BEONBOARD ASPIRES


With only 8% of Trustees coming from communities of colour, BeOnBoard are proud to announce that we recently received funding from the National Lottery to launch Aspire. About this funding, BeOnBoard founder Kalpna Woolf said: “Aspire is a one-year pilot that will adopt an action-research focussed approach to address the lack of boardroom racial diversity across the city’s VCSE sector. We believe that one of the keys to inclusive change is through co-creation with aspiring leaders of colour. We know that diverse leadership in the city is possible and works. This is best evidenced by Bristol being led by Europe’s first elected Mayor of African Heritage. In fact, as part of his Mayorship journey, Marvin Rees benefited from positive action training at CEED and was part of Operation Black Vote’s Parliamentary Shadowing Scheme. This conclusively demonstrates that there are huge dividends for the city and the VCSE sector when it intentionally invests in the city’s leaders of colour.”  

The Aspire pilot is set to officially launch in June with a program of ethnographic research, matchmaking, mentoring and a tailored training program. Aspire aims to co-create with existing and future Trustees of colour and collaborate with organisations to move the dial on boardroom diversity in the VCSE sector. Do watch this space for more details.