Garfield Weston funds Cranfield Trust leadership
Howard Lake | 23 September 2026 | News
Cranfield Trust has been awarded a grant of £450,000 over three years from the Garfield Weston Foundation to expand its leadership development support for small charities and not-for-profit organisations across the UK.
The funding builds on nearly a decade of support from the Garfield Weston Foundation and will allow Cranfield Trust to combine its established mentoring and peer support with practical training and a new UK-wide leadership community. Cranfield Trust says it will deliver more than 8,000 free learning and support opportunities for charity leaders by 2029, aimed at strengthening leadership capability and confidence, reducing isolation, improving succession planning and increasing organisational resilience.
Support will be available through several routes, including mentoring partnerships for current, new and emerging leaders, facilitated peer support groups, charity essentials workshops covering governance, finance and strategy, and expert-led webinars.
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Research by Cranfield Trust has highlighted growing concern across the voluntary sector about leadership capacity, succession planning and wellbeing. Small charity leaders, it notes, often manage strategy, governance, finance, people and compliance alongside day-to-day service delivery, frequently without access to affordable leadership development.
Charity leaders who would like to hear more can register their interest by emailing Ta******@************st.org with the subject line ‘Supporting and developing leaders’.
Dan Francis, Chief Executive of Cranfield Trust, said:
“We are incredibly grateful to the Garfield Weston Foundation for this significant investment and for their longstanding confidence in our work. Small charities play a vital role in communities across the UK, but their leaders often have fewer opportunities for leadership development than those in larger organisations. Yet leaders are multipliers of impact: when they become more confident, capable and resilient, the benefit strengthens their teams, their organisations and, ultimately, the communities they serve.”
Sophia Weston, Deputy Chair of the Garfield Weston Foundation, said:
“We believe in supporting a diverse range of charities across the UK. From local community initiatives to large national projects, the common thread is that all our grantees make a real positive difference, improving lives and strengthening communities throughout the country.”
The Garfield Weston Foundation made grants totalling nearly £130 million to 2,967 charities in the 2024-25 financial year, and has donated nearly £1.7 billion to UK charities since it was established in 1958.
- Weston charity awards winners announced for 2025 (7 July 2025)
- Cranfield Trust launches charity management month to support sector leaders (23 April 2024)
- Project identifies lack of training opportunities for upskilling emerging leaders of smaller charities (1 August 2023)
About Howard Lake
Howard Lake is consultant editor of UK Fundraising. He founded the site in 1994 and successfully sold it in 2022. As director of Giving X Ltd he is exploring growing giving on a massive scale.
He is the founder of Fundraising Camp and co-founder of GoodJobs.