Ruth Davison takes up CEO role at Refuge – & other charity mover news

Melanie May | 10 March 2021 | News

• Tagged with:
• Comic Relief
• Recruitment / people

With Ruth Davison joining Refuge as its new CEO from Comic Relief, Ian Karet appointed interim Chair of the Charity Commission, and Laura Croudace joining Cirrico as Technology Impact Evangelist, here’s more on those appointments, plus other recent mover news.
 

Ruth Davison leaves Comic Relief to join Refuge as CEO

Ruth Davison joins Refuge as its CEO on 12 April from Comic Relief where she has been Interim Chief Executive since November 2019. As its CEO, Davison led Comic Relief through the global pandemic, significantly growing income and brand awareness by delivering two TV telethons in three months, raising over £100m combined.

Prior to her internal promotion, she had served as Comic Relief’s Executive Director of Impact & Investment for three years. Before joining Comic Relief, Davison worked in a range of senior roles in the voluntary sector, leading strategic and cultural change at charities including Prince’s Trust International Christian Aid, Friends of the Earth and Crisis. She also helped launch the Canal & River Trust.
 

Blondel Cluff appointed National Lottery Community Fund Chair

Blondel Cluff CBE has been appointed as the next Chair of the National Lottery Community Fund. The role will see her set its long-term strategic direction. Cluff has been a solicitor for more than 35 years, with high level public roles focused on communities, education, health and heritage. She was co-opted to the Prime Minister’s Commission on Race and Ethnic Disparities, with a focus on education, and is a member of the Home Office-led Windrush Cross Government Working Group. 

She recently retired from diplomatic service, having represented the British Overseas Territory of Anguilla, but remains CEO of the West India Committee, and a Consulting NGO of UNESCO on small island developing nations and heritage. During the past six years, Cluff has served as chair of the National Lottery Heritage Fund’s London and South Committee and also chaired the London Committee of its predecessor, the Heritage Lottery Fund.
 

Clare Horwood joins MS Society as Executive Director of Engagement & Income Generation

 Clare Horwood has joined the MS Society with 15 years charity experience working at a number of organisations in senior positions. For the past five years she has worked in interim roles, most recently, at Mind as the Interim Associate Director of Fundraising and before that was in a similar role at Diabetes UK. 

In her new role Horwood will oversee all aspects of marketing and fundraising at the MS Society, including the charity’s Stop MS Appeal, which aims to raise £100m for MS research.  She joins the MS Society on 22 February and replaces Emma Whitcombe, who left the charity in December to move overseas.
 
 

Malcolm Robertson takes up Chair position at Street Soccer Scotland

Malcolm Robertson, founding partner of Edinburgh-based strategic consultancy Charlotte Street Partners, has been announced as the new chair of Street Soccer Scotland.

Robertson, who is currently chair of UNICEF UK’s Scotland Advisory Board, brings more than 20 years of experience in strategic leadership to the social enterprise, which uses football-inspired training and personal development as a medium to empower people affected by social exclusion, and to make positive changes in their lives. He is joined on the board by Sabina Kadic-Mackenzie and Jamie McCall. Both have been involved with the charity for a number of years in advisory roles.
 

Four new trustees for National Emergencies Trust

The National Emergencies Trust (NET) has welcomed four new trustees and a new corporate patron to its team to help deliver its future strategy.

The four new trustees are Elizabeth Balgobin (pictured) – Head of Equality, Diversity and Inclusion at the Chartered Institute of Fundraising, Jhumar Johnson – Director of the Vice-Chancellor’s Office at the Open University, Dalton Leong – Chief Executive of The Children’s Trust and Chartered Companion and Race Advisory committee member of the Chartered Management Institute, and Louise Wilson – a British business leader and Harvard Fellow combining Non-Executive experience and international commercial expertise gained at Accenture, The Coca-Cola Company, Procter & Gamble, and as an entrepreneur and the Client Services Director of the 2012 London Olympic and Paralympic Games.
 

Steve Haines joins Impetus as Director of Public Affairs

Impetus has welcomed Steve Haines as the charity’s Director of Public Affairs. Haines will spearhead its communications, policy and research work, joining its Senior Management Team and working alongside the CEO, board, donors, supporters and charity partners to effect real change for young people.

He joins the Impetus team from the National Deaf Children’s Society, where he served as Executive Director Policy and Campaigns. Before joining NDCS, Haines held roles with Save the Children, the Tony Blair Africa Governance Initiative and the Disability Rights Commission, as well as serving as an advisor to the United Nations, Public Health England and the Department for Education. In 2020 his book How To Go To Work: The honest advice no one ever tells you at the start of your career, co-authored by Lucy Clayton, was published by Penguin Books. Haines also currently serves on the board of trustees at the Greggs Foundation.
 

Gill Raikes to step down as CEO of Royal Brompton & Harefield Hospitals Charity

Gill Raikes is stepping down in April as Chief Executive of Royal Brompton and Harefield Hospitals Charity after nearly nine years at the helm. Raikes has shepherded the charity through nearly a decade of events, appeals, carol concerts and fun runs.

Recently she has managed it through the changes in how the charity works due to the pandemic, including running its first emergency appeal, whilst at the same time, fulfilling the day-to-day pledges to fundraise for new imaging equipment and its Patients’ Fund. Raikes worked as a journalist and then a press officer before starting her fundraising career with the National Trust more than nearly four decades ago. She has been Chief Executive of the Royal Brompton and Harefield Hospitals Charity since July 2012. Her future plans include moving to the Welsh borders.

Ian Karet appointed interim Chair of the Charity Commission

The Secretary of State for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport has appointed Ian Karet as the Interim Chair of the Charity Commission from 27 February 2021 to 26 August 2021, while the appointment process for a permanent Chair is conducted. Karet joined the Charity Commission Board in January 2019. He is a solicitor and a partner of Linklaters LLP, specialising in Intellectual Property and Technology.

Ian sits part time as a Deputy High Court Judge and is a member of the Civil Justice Council. He has served as a Trustee of the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew and on the board of the International Association for the Protection of Intellectual Property.
 

Cancer Research UK appoints COO and CTO

Cancer Research UK has appointed Angela Morrison as Chief Operating Officer, and Richard Newsome as Chief Technology Officer, as part of its restructure following the impact of Covid-19. In the newly created COO role, Morrison will sit on the charity’s executive board, and bring technology, HR, finance and a range of other functions together into one directorate. Joining on 12 April, her leadership experience includes serving on the Executive Board of several FTSE companies, including Debenhams, Direct Line and Sainsbury’s.

Newsome will join Cancer Research UK on 1 April. Reporting into Morrison, he will lead the technology department and play a critical role in the charity’s digital transformation. His career has included building, developing and leading technology teams in retail and consumer goods, including Boots, Cadbury’s, Kraft Foods and Rolls Royce. He joins the charity from his most recent role as CTO, Corporate Platforms, at Sainsbury’s.
 

Shane Ryan announced Global Executive Director of Avast Foundation

Avast has announced the appointment of Shane Ryan as Global Executive Director of the newly established Avast Foundation. The social impact organisation was established in December 2020 and will align closely with the company’s purpose of securing people’s digital lives by driving programmes focused on online safety, trust and freedom, inclusivity, transparency and working with youth.

Ryan joins from The National Lottery Community Fund where he held the role of Deputy Director and was responsible for oversight of a number of strategic national funding programmes including the design of their partnerships funding mechanisms and associated policy. He was also previously CEO at Future Men.
 

Michelle Armstrong-Surgenor appointed Executive Director at Playlist for Life

Playlist for Life has announced the appointment of Michelle Armstrong-Surgenor as Executive Director. Armstrong-Surgenor joined the charity in 2019 as Head of Operations and has held the role of Interim Executive Director since August 2020. She has extensive experience in the private and voluntary sector, beginning her third-sector career in 2013 at Cancer Research UK, before taking on the CEO role at Hearts and Minds.  

She is currently a member of the board of trustees for Aberlour Children’s Charity and was previously a panel member of The Scottish Fundraising Standards and Adjudication Panel. Earlier in her career she worked for various multinational organisations in locations across Europe, the Middle East and Canada.
 

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Laura Croudace joins Cirrico as Technology Impact Evangelist

Laura Croudace has joined technology company Cirrico as its Technology Impact Evangelist. Cirrico, a partner of Salesforce, helps non-profits and socially minded businesses accelerate their impacts through sharing their expert knowledge, tools and resources.

Its CirriCommit programme will give 1% of its profits, time and resources to its commitments to four of the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals: Quality Education, Gender Equality, Responsible Consumption and Production and Climate Action, whilst running programmes and forming meaningful partnerships with organisations around the world. It will also enable young fresh talent to join the technology and impact sector through its Apprenticeship Programme, to be rolled out this year. 

 

Paul Hayward joins RNID as Director of Fundraising

RNID has appointed Paul Hayward as its Director of Fundraising. His appointment follows two years as Head of Public Fundraising at RNID where he played an important role in helping deliver its first surplus in several years, worked to support the charity’s financial recovery plan and delivered new strategies for Legacy Administration and Marketing, Individual Giving and Community & Event Fundraising.
 

Professional Footballers’ Association Charity appoints two female directors

The Professional Footballers’ Association Charity (PFA) has appointed two female directors, Monica Shafaq and Jackie Newcombe to its board of trustees for the first time. Monica Shafaq (pictured), CEO of mental health and wellbeing charity, The Kaleidoscope Plus Group, will sit on the board alongside Gordon Taylor, Brendon Batson and Garth Crooks.

As well as leading The Kaleidoscope Plus Group for over a decade, Shafaq has previously chaired ACEVO’s national Black and Asian Leadership Special Interest Group and is currently a Non-Executive Director at Birmingham County Football Association, The Paul Canoville Foundation and Kidderminster Harriers FC. She is also an active member of the Premier League’s Equality and Diversity Panel, an ambassador for Compton Care and a devoted mum of three.
 
 

Two new senior appointments for Tŷ Hafan

Tŷ Hafan announce two new appointments to its executive team.Earlier this month it announced that Maria Timon Samra, who took over as Interim CEO of the charity in May 2020has been appointed CEO on a permanent basis. Educated in Ireland, she brings extensive international experience gained across a range of industries.  Her previous roles in Wales include Interim CIO/Head of BIS at Welsh Water, Transformation Director at Barclaycard and Managing Director at KPMG.

Triple senior hire at UK Community Foundations

Hicks’s career has been spent in marketing roles for not-for-profit organisations, mostly helping educational institutions to achieve their marketing and communications goals, both in-house and most recently as a consultant for RSAcademics Ltd. She is also a Trustee of York Centre for Voluntary Services and Heworth Moor House Trust. Bamidele (pictured, left) joins UKCF with 14+ years’ national and international experience devising and leading projects within the education, manufacturing and not for profit sectors. She is experienced in managing both large and small-scale grants programmes to achieve social impact across the UK. Prior to joining UKCF, Bamidele worked as a Youth Endowment Fund Programme Manager for Social Investment Business. 

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About Melanie May
Melanie May is a journalist and copywriter specialising in writing both for and about the charity and marketing services sectors since 2001. She can be reached via thepurplepim.com.