation and use of images of poverty.

Jess also has significant experience producing stories in across four continents, and has lead teams to create some of the most innovative and award winning content in the humanitarian sector. In her most recent role as Global Content Director Jess sat on the senior leadership team at Save the Children, set up and led a large global team working across 29 countries, and created content ranging from VR to participatory projects with children to experiential events, winning Save the Children awards including Cannes Lion Gold and Silver, a Clio, and a Silver British Arrow.

With 40 years in fundraising, which includes more than 30 years specialising in legacies, there isn’t much about legacy fundraising that Richard doesn’t know. However, he never presumes he is right! Every time he spends time with his clients and their stakeholders he discovers unique attitudes to each client. Richard knows when he will retire: it is when he thinks he knows everything and becomes arrogant!

Harbi is enthusiastic about organisational growth, people, and supporting organisations by creating diverse income streams. Harbi has a vast knowledge of supporting companies and donors in achieving their social impact goals. These include, but are not limited to, The Co-op Foundation, Bank of New York Mellon, Bank of Ireland UK, Deutsche Bank, Alnylam Pharmaceuticals, British Land, and S&P Global Foundation. Harbi has spent time working in East Africa, implementing projects on journalism and entrepreneurship.

Harbi is the Head of Development at The London Community Foundation, which means he is responsible for securing new income for LCF alongside engaging with our existing donors to help them give more effectively in London. Harbi joined them from Refugee Action, where he led the development and strategic planning of their corporate income and partnerships.

Harbi is passionate about having a strong and diverse civil society tackling the capital’s disadvantages. Harbi is also a Trustee for the Association of Visitors to Immigration Detainees (AVID) and The Public Law Project (PLP).

Hannah advises charities and not for profit organisations on a range of charity law issues, including governance, grants, contracts and mergers and incorporations.

Hannah has a particular specialism in advising on fundraising law, including in relation to corporate partnerships, challenge events, lotteries and regulatory compliance. Hannah also regularly advise charities on data protection matters, particularly in relation to direct marketing and fundraising campaigns.

Joel has more than 25 years’ experience of fundraising management, including 10 years leading large scale individual giving programmes for international development and human rights organisations, and 15 years leading fundraising functions in the UK health and social care sector.

As Fundraising Director at two hospices, Joel and his teams grew major donor fundraising programmes on relationship fundraising principles to good effect, doubling income from major gifts over a two-and-a-half-year period at Hospice of St Francis.

For the last five years, Joel has been working as a consultant to not for profits in organisational development and governance, as well as business development and fundraising.

Ngozi Lyn Cole believes that everyone has the passion and potential to achieve their ambition and sees her ‘why’ as supporting individuals and organisations to do just that.

A self-employed executive coach and leadership catalyst, Ngozi holds non-executive posts including Chair of the North East Justice Together Initiative and Board Vice Chair at the South Tyneside & Sunderland NHS Foundation Trust.

She spent 18 years at the National Lottery Community Fund holding several roles, including England Director until February 2017. In that role, she was responsible for all grant programmes, overseeing over 500 employees and an annual budget of £450m to £1bn depending on Lottery rollovers! Prior to this, she worked in community development, education, urban regeneration, and housing.

She has significant experience of leadership and executive coaching; running action learning; developing and implementing strategy; organisational and leadership development; change management; collaboration and diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI).

More recently she has worked with funders such as the Paul Hamlyn Foundation, Lloyds Bank Foundation, Millfield House Foundation and Virgin Money Foundation; Children Investment Fund Foundation and several senior leadership teams and charities on their leadership, DEI and racial equity journeys.

Her deeply personal ambition on DEI is to leave the world a better place for our future generations.

Jonathan is Director of Giving for the Church of England, whose 12,000 parishes have a combined voluntary income of over £700M a year. He has been in this role since 2019, before that he was Generous Giving Adviser for the Diocese of Oxford.

He holds an MA in Applied Theology and is a full member of the Chartered Institute of Fundraising. He has held senior leadership, fundraising and governance roles within the charity sector for over 30 years and is also a Lay Canon at St Edmundsbury Cathedral. 

His book, The Porcupine Principle (and other fundraising secrets) is being republished by the Directory of Social Change in April 2024. 

Helen is a freelance writer for Charity Digital about all things digital, with an interest in emerging technology and AI.

She also runs a digital marketing collective called Seashell which has been supporting charities and purpose-led businesses since 2019. Helen specialises in strategy, social media, email marketing and copywriting.

Helen has worked with non-profits for 20 years. She got started in the health and social care sector before moving into human rights as UK Associate Director for Development and Outreach at Human Rights Watch.

Sam has worked in the third sector for over 15 years in a variety of fundraising and marketing roles in both large and small charities.

She is passionate about creating communications that benefit supporters and charities equally, bringing joy and purpose to the giving relationship.

She founded Verdantly in 2021 so she can support charities develop supporter fundraising, marketing, communications and stewardship, with tailored practical solutions, founded in research and sector experience, to improve engagement, build relationships and grow funding.