YMCA St Paul's Group - Board Member Campaign

The Story

YMCA St Paul's Group is a charity and registered housing provider supporting young people and their communities. They are now the largest YMCA in Europe and one of the biggest providers of supported housing in London and beyond providing a safe place to stay for around 1,200 residents each night.

YMCA SPG were committed to maintaining a strong board and governance structure and looked to strategically strengthen their Board of Trustees as well as bringing additional Committee Members to supplement their Development and Asset Committee, Audit and Risk Committee and the newly formed Performance Committee.

These were all key appointments and it was essential that a balanced and comprehensive shortlist was created to ensure that there was representation from a skills, expertise and diversity perspective so that they could assist with the ongoing transformation that was taking place across the organisation.

The Results

YMCA SPG had six vacancies across their Board of Trustees and Committees which they wished to appoint. We successfully presented a comprehensive and diverse shortlist with thirteen selected for interview. We managed the scheduling of the final panel interviews, assisted with the preparation of interview questions and attended the interviews as an observer to take objective feedback and to support the process.

All six appointments were successfully made, two of which were for the Board of Trustees and the others as Committee Members. Half the appointed individuals had protected characteristics. They have all successfully completed their induction and are making positive impact on

The How

This was a complex and challenging search as the client had conducted a skills audit and had identified multiple specialisms which they looked to strengthen which included housing, safeguarding, income generation, asset management, finance, audit and risk. We met with the Board of Trustees to discuss these requirements, their culture and strategic objectives and then approached the market to build a comprehensive talent pool in line with briefing.

This talent pool was built using a multifaceted approach which included integrating our extensive database of candidates who brought experience from across the charity, public sector and private sectors. This was further complimented by targeted headhunting, proactively reaching out to an extensive set of networks and strategic advertising – this resulted in a robust and deep search identifying high calibre individuals who also brought a clear alignment to the mission and values of the organisation.

We maintained regular contact with the Board of Trustees providing updates on the search and a commentary of potential expressions of interest ensuring that the shortlist was balanced and in line with expectations.

We conducted preliminary interviews with all shortlisted candidates and presented a detailed report documenting strengths and motivations to assist the Board of Trustees with their decision of who to invite to final panel interview.