DiNN 2021-2022 Impact Report

The future needs us all.

2021 - 2022

IMPACT REPORT

A Word from our CEO

5

Do it Now Now in 2021-2022

7

Our Updated Theory of Change

11

Our Initiatives

25

Our Learning Methodology

41

We Say Global Majority

47

Black and Good is a Game Changer

49

Meet Priscilla

55

Meet Lydia

56

We're funding Black Communities

57

Black leaders are Authentic Leaders

69

Meet our 2021-2022 Grantees

73

Grantee Archetypes

75

Black Womxn and their Moon Landing

77

Meet Thelma

83

Meet Afiya

87

It's all about Voltage Revolution

89

Meet Sandra

95

Meet Banji

97

The Impact Sector needs Melding

99

Living for an African Dream

105

Meet our 2021-22 Prize Finalists

109

Introducing the Racial Justice Index

111

DiNN Vision

117

How we are Fortifying the Black Community

119

We Need You in 2023-2024

123

Overview

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A Word from our CEO It gives me great pleasure to introduce Do it Now Now's Impact Report, a document that showcases the tremendous work done by our organisation in the past couple of years.

Do it Now Now has been making significant strides in addressing social and economic inequalities experienced by people in the Black community across the UK and in Africa.

This report particularly highlights the positive impact that the organisation has had on the lives of our service users and the areas in which we have sought to influence change on their behalf.

As the world continues to face various challenges, including inequality, climate change, and poverty, the work of organisations such as ours becomes even more critical.

Our efforts in empowering Black communities, supporting social enterprises, and promoting sustainable solutions are a beacon of hope for our community and a model for which we hope other organisations will seek to follow.

This report offers an excellent opportunity to reflect on the progress made by our organisation and to acknowledge the individuals and communities whose lives have been impacted positively by our work. Through our updated theory of change, this document also provides a clear picture of the impact journey that lies ahead and the opportunities for growth and collaboration.

DiNN has flourished under the support of funders and sector experts, and it has been an enlightening experience for all involved as we navigate new possibilities. The rapid growth that this organisation experienced between 2021 and 2022 has extended the horizon for the leadership team as we prepare for the next five years.

I would like to express my appreciation to the team at Do it Now Now for their dedication and hard work in creating this report. It is a testament to their commitment to transparency, accountability, and impact. I encourage everyone to read this report and to join us in our mission to create a more equitable world.

Bayo Adelaja

Founder and CEO

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Do it Now Now

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Do it Now Now is a social enterprise that believes every Black person should have the skills, tools and resources they need to lead, influence and create the future for themselves and their community. We work to empower Black individuals, Black-led organisations, and Black community leaders to change systems, access opportunities, and support each other as we co-produce interventions that address social challenges.

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DiNN works across six initiatives to serve specific Black communities in defined ways to create the most significant impact possible. By identifying core causes through research, DiNN can apply learnings to our initiatives' programmes, content, and services.

DiNN takes an open innovation approach in all our work. Our commitment to open innovation drives us to act as an impartial convener that unites and facilitates effective collaborations between large corporations, NGOs, government bodies and Black changemakers (Black-owned businesses, Black-led charities and social enterprises, Black campaigners and Black community leaders).

We support their ambitions to work together to create opportunities for lasting positive change across sectors and systems.

We support their ambitions to work together to create opportunities for lasting positive change across sectors and systems.

Do it Now Now 2021 - 2022

We have continuously operated at a grassroots level when it comes to direct delivery and user-centric engagement.

We have kept our metrics, diligently logging them every month and taking notes of the feedback we get, adjusting and evolving our training and content to ensure high relevance.

Yet still, numbers can feel somewhat removed from the astounding real people that we are lucky enough to engage with and serve.

From time to time, we will share stories from participants to hint at the value that they received from partaking in our training and development programmes.

Please enjoy reading through our impact report.

Over 2021 to 2022 we: collaborated with 66 Black-led community leaders to deliver their grassroots programmes ran 275 DiNN programmes had 9,963 people take part in DiNN programmes gave £300,000 away in grant funding funded 36 organisations supporting the development of Black communities supported an additional 7,803 people through our grantee organisations

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Theory of Change Our updated

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The global Black community encompasses individuals from diverse cultural and global majority backgrounds, including African, Caribbean, and AfricanAmerican heritage. We are united by a shared history and a commitment to addressing Black people's challenges and advocating for our rights and freedoms.

"Black Community refers to people who identify as Black and share a common culture, history, and experience."

Over the years, the Black community has faced various challenges, including systemic barriers that create generational poverty, discrimination, and limited access to education, employment opportunities and justice. To name a few factors of multiple deprivations, we are, unfortunately: disproportionately represented in lower-skilled and lower-paid occupations, we face significant workplace discrimination, with some employers using stereotypes and prejudices to limit our career opportunities. discriminated against in the criminal justice system; Black defendants are more likely to be convicted and receive longer sentences than our white counterparts. more likely to experience poor mental health and less likely to access mental health services. many others including being the recipients of the lowest rates of entrepreneurial investment, and ongoing LGBTQIA+ discrimination.

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The Black community faces a general lack of access to racial justice. We define racial justice as the systematic fair treatment of people of all races, resulting in equitable opportunities and outcomes. We believe that Black people's problems go beyond just racism in society or the prevalence of discrimination and inequities. It involves the presence of deliberate systems that help perpetuate and sustain them.

While several programmes have been undertaken over the past decades to address the myriad challenges to the Black community, these have proven insufficient in suitably redressing the systemic inequalities that plague our community. Since 2019, DiNN has provided services to the Black community in Africa and the UK. Our initiatives allow us to contribute to the global solution.

DiNN

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The world we are building is one in which each Black person has access to the tools and resources they need to effectively engage in the systems around them to affect positive change for the benefit of all. We believe that a just future is only possible if the barriers that limit Black people’s effective contribution to society are significantly reduced.

Against this backdrop, our Theory of Change (TOC) is grounded on recognising that new approaches are required to address systemic problems, namely the key stakeholders' relationships, mindsets, and behaviours, as necessary precursors to achieving racial justice.

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An outcome-based TOC was adopted as it is best suited to map out our overall goal: DiNN being the Black community's foremost champion, enabling the systemic development and coproduction of equitable opportunities and outcomes for Black people.

This outcome-based approach allows us to be a very innovative organisation focusing on our destination rather than individual pathways. Our partners and stakeholders can also identify the outcomes to which they can provide support to effect systems and community change.

DiNN's primary focus is to empower Black people to possess increased financial, cultural and social capital. Our work is designed to contribute to the long-term impact and vision through 5 key strategic priorities: Training and development Grantmaking and social investment Research and consulting Networking and communities Service design and development

Theory of Change

Taken together, DiNN believes that our initiatives in these five key strategic areas will deliver three types of outcomes for Black people and the Black community: Impact outcomes which would drive changes in knowledge, skills, behaviours, and wellbeing.

For example, we provide increased access to learning opportunities about entrepreneurship, growth hacking, financing and funding.

Influence outcomes which would drive changes in institutions, services, systems, community norms, partnerships, public and political will, policies, regulations, services practices, business practices and issue visibility.

For example, we ensure increased support for Black people to engage in approaches, spaces and roles to drive equal representation.

Leverage outcomes which would drive changes in public and private funder’s investment strategies for Black programmes.

For example, will contribute to a shift in social norms resulting in more equitable funding and support opportunities.

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Our key assumptions We have made the following assumptions which act as mechanisms of causation, barriers, and enablers of our initiatives.

Cultural diversity: the Black community is diverse and comes from various cultural backgrounds, so it is essential to consider this diversity and tailor training and business practices to accommodate these differences.

Historical context: understanding the history and context of the Black community is crucial for building trust and credibility with Black people. This includes understanding the impact of colonialism and slavery on the community and the ongoing challenges of systemic racism and discrimination.

Theory of Change

Language and communication: communication styles and language use may differ among members of the Black community, and it is important to consider these differences when conducting training and business interactions.

Barriers to entry: understanding and addressing the barriers that Black professionals face in accessing education and professional development opportunities are important for ensuring equal access and opportunities for success.

Inclusion and representation: ensuring that the Black community is represented and included in all aspects of business and professional training is crucial for creating a welcoming and inclusive environment. This includes having a diverse range of speakers, trainers, and role models.

Intersectionality: Black people face multiple and intersecting forms of oppression and discrimination based on race, gender, sexuality, religion, and other aspects of identity.

Understanding and addressing these intersections can help create a more inclusive and equitable business and training environment.

Economic empowerment: Black professionals may face unique financial challenges, such as a lack of access to capital and resources. So, it's essential to consider these issues when conducting training and business practices that support economic empowerment.

Networking: Black people face challenges building and maintaining professional relationships with individuals and organisations that share their common interests, goals, or values. Developing strong networks will help facilitate collaboration, resource sharing, and advocacy to amplify impact.

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Our key stakeholders To achieve our goals, we must work exceedingly well with the following groups of people.

Service users: individuals or communities benefit directly from our services or programmes.

Community leaders and influencers: have a significant impact on the Black community, including elected officials, civic leaders, and community influencers.

Donors or funders: individuals, organisations, or government agencies that provide financial support to underserved communities.

Employees or volunteers: who work for or with DiNN, including staff members, freelancers, and volunteers.

Government and regulatory bodies: agencies or regulatory bodies that develop policies and oversee the sector in which DiNN operates.

Media and the general public: the individuals and entities that consume and share information about DiNN and our work, including journalists, bloggers, and social media users.

Partners or collaborators: other organisations or entities with whom DiNN achieves its mission and goals.

We have identified the most interesting outcomes by developing and articulating our theory of change. This allows us to adapt our approach to achieving those outcomes in different contexts and respond to currently unknown future opportunities. Acting as a champion for these outcomes will enable us to engage others who share our passion for achieving any of these outcomes.

Theory of Change

INFLUENCE OUTCOME

IMPACT OUTCOME

LEVERAGE OUTCOME

TRAINING AND DEVELOPMENT

Increased number of Black people opening new businesses and enter employment

Greater number of Black people receiving practical learning programmes

Black people are more able to manage their day to day finances

More Black people opening businesses lasting more than 3 years with growing teams

Improvement in the financial wellbeing of Black people

Increases in the number of profitable Black businesses

Theory of Change

LONG TERM

| > 3 YEARS

| 18 MONTHS - 3 YEARS

Increased access to learning opportunities about entrepreneurship, growth hacking, financing and funding

MEDIUM TERM

GOAL

| 12 - 18 MONTHS

STRATEGY

SHORT TERM

KEY

Improvement in the overall wellbeing of Black people

GRANTMAKING AND SOCIAL INVESTMENT

Increased opportunities for Black people to engage with entrepreneurship, leadership and voluntarism as real life applications

Increased support for Black people to engage in approaches, spaces and roles to drive equal representation

NETWORKING AND COMMUNITIES

Increased partnership based working between established Black and non-Black community leaders to develop and deliver interventions to increase racial equity in their community

Increases grassroots engagement that leads to Black lived experience leaders making change in their communities

More Black people becoming Thought Leaders within their community

Black people become empowered to engage directly with decision makers in their ecosystem to engage in sytems change

RESEARCH AND CONSULTING

SERVICE DESIGN AND DEVELOPMENT

Increased availability of grant funding and investment to Black-led organisations

The development of greater consensus around common definitions of racial justice problems and possible policy options

More Black-led organisations access grant funding to support the core operations of their organisations

Black people have an increased sense of belonging in their community

Black people more frequently work with each other and nonBlack communities to address equity barriers

More organisations consider racial justice issues in their planning and operational activities

More Black-led organisations are able to attract alternative sources of funding other than just grants as they grow

More Black people raise issues in the media to campaign and advocate for change at a local and national level

Black people are more resourced to work with each other and nonBlack communities to take actions on local issues

Increased visibility of racial justice issues in policy processes

Higher uptake of social investment products among Black-led organisations, which are created for their needs

Strengthened ecosystems for Black entrepreneurs, community innovators and leaders

More Black people taking up leading positions in local and national government, influential charitable and entrepreneurial organisations

Shift in social norms resulting in more equitable funding and support opportunities

Increased recurring and diversified streams of income that ensure the sustainability of Black-led organisations

To be the Black community's foremost champion enabling the systemic development and co-production of equitable opportunities and outcomes for Black people.

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Understanding the terms in our Theory of Change Black community: refers to individuals who identify as Black and share common experiences, history, culture, and social and economic challenges. This community is defined by race and can encompass a wide range of cultures, nationalities, and experiences but is united by a shared history of oppression and discrimination.

Black-led organisation: an organisation that is primarily led, governed, and controlled by Black individuals. The leadership team, including the CEO, senior executives, and board of directors, should have a significant representation of Black people.

Black people: refers to individuals who identify as Black and of African/Caribbean descent. This includes people with ancestry from various African countries and regions and those who are part of the African diaspora, such as people of African descent in the Americas and other parts of the world.

Theory of Change

Entrepreneurship: the process of creating or starting a new business venture to make a profit. It involves identifying a need in the market and developing a product or service to meet that need.

Social investment: refers to using financial resources, such as loans, bonds, or equity investments, to address social and environmental challenges and create positive social and environmental impact.

Grantmaking: is the process of providing financial support, in the form of grants, to organisations or individuals for specific purposes or projects.

System: is a set of interconnected elements or components that work together to achieve a common purpose or goal. Systems exist in various contexts, including nature, technology, organisations, and society.

Leadership: is the process of influencing and directing individuals or groups towards achieving a goal. It involves creating a vision, setting direction, and motivating people to work together to accomplish a common objective.

Racial justice: refers to the fair and equal treatment of individuals of all races in all aspects of society.

It involves the elimination of systemic racism and the creation of a society in which people of all races have equal access to opportunities, resources, and outcomes, such as education, employment, housing, and the criminal justice system.

Voluntarism: is the principle that social and economic systems should be based on voluntary cooperation and individual initiative rather than coercion or government intervention. It is a philosophical belief that individuals, rather than the state or other centralised authority, should be the primary drivers of social and economic progress.

Wellbeing: refers to a state of overall physical, mental, and emotional health and satisfaction.

It is a holistic concept encompassing a person's sense of purpose, life satisfaction, relationships, and experiences.

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Our Initiatives

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AfriTech XYZ afritech.xyz

We believe that the startup ecosystem in Africa is bursting with brilliant people capable of creating products and services that can nourish their communities, boost economies, and transform technology. With the proper support, they can have the opportunity to realise their fullest potential.

AfriTech XYZ is an ecosystem development mechanism that empowers stakeholders across Africa to communicate and support each other based on knowledge and collaboration.

With a focus on connecting tech founders to experts across the rest of the continent and around the world, AfriTech XYZ works with African-based tech entrepreneurs to provide them with the mentors and funding they need to build technologies that will contribute to a better future for Africa.

The work done within AfriTech XYZ focuses on addressing social challenges, solving problems and supporting the development of Africa-based markets through forging connections with social innovators, investors and philanthropists.

Our flagship programme, AfriTech XYZ’s Innovation Prize, selects small groups of startups that have the potential to solve pan-African or global problems by providing in-depth support, including access to experts and opportunities that will challenge them to think bigger and build quicker and more sustainably.

In addition, we work to change the narrative around investment in African-based startups. Increasing support in all ways will have a snowball effect and rapidly increase trade, peer-to-peer support, scale, job creation, and affordable tech solutions to some of our trickiest and most costly global issues.

Our Initiatives

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Black and Good blackandgood.com

We aim to give every person in our community the tools they need to build or sustain a flourishing business, creating a sustainable and lasting future for themselves and their networks. We work holistically with tailored solutions and a belief in the importance of wellbeing and joyfulness amidst entrepreneurship.

Black and Good is an onlineoffline, peer-to-peer support programme that engages Black leaders through entrepreneurial training and community building to assist in growing the next generation of Black-owned businesses. Black and Good works to create a world in which every Black person has the skills, tools and resources they need to build a sustainable business.

Our Initiatives

Working alongside experts and industry leaders, Black and Good gives Black entrepreneurs access to previously gate-kept knowledge and resources to raise tech adoption, business skills and profitability.

We collaborate with leading companies to share resources and tools with participants, providing actionable insights and supporting aspiring and active Black business people.

Our programmes provide support and guidance through the difficulties of entrepreneurship.

Offered in stages, each supporting the last; Side Hustle Support begins the learning journey and provides all the tools and resources entrepreneurs need to test the viability of their new venture.

Starting Up, Starting Out supports businesses' idea/launch stage while building confidence to build, test and launch a viable business venture.

Build, Hustle, Grow is designed to support the growth and scale of established businesses with the confidence of a clear outlook, providing the knowledge needed to take companies to the next level and support business expansion.

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Centre Black centreblack.com

We believe that the lived experience and opinions of Black people must be the starting point for all work done to address social challenges in the Black community. Our goal is to conduct high-quality research to produce qualitative and quantitative evidence that supports the development of interventions that will have lasting impact.

The research done by Centre Black empowers leaders within the community to become thoughtleaders within their local, regional, and national settings, contextualising their lived experience with data they significantly contribute to.

In addition to the external facing research conducted by the Centre Black team, there is a significant amount of work done by the team to improve the research base of our skills and learning programmes.

They also work closely with our community members to validate assumptions and determine the new direction of our work throughout the year.

We centre Black experiences and understand that all of society will be better positioned in a thriving and diverse landscape that works to counteract the historic imbalance positively.

In the past couple of years our research team has consulted with funders to support the design of their racial justice funding products.

We have also worked with companies to help them investigate the opportunities for adoption of their services within the Black community and we have released reports that we have coproduced with our community such as our Lived Experience Report which is now seen as seminal reading in the racial justice space.

Our Initiatives

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Common Call commoncall.fund

Through our funding, we work to create a vibrant and thriving ecosystem of Black-led social enterprises and charities that can change the systems in which we operate for the better.

This intermediary funding model works to close the historic funding gap for Black organisations by creating an authentic pathway between grassroots organisations and trusts and foundations.

Common Call is a grant fund that supports charity and social enterprise leaders working with Black communities. The goal is to make it easier for Black people with lived experience of crucial social issues to build and sustain impact-based organisations that solve them over time.

In 2021, Common Call awarded grants to 36 organisations addressing social challenges in areas such as; arts and culture, employment and education, mental health and wellbeing, and more. Acting as an intermediary funding partner of Barclays, National Emergencies Trust, Esmée Fairbairn Foundation, The Clothworkers' Foundation, and Comic Relief, Common Call disbursed £300,000 to Black-led organisations allowing them to continue to deliver transformative impact in their communities while supporting the long-term development of the organisations themselves.

As an intermediary funder we engage with key trusts and foundations across the sector to increase the diversity of the recipients of their funding while taking on all the management and legal responsibilities of the funding process.

Our Initiatives

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M el

di

ng

Melding meldhere.com

We believe that the state of the Diversity and Inclusion practices of organisations across the impact sectors is of paramount importance as it determines the inclusivity of service design and delivery across the UK.

Accurate representation of views, experiences, and voices benefits everyone in our society, particularly those that have been historically left out of key conversations.

Melding offers unlimited LIVE training to the grantees of our clients, allowing their boards, leadership teams, employees, and volunteers to access essential support and insights through our D&I model.

Melding works with funders to champion the development and sustainability of Diversity and Inclusion practices in social enterprises and charities across the sector. Diverse and inclusive organisations are the most sustainable, equitable, and innovative.

Our resources and processes are adaptable for any sized organisation and are the answer to the sector’s need for a D&I strategy that has longevity.

At the time of writing this report, we are on track to provide training to over 2,000 people a year through this initiative.

Our Initiatives

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My Moon Landing mymoonlanding.com

The work we do through My Moon Landing is with the goal of giving all Black LGBTQ+ womxn and nonbinary people the resources to live joyfully and independently. We believe that in serving this community, we mitigate constraints in their lives that hinder their ability to live their truth and feel safe and nurtured.

My Moon Landing supports people on their path to financial independence and wellbeing, holding the belief that Black LGBTQ+, womxn and non-binary people are central to the future of the Black community.

My Moon Landing is dedicated to ensuring that the skills, knowledge, and esteem of this community are supported through a thriving network.

Our Initiatives

Our Financial Fundamentals programme, delivering support to people in London and Glasgow, works with experts to develop financial literacy and freedom, focusing on building a better financial future for the My Moon Landing community.

Financial training and an in-depth focus on wellbeing ensure they have everything they need to live their most authentic and representative lives.

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Voltage Revolution

voltagerevolution.com

We believe that guidance and opportunity go a long way to providing fertile ground for young people to build fulfilling careers.

Our goal is to provide a wellspring of inspiration and support that sees the next generation of creative and tech leaders enter their chosen fields with confidence and clarity.

Voltage Revolution works with young Black people aged 18-24 who are unemployed or underemployed, focusing on guidance for building a career in the UK's creative and tech sectors. Breaking the traditional barrier to entry for these sectors, Voltage Revolution empowers young Black people in the UK with access to the people they need to know and the knowledge they need to get where they want to go.

Through creating programmes and campaigns that provide opportunities to connect with mentors to build careers, our team ensures we champion their employment opportunities and protect their mental health and wellbeing in these uncertain times.

We work to ensure our community maintains creative equity and that their voices are central to the work and artistic landscapes that they are a part of. Through commissioning and collaborations, we provide safe, structured environments for young people to develop their voices and know their societal worth.

Our Initiatives

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As a Black-led organisation working for the Black community, there is already a deep understanding and empathy for the community we serve. We emphasise research to understand current and potential participants' temporal needs and capacity. This is our anchor for designing learning. We place the individual at the centre results in a better programme and a more profound, sustainable and effective learning process.

The success of our programmes is entirely founded upon the research-based methodology we follow. Over the years, based on the insights provided by our programme participants, we developed a methodology that ensures participant success through our support programmes.

Our Learning Methodology

We call it ASAP: Awareness: participants will understand their strengths and weaknesses and their short, mid and long-term goals.

Self-actualisation: we know there is no linear enterprise path, and we teach to support the development of skills that can be used in multiple contexts.

Activation: through case studies, simulations and shortterm projects, we provide training that will stay with them when they’re under pressure.

Personalisation: we develop training with personalisation in mind. We are sensitive to the needs of participants so that we can ensure their success throughout and after the programme.

This is how DiNN designs participants' learning journeys to ensure we provide the most effective programmes. It is not linear, and we will explore each element at different points on the learning journey.

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Our programmes provide support through training and content critical to the sustainable development of participants and their businesses. To give a bit more detail:

Awareness Each programme is made up of cohorts, and all include time and space for participants to grow as individuals. This is an essential part of learning; to understand what they are good at and where they may need to develop more. The cohorts provide space to challenge and support each other, constantly learning from their own and others' experiences.

ASAP Methodology

We also emphasise a holistic approach, valuing the importance of health and wellbeing to achieve full potential. In our programmes, we use aspirational interviews with our expert skills developers.

Participants are encouraged to think about where they want to be by the end of a programme and set goals and milestones for getting there. We set up peer groups to support each other's development, and we have partnered with excellent providers to deliver sessions on health and wellbeing for our participants.

Self Actualisation There are many different paths for entrepreneurs and individuals.

Deciding which approach to take needs consideration and often the development of specific skills. Do it Now Now designs programmes with this in mind. As participants reach a level of self-awareness of their strengths and weaknesses, they can develop the skills they have identified as needing. The aim is that they are equipped to self-advocate within their communities and beyond and put them in a much stronger position to succeed. Our focus is to empower participants to feel confident and self-assured in the world.

We have core skills sessions which could include business skills, such as business modelling, strategy, marketing, and financial management. These sessions are set up as a series designed to empower participants to access knowledge, tools, skills and resources tailored to their business goals and aspirations. They provide a space to challenge participants to develop products and services beyond the norm.

The programme also provides more comprehensive skills sessions to accelerate thinking and delivery of critical ideas and innovations. It brings experts to offer in-depth training and support on specific areas designers identify.

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Activation

Personalisation

Putting goals into action has multiple stages; participants will try things out while on the programme, creating a testing ground for troubleshooting and feedback. In sessions, they can reflect in their groups to see what they learned and how to develop their ideas further.

As described above, our programmes are designed to meet the needs of the participants through initial research. We use co-design processes to include potential participants or relevant stakeholders to help develop the programme outline and content and who we work with or invite to deliver sessions. This level of personalisation continues throughout the learning journey.

Collectively, a space for inspiration and insights is created, where participants discuss challenges they may be facing. We may invite guests to share stories at these sessions to centralise lived experience.

ASAP Methodology

Through regular check-ins at sessions, one-to-one sessions with our skills developers and thorough but accessible, ongoing evaluation.

Our team knows where the participants are on their journey and adapts and adds content where this feels most appropriate and useful. The Skills and Learning team are expert facilitators and can draw people into sessions where they see and feel a need or a contribution is valuable.

DiNN uses ASAP Methodology as a basis to design learning throughout our support programmes across all our initiatives. Our Learning Designers and Skills Developers put together programmes using their vast knowledge, evidence-based methods, and lived experience. It is critical to have consistency in how we design, which is where the ASAP methodology is invaluable, and working with experienced learning designers and skills developers ensures a steady flow of new ideas and insights to keep the learning programmes fresh, relevant and impactful.

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We say

Global Majority

Self-identified terminology is essential to centralising the Black experience.

While we do not shy away from saying Black when we mean Black, we also want to engage in language that does not make our community and others like ours an antithesis by default. Therefore, we choose to say Global Majority to refer to the similarly racialised communities who all under the unfortunately popularised “BAME” moniker.

Do it Now Now encourages all organisations and groups to adopt the usage of Global Majority and encourage their networks to do so too.

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One of the reasons we are adamantly in support of Black entrepreneurs is our core belief that entrepreneurship is a key gateway to social mobility that the Black community can thrive in.

That doesn't mean to say that the barriers that exist in other key gateways, such as education and employment, are non-existent in the world of business. That is to say, that entrepreneurship has the power to be game-changing.

Black and Good supports Black people who want to grow as entrepreneurs and leaders. We upskill, connect, support and amplify the potential of Black people each year and collaborate with leading organisations and people of influence to share resources and tools with our participants.

It is a unique, personalised entrepreneurship and leadership training programme driving the next generation of Black innovators to impact change. The initiative promotes courses, opportunities for peer-to-peer support, and a safe space to network for all its participants. Our mandate for Black and Good is to support Black entrepreneurs and help them raise their tech adoption, business skills and profitability.

Black and Good is a

Game Changer Black women, in particular, vitally need this sort of support in their entrepreneurial journey.

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Build, Hustle, Grow The workshops in this programme are designed for people who have launched their businesses and want to take them to the next level. This course is designed to support the growth and scale of established companies in three ways:

Starting Up Starting Out The workshops in this programme are designed for people in the idea stage who want to launch their businesses. Each session empowers participants to access knowledge, tools, skills and resources tailored to their business goals and aspirations. This course is designed to support the significant development of idea/launch stage businesses in three ways: Structuring participants' ideas and begin creating a viable business model.

Equipping entrepreneurs with the tools to develop a captivating business plan and pitch.

Providing the knowledge to understand customers’ needs, determine business values and craft a plan to generate solid income for longevity.

“The programme has been a game-changer for me as I’ve had the opportunity to be coached by experts and to broaden my horizons. It was a safe place where I could open up freely about the issues that I face as an entrepreneur, and the kindness of my mentors and peers helped me reignite my enthusiasm for my business. At the end of the eight weeks, I felt empowered and clearer in how I should move forward."

Supporting a strategic approach to scale and/or grow businesses. Encouraging reflection on existing business models and deciding on the need to pivot.

"This programme was a great opportunity. I am very appreciative to have been granted the opportunity. The additional bonus is the rich content but free service to business owners and those just venturing to start a business. The facilitators and admin set a standard of excellence."

"You all have helped me grow so much, and I feel empowered by the experience. Going forward I feel positive and prepared for the future of my business."

Equipping participants with tools to evaluate business goals, current markets and the most viable options to pursue.

Providing the knowledge to feel confident about raising and managing money to match growth.

"The programme is a power shift of mindset, with the tools and knowledge to move your business forward. You may not achieve it all in the eight weeks. But I have a structure. I will implement it over the next few months."

Black and Good

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The programme is an intensive, collaborative, and strategic course to cover the fundamental elements of building and scaling a business, along with peer-support groups, 1-2-1 mentoring and our dedicated pitching-focused sessions to support those on the programme to build, deliver and develop confidence in their pitch for future investment opportunities.

The demographics of people we support are primarily in low income brackets, people with young children, or those still working full-time elsewhere alongside building their businesses. Over the time spent on this course, we support participants to level up their knowledge, develop a strong pitch and create a strategic pathway for business growth.

Along with coursework, peersupport groups and mentoring outside of the core workshop sessions, what we expect is for the participants to come away from the course with a strong community, opportunities for collaboration, new networks they have access to, a detailed, clear business outline with actionable steps to implement and a pitch they can present with confidence for future funding and investment.

We consider each participant's business, strengths and offerings and plan actions to continue involving the alums in our programmes through speaking engagements, workshop delivery and activity sessions. This means that those participating in the programme continue to be supported and engaged in our ecosystem and introduced to the broader community through paid engagements and brand exposure.

Once the programme is over, we continue our connection with the programme's alums. We hold inperson and online events that are specifically catered to Black entrepreneurs and those building their businesses. We invite special guest speakers to participate in panel Q&As related to the entrepreneurs' mindset journey and emphasise networking so we can support people to broaden their networks, collaborate and build further together.

From what we have witnessed, we can confidently say that this programme offers business knowledge and support to help Black female entrepreneurs to implement the foundations of their business and provides a platform that enables our participants to develop strong, long-lasting business networks and connections.

Beyond the knowledge transfer, our goal is to foster friendships and a sense of community that our participants may not have experienced, enhance their selfbelief, confidence and mindset.

We provide a platform for them to be involved in an organisation that continues to support, raise and build the visibility of their businesses.

Black and Good

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Meet Lydia "From the one-to-one support, the team energy and amazing facilitation, I loved everything about this programme, and I am so grateful to have found it. I'm more excited about the future of The Good Hair Co. than I was a few months ago, and I can't wait to share the programme with others who are looking to start their entrepreneurial journey."

Lydia Macharia co-founded The Good Hair Co., a two-sided online platform that makes hair care consultation more accessible, affordable and straightforward for women with textured hair. Lydia has been passionate about her business ever since she and her cofounder had the idea, but life always got in the way.

Our programme helped her to feel that it is truly possible to achieve what she has set out for in her business and validated that her foundational work before starting the programme was not in vain.

Black and Good

Lydia gained a vast support group she feels she can reach out to when needed, and she is no longer afraid to put herself and the business into the world. She shared that the feedback she received from the programme’s experts was to put herself more into the company because there is power in personal stories. She never knew what that looked like nor felt confident doing it.

Having fellows on the programme share that they would use her services gave her the encouragement she needed to keep going. The one-to-one sessions, in particular, provided Lydia with the knowledge to tighten her pitch while also developing a greater understanding of the financial side of her business.

Something that she found was challenging when doing general research because that research was not personalised to her problem. Lydia learnt how to calculate her budget/expenses and unique ways to seek support for different aspects of the business such as market strategy and funding.

She finished the programme feeling proud of her business, especially as she won first prize during the programme's Demo Day.

Meet Priscilla "It has helped me to identify what my weaknesses are and what my strengths are that I can lean into. The programme has helped me to get out of my head, be encouraged by others and take action."

Priscilla Vivian, founded Vivify Therapy, a multicultural mental health service that supports Africans and Caribbeans in the UK and across the diaspora.

Before starting our programme, Priscilla was reaching the point of burnout within her work. Starting in early 2019, her career picked up in 2020 as more people were experiencing the need for therapy and stigma was being reduced; meaning more people within Black and ethnic minorities were reaching out for support.

She was working all hours to be able to support those she was working with. Priscilla had the therapy skills she had trained to deliver but needed to learn how to manage the business side of her work.

Priscilla wanted to find a way to evolve from one-to-one work to one-to-many so she could offer a more significant impact. Through support from the programme and peer discussions with those facing similar challenges, Priscilla developed a mindset of taking action and asking for help. It highlighted the ability to outsource areas of her work.

The pitching sessions enabled Priscilla to refine her story and define her approach. It encouraged her to leverage her network and connect with existing clients through word of mouth.

Priscilla loves networking and feels confident to lean into her strengths. Our experts helped Priscilla to begin her transition from sole trader to Director of a CIC and implement a new approach to her business model.

Priscilla has also experienced a massive boost in confidence, being able to refine her pitch and host her first international retreat in January 2023.

After her graduation, we commissioned Priscilla to host a wellness workshop for the Black and Good business programme in February 2023 to support her in building her network and visibility while ensuring we can provide a deeply valuable and varied learning experience for those on the programme.

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Common Call is funding

Black Communities Common Call was founded to support organisations led

by Black people with deep knowledge, understanding and lived experience of the critical issues they seek to solve.

The Black voluntary sector has experienced challenges accessing funding for many years. Despite the challenges, there are many opportunities too. The overriding desire of these groups is to work 'on the same page' as funders and to be able to communicate openly and honestly. There is a general recognition of the straightened times but also a sense that funds could do better to address the needs of Black-led CSEs. As an organisation, DiNN has developed a unique insight into the 'contract of understanding' between Black-led charities, social enterprises, and funders. The organisation is uniquely placed to navigate the expectations of both parties and engender commitment from funders to address the most pressing needs in the UK's Black community.

The UK’s impact sector is shifting faster than ever; the last few years have been an extraordinary journey for equitable practice in grantmaking and social investment. We are seeing more grantmaking and intermediary based grantmaking through lived experience led organisations like ourselves.

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The UK’s impact sector is shifting faster than ever; the last few years have been an extraordinary journey for equitable practice in grantmaking and social investment. We are seeing more grantmaking and intermediary based grantmaking through lived experience led organisations like ourselves.

Through our work, DiNN has found a wide gap between perception and reality regarding funding practice and the extent of support for Black-led CSEs. The truth is probably between the two, but this gap is a testament to a lack of confidence in funders borne out of frustration and sadness at witnessing other Black groups fold after funds run out.

DiNN is one of the UK’s first Blackled intermediaries and is in the best position to address the unmet needs of our community in a culturally appropriate way.

Established in 2019, we are providing cost-effective fund management services and, filling an essential gap in funders' and local authorities' attempts to meet the diverse needs of their communities. DiNN can draw on its full range of organisational strengths for the benefit of Blackled charities and social enterprises (CSEs):

Grant: an experienced grant administrator with a focus on building organisational resilience.

Programme design: experience in investment readiness and broader business readiness approaches.

Frontline support: business, investment readiness and impact advisory expertise as part of our assessment and due diligence offer.

Fund design: investment fund structuring and investmentmaking expertise.

Networks: public, private and third-sector connections across the UK and internationally.

In the first phase (2020) of DiNN’s innovative funding project, Common Call, 16 organisations received funding worth £50K. This was a significant achievement for a sector unused to onward grant distribution through Black-led intermediaries. The funded organisations supported communities over a period of 6 months at the peak of the pandemic.

This led to diverse outcomes for their communities, including improved general wellbeing, reduced hardships, and fostered social integration during a period where lockdown measures strained social connections. At the close of the fund, we found that approximately 60% of the income of the UK's Black-led, Blackfocused organisations comes from the personal savings and employment income of their directors, while approximately 20% comes from grants.

Following the success of the Pilot, we went on to run Fund Two after we received funding from Comic Relief's Global Majority Fund to provide financial support to Blackled charities and social enterprises that COVID-19 had disproportionately impacted in the UK. The £300,000 fund included contributions from Barclays, National Emergencies Trust, Esmée Fairbairn Foundation, The Clothworkers' Foundation and Comic Relief. The following graphs show the characteristics of the organisation that we have funded since we began our work as an intermediary in the grant funding sector.

The graphs show the income streams, types of organisations, the locations in which we have funded, the sectors our grantees work in, their turnover, the demography of their service users and the ages of their organisations.

We are proud of the diversity of our funding and believe it truly reflects the scope of Black-led organisations across the UK.

Common Call

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Age of Organisation

Income Streams

Turnover £150-500k

88% 18%

£50-150k

29%

63 %

£10-50k

Less than 5 years

Less than £10k Employment Income

Personal Savings

Grant Funding

Sectors

0%

10%

20%

30%

40%

50%

Location of Service Delivery

55%

Within Greater London

6%

Physical Health

5

6%

Racial Justice

4

14%

Disabilities

3

22%

Mental Wellbeing

2

39%

Employability

1

Demography Children (under 18) Young People (18-25) Refugees, Asylum Seekers and Migrants

Organisation Type

%

People who are unemployed (<3 years)

3 2

4

Charity

18

%

People with Long Term Conditions

Charitable Incorporated Organisation

Others Parents, Professionals, People with Mental Health Conditions, Older People (Over 65), Entrepreneurs...

%

37

2

2%

1

Community Interest Company Limited by Guarantee

Women

Limited Company

by Guarantee

16

Common Call

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Fund Two was characterised by increased deal flow and deal size, as well as expanding our outreach to Black-led organisations making a significant impact across several sectors.

This, in turn, allowed them to expand outreach to their service users and communities while making a significant impact. We received 1038 eligible applications over the two funds, which led to considerable competition for the available funds. Since then, we have managed funds and designed funding programmes for clients such as BBC Children in Need and Impact on Urban Health.

What we have learned in this period is that grant funding is not enough as a sole intervention to ensure the continued sustainability of Black led organisations. Within the funding landscape other products and models must be engaged equally. As a result of this finding, we have invested our time and research capacity into investigations that help us understand the position of Black led organisations in the social investment space.

Common Call

Social impact investing in the UK has grown six-fold over the past eight years, increasing from £830 million in 2011 to £5.1 billion in 2019, according to figures released

by Big Society Capital. Their latest annual market estimate shows that most of the growth during this period has come through alternatives to traditional bank lending, which have scaled 20-fold from £169 million (2011) to £3,388 million (2019).

This diversity in the social impact investment market has enabled different types of investors to enter the market and increased the availability of finance options for social enterprises and charities.

Most recently, between 2018 – 2019, there was a little over 20% increase in the value of social impact investments in the UK (to £5.1 billion). The number of transactions made in the sector increased by 18% yearly to more than 5,000 in 2019, with investments coming from various institutions, including venture capital funds, social banks, social property funds, charity bonds and specialist lenders.

However, only some Black-led CSEs can take on social investment, as most are still early and need more capacity and developing revenue streams.

Based on our experience as an intermediary funder to 51 Black-led CSEs, we know that unrestricted grant funding of up to £30K can enable Black-led CSEs to sufficiently build capacity as the basis for viable growth. However, there is almost no follow-on unrestricted grant funding between £30-£100K. Additionally, through our two funding programmes, we have found that organisations with developing revenue streams require 'patient capital' to achieve a more significant impact while retaining sufficient reserves essential for longer-term sustained growth and social investment.

This funding mismatch is compounded by a lack of collaboration among funders, which results in high costs and time constraints for these organisations to secure the blend of support needed to achieve their impact potential.

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Successful applicants demonstrated the most robust business case for achievable impact and financial sustainability.

The 36 grant recipients are creating an impact in underserved communities. The awarded organisations primarily address social challenges in these key areas: Employment, education and training In 2021, we disbursed £300,000 in grants to Black-led organisations across the United Kingdom. The fund, Fund Two, was highly competitive, as we received over 600 applications. Through this work, we discovered that 97% of our grantees and potential grantees identify themselves as Lived Experience leaders.

Arts, culture, and faith Mental health and wellbeing Community and citizenship Racial justice and equality The grant allowed these organisations to continue delivering transformative impact in their communities and supported their long-term development.

The funding we provided to the 36 organisations allowed them to increase the efficiency of their programmes and provide services to a further 7,803 individuals over 12 months.

Many Black-led Charities and Social Enterprises (CSEs) in the UK that are capable of transformational change and impact struggle to achieve their potential because: They cannot access unrestricted core funding They cannot access business skills support and mentorship They lack “visibility” among many funders Most funders only address part of the overall needs of these founders and CSEs Little active collaboration between different funders results in significant transaction costs and delays for Black-led founders to secure funding. As a result, most Black-led founders remain sub-scale and operate on a boot-strapped basis with no apparent ability to fund long-term growth.

In addition to the above, there is limited and fragmented earlystage funding for CSEs in the UK: Most UK CSEs are “small” - 87% have annual incomes below £500K 90% of all funding available goes to the country's top 13% of charities and social enterprises - "major" CSEs earning over £500K a year Early-stage fundraising needs to be more cohesive, leading to high costs for smaller CSEs (the group most Black-led CSEs fall into) Most funding offered at the "small" stage is restricted to the cost of delivery projects, leaving little for organisational development.

This makes it extremely hard for Black-led CSEs, even those with high potential, to develop scale and resilience.

Common Call

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As an open innovation organisation, we invest in our learning and further development of our interventions. Discovering that a significantly high proportion of our community identifies as lived experience leaders set us on the path to delivering an in-depth report on the topic.

The following are the recommendations from our Lived Experience Report:

Centre Black published a report on the lived experience of Blackled impact organisations in the UK.

Non-funded involvement in policy discussions is insufficient to deliver meaningful change at the grassroots level.

Our hope with the publication of this report was to shed light on the nuanced experiences of Black people leading CSEs and how the sector could contribute to a more equitable system to support their success.

Funders should use staff with lived experience in the outcome areas they are looking to effect social change. The lack of lived experience within funder organisations leaves the impression that application processes are unfair to Blackled impact organisations and causes unequal distribution of funds.

Funders should place more value on the lived experience of Black-led impact organisations to deliver local programmes.

Funders need to set up more visibility around their operations. Black-led impact organisations need to know that operational processes not only seem fair and transparent but are.

Common Call

Funders should provide applicants with more detailed feedback when applications are unsuccessful. In the short term, this ensures that Blackled impact organisations learn from their mistakes but, in the long term, improve their conversion rate, aid in the equitable distribution of funds and leverage the large amount of lived experience at the grassroots for social change.

To reduce the distance between Black-led impact organisations and funders, funders should consider using Black-led intermediate funders to aid the equitable distribution of funds in the local communities. This would go some way in addressing the perceived bias towards more prominent organisations as well as white-led organisations.

Black-led impact organisations should review their legal structures to determine whether they are best suited to establish trust and credibility among funders and aid the sustainability of their organisations and programmes.

Black-led impact organisations need to work in greater partnership with other organisations to build their collaborative advantage and thus increase their access to resources and reduce risk.

Black-led impact organisations should build strong relationships with local MPs and councillors in order to gain greater support, financial and non-financial, in their local communities.

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We have investigated the leadership capacity of our grantees and determined that there is boundless authentic leadership displayed by the UK’s Black lived experience leaders daily.

Centre Black published a research report into the lived experience of Black-led impact organisations in the UK, which provides valuable insights into the day-to-day affairs of Black leaders.

As part of this research, we noticed many interesting themes emerging around leadership in the Black community. We hope the insights will raise awareness around leadership traits among those looking to set up their businesses or lead on broader issues affecting the Black communities.

In our discussions with these leaders, what came through to us was how the issues raised aligned with Bill George's authentic leadership model. George's model reduced the qualities of leaders into five key dimensions, and the themes which came out of our discussions were in line with these underlying qualities of authentic leaders such as purpose, heart, values, relationships and self-discipline. The five key traits of the model are: Pursuing their purpose with passion Practising solid values Leading with their hearts as well as their heads Establishing connected relationships Demonstrating self-discipline

Black Leaders are

Authentic Leaders

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Black leaders drive their organisations by a moral and ethical purpose and do not lose sight of their values and principles.

They led with their heart, developed lasting relationships and achieved excellence through self-discipline.

Practising solid values "So you have to be there to stand up for good causes, to stand up for those who can't stand on their own, you know. Otherwise, you don't get anything."

Establishing connected relationships "We work in partnership with the local authority and other stakeholders. In this country, if you don't dare, you don't get anything, you don't receive anything."

As authentic leaders, their colleagues responded positively to them, and their organisations also benefited from this authenticity.

Looking at each of these dimensions in turn, we found:

Once Black leaders find the purpose that ignites their passion, mainly through their lived experiences, they stay true to their established values. They acted following these values by making significant sacrifices to stick to them.

Pursuing their purpose with passion

Leading with their hearts as well as their heads

Demonstrating self-discipline

"But at the same time, it's important for me to be myself and not become someone else in that role; I still want to remain authentic, essentially and also to respect my feelings about things."

"I've been really, really happy to help the community and stand up for the community, not only the French community but also our local community."

"I suppose one of the most useful bits of advice I had around leadership was just to be calm in the face of things being upside down because nobody's instilled with confidence by a leader who's emotionally just on a roller coaster."

The Black leaders we spoke to were passionate about the areas in which they worked. They all had a deep sense of purpose for what they were trying to achieve, partly due to their lived experiences, that is, their personal experiences of the problems they were trying to solve. They were also highly motivated by their work since they all believed in their intrinsic worth.

Sensitivity to the needs of their communities and a keen willingness to help was highly represented in the sample group of Black leaders. These leaders demonstrated a deep compassion for members of their communities and work colleagues.

Enduring relationships based on their connectedness with stakeholders is the trademark of Black leadership. They achieve this by being open, sharing and committed to these relationships to achieve their goals.

High levels of focus and discipline typify the Black leaders' style of engagement. They are very focused on their goals and consistently move forward towards those goals, even in the face of significant setbacks such as the COVID 19 pandemic.

In a system that undersupports and underfunds Black-led organisations, we need to ensure that this traits are consistently fostered and developed to ensure best practice and outcomes for the underserved communities these Black lived experience leaders work in.

"I'm actually going through some training in that area [leadership].

And that's because of a fund that we had applied for. I thought, oh, hang on. It'd be good actually to go deeper into this because leadership is really important.

What is the leader? What makes a good leader, examples of charity leaders? Sometimes we get that we're leaders; I just think we forget that. You need to be reminded, and your skills need to be refreshed."

Some of our Black leaders were unaware that they possessed these essential traits associated with authentic leaders. We hope Black leaders are encouraged by the information provided in this blog and commit to leadership development programmes, such as the Common Call Lived Experience Fellowship Programme, to unearth and develop these areas of their authentic leadership skills.

Common Call

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Meet our 2021 - 2022 Grantees Here is a list of the fantastic organisation that we have supported in this period.

Fund Two Grantees £5000 Award

Fund Two Grantees £12,500 Award

Activities 4 U, London African Youth Development Association, London AidExcel Support Services, London Ebonista Project, Luton Elimu, London Fico’s World, London Girls into coding, London Grosvenor Road Studios, London Kunsaka, London Melanin Medics, Luton MMARAP Enrichment, London Plasma of Hope, Walsall Shop and Donate CIC, London Special Needs Community CIC, London Street 2 Boardroom, Bristol Thinkher Ambition, London Ultimate Counselling CIC, London ViSHEbility, London Walk With Me UK, London Woke Finance, London

2020 Change, London African French Speaking Community Support, Birmingham Bright Futures 4 All, London Brixton Wings, London Community Infosource, Glasgow Da’aro Youth Project, London DataKirk, Edinburgh Houria, Bristol Jambo Radio, Glasgow Millennium Community Solutions, London Motivez, London Rekindle, Manchester Sickle Cell Care Manchester, Manchester Success Club, London The Safety Box Youth Programs, London Triangular, Newcastle

On the basis of our grant funding work, the Centre Black team has delivered a typology to determine the different types of organisations that exist in the Black community. We have divided them into 4 archetypes; Palms, Maples, Hibiscuses and Vines.

Common Call

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Palms

Maples

Hibiscuses

Vines

Black-led organisations in this business archetype (called Palms) are overwhelmingly dependent on one source of funding (grant funding contribute to 97% of revenue). They are palm-like in structure having a very distinct source of revenue. They tend to have annual turnovers of between £50k - £150k, and 6 - 10 years experience even though there are significant numbers also having 20+ years experience. Palms are most likely to be organisations in the development and growth stages. Compared to the other archetypes they are most likely to have CIO and charities legal structures.

Maples are Black-led organisations that mostly depend on two sources of funding (96% grant funding; and 18% personal savings). They are maple-like in structure having two main sources of revenue: a main source of income with a smaller but significant secondary source. They can be relatively small organisations with annual turnovers of between £10k - £50k but also larger organisations with £150 - £500k annual turnover. They are likely to be start up and development stage organisations with 6 - 20 years experience. They are more likely to be registered as charities.

Hibiscuses are Black-led organisation with three main sources of funding with grant funding making the largest contribution (87% grant funding; 29% personal savings; 26% employment income). They are shrub-like in that they are relatively small organisations with multiple branches of revenue totalling around £10k - £50k per annum.

They are more likely to be start ups than organisations of the other archetypes, and having less than 5 years experience. They are also more likely than other organisations to be legally registered as CIC Ltd by guarantee.

Vines are micro-sized Black-led organisations with the most diverse sources of income (51% grant funding; 49% personal savings; and 35% employment income). They are vine-like in that their revenue portfolio is very diverse containing multiple sources of funding without one funding stream dominating the portfolio. They tend to have a turnover of less than £10k per annum and less than 5 years experience although there are some with 20+ years experience.

They are more likely than organisations in the other archetypes to be registered as Ltd by shares, sole traders, or unincorporated.

Common Call

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Black Womxn are achieving their

Moon Landing There are moments in life when we unlock our understanding or acceptance of our true potential, that is, a moon landing. It's the sort of thing that reminds you that anything is possible because even the impossible is probable under the right circumstances.

My Moon Landing believes that Black womxn, Black LGBTQ+ and Black non-binary people are central to the future of the Black community; therefore aims to ensure that Black womxn and non-binary Black people are supported to build social community projects for the benefit of local Black communities in the UK. My Moon Landing empowers the passion and drive that already exists in the Black community by giving Black womxn, Black LGBTQ+ and Black non-binary people the skills, connections and resources to build projects that will support themselves and the community.

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My Moon Landing believes that Black womxn, Black LGBTQ+ and Black non-binary people are central to the future of the Black community; therefore aims to ensure that Black womxn and non-binary Black people are supported to build social community projects for the benefit of local Black communities in the UK. My Moon Landing empowers the passion and drive that already exists in the Black community by giving Black womxn, Black LGBTQ+ and Black non-binary people the skills, connections and resources to build projects that will support themselves and the community.

Despite being 3% more likely to report abuse to the police, Black womxn are 14% less likely to be effectively supported out of the abusive situation, according to Refuge. Statistics like these make it increasingly crucial for Black womxn to achieve financial independence so that it is possible to make a way out of a bad situation when necessary.

The problem is so well acknowledged within our community we often find ourselves swapping stories and tips readily in hopes of contributing to the Financial Freedom of a close friend or family member.

Note the word "freedom" there.

While finance isn't the only factor, according to the World Bank and Dana Harrington Conner's 2014 paper in the William and Mary Journal of Race, Gender and Social Justice, access to finance, coupled with the other keys in place, will lead to longer-term success and more robust sustainability in the future.

Based on our concerns over the key issues the research indicates, we undertook a survey with our community members and discovered the following:

Respondents' top 3 financial goals for the next five years are home ownership (66%), sticking to budget (49%), and building an emergency fund (49%) Basic living expenses (34%), Debt (23%) and financial commitments towards family (23%) are the biggest challenges preventing respondents from achieving their financial goals 26% of respondents never talk about money and finances with their peers. That said, 6% do so daily, 17% weekly, 29% monthly and 23% quarterly 34% and 43% of respondents know how much money their friends and family members are making respectively

This information supported the development of our support programme. My Moon Landing is a ground-breaking support mechanism that empowers Black womxn, LGBTQ+ and non-binary people.

The Financial Fundamentals programme; a training course to provide skills and tools to develop the key financial skills necessary for personal development and financial sustainability.

In upcomimg articles, we hear from external experts, Thelma (Glasgow) and Fi (London), who deliver high-quality training that benefits from their day-to-day deep-rooted engagements in the finance world as well their own lived experience. In addition, we apply our ASAP methodology to deliver this training, ensuring a user-centered approach.

With an extra £1,000 a month, 83% of respondents said that their mental health would improve greatly.

My Moon Landing

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The cohort-based intervention aims to support Black womxn, Black LGBTQ+ and Black nonbinary people based in London or Glasgow who earn below £25,000 a year with personal finance-based training to equip them with information, resources, and tools to improve their savings and manage their debt and budget more effectively. The programme consists of: Three weeks of core skills training focused on managing your debt, increasing your wealth gap and budgeting effectively 1-2-1 Expert support to help participants personalise their learning and manage their finances

Access to an interactive private group space on our online network, a space where members can explore a wide variety of events, Q&As, professional development opportunities, etc., and have the experience of being part of a tightly knit learning community There is a future in which all Black womxn can fully engage in our society's systems effectively, benefit from it entirely and navigate it deftly. That is the future we are working towards, which is why we champion the financial freedom of Black womxn.

Wider skills training sessions that focus on topics such as setting financial goals, wealth, and investment

My Moon Landing

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Thelma (Dr Tee) is a very passionate and enthusiastic individual who is keen to empower communities. As a researcher, her interests are community development, financial inclusion and gender justice. Thelma's desire to promote financial inclusion as an instrument for poverty alleviation, mobility and empowerment resulted in a doctoral degree examining how microfinance institutions can promote financial inclusion.

Dr Tee is a certified financial education instructor, and nothing gives her more satisfaction than seeing individuals, especially women, take ownership of their lives through improved financial capability. She is a lecturer at Glasgow Caledonian University, Scotland, where she teaches modules relating to societypromoting greater awareness and understanding of societal risks and how to mitigate them.

Meet Thelma

Dr Tee asserts, "It can be argued that financial exclusion is a risk to society and any economy. This, no doubt, has a multiplier effect, affecting general wellbeing negatively and pressurising already stretched systems and sectors (health, crime, justice etc.)."

Outside of these roles, she volunteers with many organisations and in a diverse capacity as a trustee, member, Chair and more. We had a chance to speak to Thelma about everything to do with financial freedom and the challenges faced

by Black women concerning money.

In an interview, Thelma shared the following about the challenges and insights of the work she does.

What are some of the challenges you have faced in terms of intersectionality and/or financial independence?

As a start-up, it has been difficult trying to secure loans. However, we have grown our brand, Jezreel, to a point where we are selfmanaging. Our client base has grown thanks to satisfied, repeat clients who refer others to our organisation. However, as we expand, we will definitely need financial support, and at this time, we hope the outcome will be markedly different.

Tell us more about yourself and what your goals in life look like.

What are your interests? What are your fears?

We have developed a theory of change on where we'd like to see Jezreel in the next five years; a

trusted brand building an effective and lean eco-system.

This will promote social mobility for individuals whilst strengthening the groups that do incredible work in supporting communities. However, we realise that we need to work on doing it independently and must collaborate with like-minded organisations, including government agencies.

How has being involved with My Moon Landing helped you with mental health and financial independence?

As a trainer, whenever I am developing materials for impacting knowledge and motivating people to act, I also evaluate my personal circumstances to ensure that I am practising what I preach.

Do you have some advice/inspirational quotes you live by or that have impacted you?

It all starts with managing your finances. When you are financially empowered, dealing with other life circumstances is easier. Take charge of your future; improve your financial skills...live the life you desire and love the life you live!

My Moon Landing

What was your financial experience like growing up?

I was born into a middle-class family. My mum was a teacher, and my dad worked as a marketing manager in several companies, including Lever Brothers. I come from a large family- when I say large, I mean large! However, my parents provided all we needed and some of our wants. We did not feel deprived as all our needs were met by my parents.

Who first taught you about money, and where are you confident financially?

My mum taught us all financial discipline. As a teacher, she is very articulate and meticulousextremely prudent. Again, with so many children, my mum always shops in bulk. This is often cheaper and also ensures we do not experience stock out. She was part of a cooperative where they do things in common, including buying cows, rice, toiletries etc.

She would go to the then-popular Mile 12 market in Lagos, Nigeria, to get baskets of pepper, onions, potatoes etc. With all these, I am extremely confident with savings and budgeting. I am fully aware of my needs versus wants and that of my immediate family.

What preconceptions did you have/or did they (the person that first taught you about money) have?

My beliefs about finances to date were shaped by my mum's own perception. There is the need to plan for a rainy day! When all is well, save! When things aren't going so well, still save. Never be caught unaware! I developed a savings mindset, which has helped me in life. I try to maintain a healthy balance between savings and expenditure.

Is there anything else?

Nothing really, just that the new generation, or the younger generation of Black women, born and bred in the UK, need to learn to be more financially prudent not chasing after the latest gadget, clothes etc. Don't get me wrong, there's nothing wrong with these items, but I guess, moderation is key! The younger women should also not be afraid to say, “No, I cannot afford this” and not be swayed by peer pressure!

My husband always teases me“You say you don't have money, but when money matters arise, money comes out"!

What do you think are the solutions that the MML community needs to thrive financially?

Keep educating women! Provide one-to-one sessions, understand the mindset of women and keep creating awareness of the relationship between financial prudence, financial empowerment and general wellbeing.

Do you see any of these preconceptions showing up in Black women today?

I think culture plays a vital role in dictating and guiding all aspects of our lives. This is especially so for Black women that grew up in Africa. The communal life also influences your perception of money - make your money work for you! There's also the spiritual/religious aspect of money, such as being a good steward of all God has committed into your hands, including finance. Money has wings, do not love money as it's the root of all evil etc.

Lastly, what did you learn from attending any of the MML programmes or events?

Being a facilitator on an MML programme has further opened my eyes to the need to keep empowering women via financial inclusion. A financially stable woman has a voice and can better appreciate themselves and create healthier boundaries.

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My Moon Landing

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Meet Afiya

Afiya ‘Fi' Titus is ACA examqualified with a finance background working to support individuals and entrepreneurs to build their financial futures. She has been a self-employed entrepreneur, sole trader, and limited company director for several years. Her experience also includes leadership and business growth. Her goals in life are to live and work in a way that is as autonomous and flexible as possible.

Her business Coco Financial is a family-run business that supports early-stage micro-businesses to take control of the accounting and finance side of the business. Using her expertise and qualifications, Coco Financial is a fantastic avenue to help other small business owners with financial questions.

Fi co-created her business because she realised a gap in both confidence and knowledge for many freelancers, small business start-ups and the self-employed regarding accounting and finance.

She also realised small ownermanaged businesses need more resources (time or money) to divert their attention to accounting and away from their most crucial daily role of running the business. She has been a self-employed entrepreneur, sole trader, and limited company director for several years. Her experience also includes People Strategy, Leadership and Business Growth.

What was your financial experience like growing up?

I was taught about money from a very young age. My mum was a retail bank manager and gave me very early lessons about saving money.

Fi shared with us some of the core insights of her financial journey in a recent interview.

Who first taught you about money, and where are you confident financially?

My parents - especially mum! I was confident saving from childhood, and by adulthood was very comfortable with understanding how to take on 'good' debt.

What preconceptions did you have/or did they (the person that first taught you about money) have?

Saving was a good thing, but investing was 'too risky' or 'not for everyday people like us'.

Do you see any of these preconceptions showing up in Black women today?

Yes, often - which is why I promote financial literacy to change this perception.

What do you think are the solutions that the MML community needs to thrive financially?

To unlock a money mindset, and be surrounded by examples of people thriving who 'look like them'.

Lastly, what did you learn from attending any MML programmes or events?

There needs to be more confidence and a scarcity mindset rather than an abundance mindset in a large proportion of participants. I hope the MML programmes have challenged this.

My Moon Landing

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Even before the pandemic, Black young people were often discriminated against based on ethnicity during recruitment. With a reduction in available employment due to Covid battering the economy, the grim reality was that this discrimination would get worse. The new briefing

by The Resolution Foundation sadly confirms this. Its research found that before the pandemic, '25% of economically active Black 16–24-year-olds were unemployed, compared to 10% of their White counterparts.' The unemployment rate among Black young people is 34% compared to 13% among White young people.

These findings don't surprise us.

Every single one of the young people we work with has been economically impacted by the pandemic and are still struggling to find sustainable work. On average, they have been unemployed for seven months before engaging with us, and 90% self-report feeling overwhelmed and pessimistic about the future.

60% also state that they do not have relationships with people in the careers they are interested in engaging with, leaving them unprepared for a competitive job market in their chosen field.

It's all about

Voltage Revolution We're committed to breaking down barriers by providing access to industry experts, paid opportunities and other resources as well as support for mental health and wellbeing.

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We believe to improve employment prospects for young people during and after the Covid19 crisis, we need to work with them directly to empower them to give voice to their experiences and aspirations. With the Resolution Foundation highlighting that 16-24 year-olds account for the most significant share of those finding themselves unemployed in the last year (57%), there is an urgent need to find new solutions to tackle this head-on. It is already having a significant impact on the mental health of young people, with relatively low numbers of Black young people seeking help - and it is worrying what lasting effect it could have for all young people.

Young Black creatives in the UK are consistently being left out of opportunities to help them take control of their future. Given this disparity, the Voltage Revolution programme was specifically designed to provide access to learning and development opportunities that foster the creative growth of the so-called “hard to reach” Black creatives while fostering a sense of wellbeing through community and tailored interventions.

Our evaluation showed that 94 individuals (aged 18 - 24) completed the pre programme survey, returning a mean WEMWBS score of 47.88, and 15 individuals completed the post programme survey yielding a WEMWBS score of 49.2. This represents an increase by +1.32 in the mean score pre-programme to post-programme. Whilst this did not represent a statistically significant increase in the mean score, we can cautiously say that the programme has had a positive effect on participants' mental wellbeing.

Comparing the pre and post programme WEMWBS mean scores to the national average of those aged 16 - 24 years old, revealed that the scores for individuals entering the programme was significantly lower than the national average for their comparative age group. However, post-programme it was no longer significantly different to the national average. In other words, those leaving the programme had similar mental health scores to their peers, which was not the case when they entered the programme.

Voltage Revolution

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Voltage Revolution offers diverse resources and services, including workshops, masterclasses, 1:1 mentorship and coaching. By employing a hybrid model of inperson Core Skill sessions and online resources, Voltage Revolution is accessible and scalable, maximising its impact.

Through Voltage Revolution, DiNN demonstrates our unwavering commitment to nurturing a supportive community for the next generation of young Black creative talents, paving the way for a brighter future in the Creative Industries.

We partnered with Spotify to host The Spotify Podcast Club, themed podcast discussions between participants in the Voltage Revolution programme and professionals at Spotify. The vision was to support community, regardless of socioeconomic status, to thrive and develop academically by challenging and inspiring them to new ways of thinking. Ultimately the purpose was to contribute to an increased ambition and resilience and for the community to fulfill career goals.

Voltage Revolution

The format was a monthly session where young Black people within the VR community and Spotify professionals listen to one podcast episode on varying social-issue topics and come prepared with notes ahead of the meeting, ready to share their insights and reflections. The interactions between the participants and the Spotify professionals consisted of sharing their experiences on when they first realised they were Black in different contexts and how those realisations affected their lives. It has been interesting to see the similarities in their stories whilst also serving as a reminder that these conversations about identity are crucial to building awareness and creating safe spaces for us. Regarding this programme, a Voltage Revolution participant shared, "If I could describe this session, I would say it felt like a hug. As a Black woman, it was amazing to be surrounded by people that looked like me and, most importantly, in an environment that was meant for me too. It was also very useful and educational.

There were so many tips and practices I am going to start implementing in my day-to-day life."

Many thanks to the Spotify team for collaborating with us.

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My creative interests vary, but I am a postgraduate Illustrator who has had a massive interest in Business Management, Marketing and Art. I have been influenced a lot by music, and my colourful artwork demonstrates exactly how music plays a role in what I create.

Meet Sandra

As a creative, I faced many challenges, from imposter syndrome, burnout and lack of representation within the Illustration world. Another challenge I have faced is not having an ideal of the type of role I would like to do, but knowing that by being consistent, I would find my passion. Another challenge is that many universities never prepare you for the real world, such as networking and finding your tribe, applying for jobs, setting up financial goals, or even just identity. Most of the things I learnt were the hard way, mainly learning on the go and making mistakes by allowing myself to be a beginner.

Voltage Revolution came to me when I needed the most support and to be surrounded by a Black creative community which I lacked so much at university.

After my MA, I had no sense of direction and felt purposeless. I saw this programme on TikTok, and took the opportunity to sign up, sceptical after having signed up for similar programmes that weren't the best and had a massive negative impact on my confidence. Voltage Revolution has stuck to their words, and their actions meet their values and beliefs. I felt very welcome and cared for from the very start, and so far, Voltage Revolution has been a safe space for me to attend weekly or monthly workshops where I can put my guard down and be my authentic self.

Partaking in this programme, I gained so much confidence; at the beginning, I was very mute, never wanting to share my artwork with anyone in case someone stole my work. But as I continued attending different workshops during the year, my confidence in networking grew, and from not having a website portfolio to working on a creative CV to even putting my wellbeing support first. I gained so much from the programme that I wouldn't have done all alone.

Right now, the biggest change from the programme for me and my career is knowing that consistency comes a long way in life. I came to a realisation of how important it is not to suffer in silence or battle your pain in silence. Also how important it is to share it with others or that being around people that look like you can have such a huge impact on your perspective and how you view the world.

So for me, the change was that my artwork grew. My fear of not wanting people to steal my artwork without giving me credit made it very hard for me to believe in myself. Due to my consistency and speaking to others about it within the programme, I developed this huge confidence of not wanting to hide my talent by sharing it online.

This programme taught me so much about my wellbeing, focusing on the things I can create/control and being surrounded by young Black creatives like myself to see them striving in their field has allowed me to choose life and know that consistency is key.

Voltage Revolution

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My creative work involves producing and recording music across various genres. I enjoy exploring and experimenting with all types of sounds in my creations.

However, I have faced challenges on my creative journey, such as burnout. There are times when I get stuck, and no matter how much I try, I can't seem to move forward. In those moments when I step away from my work, my creativity starts to flow again.

My overall experience with the Voltage Revolution programme has been fantastic. I've met and interacted with various people from different walks of life and creative fields, such as illustrators, writers, and photographers. The programme has helped me become more dedicated to my craft, and I now have a clearer sense of where I want to go with my music production. Before joining the programme, I was unsure about my direction in the music industry.

In addition to the challenges I've faced in my creative journey, I also have ASD (Autism Spectrum Disorder), which sometimes makes it difficult for me to form interpersonal connections with others. However, the Voltage Revolution programme has been incredibly supportive in this regard.

My favourite part of the Voltage Revolution experience has been the interactions and conversations with other participants. We've shared our journeys, strengths, and weaknesses, and it's been a great way for us to connect and grow together. I've also enjoyed the programme's engaging activities, as they've helped us bond and stay involved in our creative pursuits.

Through the programme, I've built connections with people with similar interests and challenges.

The environment has been welcoming and understanding, allowing me to feel comfortable expressing myself and engaging with others. This support has positively impacted my creative work and greatly improved my ability to form meaningful relationships with my peers in the creative community.

Meet Banji Voltage Revolution

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Many of us spend 70% of our time at work or thinking about work, and that is a lot of time either spent personally and professionally fulfilled or not. The business world as we know it no longer works for employees. According to Charity Times, in the charity sector, six in ten employees are looking to leave their current organisation in search of a similarly impact-driven role elsewhere. Despite the best intentions, the sector is not yet fulfilling employee expectations around Diversity and Inclusion promises. This leads to high employee turnover, low employee satisfaction, disengagement and lower service delivery impact.

The challenge of Diversity and Inclusion is not going anywhere.

Times have changed, and now the top challenge facing CEOs, after securing income and multi-year delivery contracts, is their unhappy and unproductive workplace. In this sector, employees are regularly asked to step forward and achieve more than possible. Over time, we have found that disengagement and reduced productivity fester and proliferate within organisations struggling with their workplace culture.

The Impact Sector needs

Melding Your responsibility, beyond your social impact, beyond your bottom-line and daily tasks, is the creation and continued development of an atmosphere that makes everyone that comes into contact with it feel seen, heard and alive. That must include your employees at every level

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You will find yourselves surrounded by employees who are either disengaged to the point of silence or planning their escape: Disengaged to the point of silence: employees that don't bother speaking up anymore because they have no confidence in the potential for real change.

Planning their escape: employees are actively looking for new roles right now, so their work productivity noticeably reduces.

Despite this knowledge, these broken workplaces exist throughout the sector. One focus group interviewee who was planning their escape explained their experience this way: "when everything happened in the summer [of 2020], there were so many grand promises about the change to come, but 18 months on, everything is back to normal, nothing significant changed, even the things we thought would make a big difference made no difference at all."

Much has been done, and too little achieved, to create new systems and embed new practices. The sector needs to ensure an accurate and lasting turnaround that invigorates creativity, passion and productivity in the short and long term. We're giving up on D&I as we know it, taking the lessons and making something new, and bound in systems change.

Do it Now Now’s answer to create a clear and effective approach is Melding. The ‘Melding Approach’ offers a tried-and-true model of D&I strategy integration that is tailor-made for each organisation at an affordable price enabling the forward motion of interorganisational culture to ensure lasting impact. Melding is built to holistically design and integrate measures to achieve Principle 6 of the Charity Governance Code, meet funder expectations, satisfy the needs of employees and improve outcomes for service users.

Melding

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Melding offers participating organisations unlimited D&I training led by Melding Experts, insight reports based on sectorwide learnings to guide decision making, research-based recommendations and implementation guides customised to the organisation's individual needs, internal D&I policy review to ensure positive change is achieved as well as a certificate of D&I achievement through the programme.

Through the offer of these services, Melding ensures that every member of the charity sector workforce can feel safe and supported in their workplace and industry.

Melding empowers the workforce to adopt the inclusive practices necessary to increase diversity, improve employee experience, align mission and vision, and ensure effective leadership development by utilising qualitative and quantitative data to lead decisions about how to develop and invest in internal culture. We ensure that D&I becomes part of the core DNA of our client's organisations.

Melding's work with these organisations ensures effective internal and external inclusion practices. The more inclusive an organisation is internally, the more inclusive their services and service users will be, therefore, the broader their base of operations.

The impact sector is starting to regulate, and ensuring we have a mindset of maintaining progress is essential. Too often, we have heard accounts of D&I trends born from political and societal events with no long-term vision and that things "fall back into old habits".

The approach we use ensures that this change is baked in, so much so that it becomes a core part of the organisation's overall sustainability.

Melding

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Living for an

African Dream As an organisation, we do not shy away from our responsibility to the Black community in Africa. It is of great importance to us that the opportunities we are afforded in the UK are leveraged to improve Africa's support and mobility ecosystem.

We decided early on that our focus in Africa would be on developing the tech ecosystem, with particular attention paid to earlystage startups. This has allowed us to provide world-class networks and expertise to very early-stage businesses across the continent, some of whom have raised upwards of £1m from UK and US sources as a direct result of our work with them.

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With AfriTech XYZ, we have a dream - raising awareness of the developments in the African tech space to millions worldwide. We asked some of our community members to contribute to our thinking on this subject by sharing what their dream for Africa is also:

Charlotte Odunlade-Akeju, Tremendoc: To be the most vibrant and innovative continent in the world.

Eyitayo Ogunmola, Utiva: A continent of 650 million young people with the right skills that global companies can’t resist.

Chioma Okotcha, Payhippo: Growth. Development. Innovation.

Hub for creation.

Tunde Kara, Vendease Africa: My dream for Africa is that people will be less reliant on faith and more reliant on systems that work. The average African prays for things that are easily accessible in more developed nations.

AfriTech XYZ

Adewale Yusuf, TalentQL: Africa my Africa. I honestly want our leaders to have more sense.

More sense brings more opportunities. We are not disabled, but our leaders are greedy and have left the citizens in a begging position. We are not victims, we have a lot of resources, but we just need better governance and infrastructure in order for Africa to thrive.

Angie Madara, Growd: I dream of an Africa where everyone has got access to different services that will help them compete globally on an equal playing field. For this to happen, the private sector, public sector, donor communities and media should work together.

Ikenna Nzewi, Releaf: Our goal is to catalyse agro-based industrialisation across the continent for shared prosperity.

No phenomenon in the history of the world has moved more people out of extreme poverty and into shared prosperity than industrialisation and we want to drive this development across the continent immediately.

Joe Kinvi, HoaQ: Economic empowerment for every single African. One where people don’t think about immigration anymore because they are successful within the continent and technology is at their disposal, enabling things.

When you can generate impact wherever you are, there is prosperity. When everyone plays their part, we can get very far as a continent. We have the resources, as we have the youngest population in the world who are super talented. An Africa where we no longer need international aid, gain political stability and can prosper as a continent.

Josh Nzewi, Eze: Self-sufficiency. Being able to rely on our resources without having to import finished goods or rely on any outside influences for the sustainability of Africa.

Seun Runsewe, Biamo Money: For it to work so I don’t have to go somewhere else. I grew up African, I identify as an African woman and so I don’t understand being anything else. I’m open to learning but I don’t need to explain my existence here. I take up space here, much better than I do outside of Africa. I don’t think I would have had the career growth I’ve had if I spent the last 10 years in another country. I’m confident that that won’t have happened. So I wish that it worked so that the brilliant people that are taking flights every day and leaving wouldn’t have reason to. The collective experience of the average Nigerian/African is just so bad that they are willing to embrace being less than or something else in another country because it just doesn’t work here in Africa and that to me is the most heartbreaking thing.

We are excited for the future of the African continent. We have the resources, we have the talent, and we have the tech. Onwards and upwards!

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Meet our 2021 - 2022 Prize Finalists Bukiya, Ghana, Kenya and Nigeria. Created to empower local food vendors to deliver Africa’s authentic and budgetfriendly meals online and expand to new neighbourhoods through cloud kitchens. Using technology, Bukiya bridges the technology literacy gap in the space by developing practical ways to allow vendors to be included in the digital economy. - Winner!

PowerBox Energy Systems, Nigeria. A renewable energy startup manufacturing affordable solar power systems to negate the need for reliance on inconsistent access to electricity from the national grid while providing an affordable, cost-effective alternative and the possibility of having unfettered access to clean energy on demand.

SALUBATA, Nigeria. A producer of recycled, low-cost plastic shoes benefitting people and the planet while turning a profit. SALUBATA's production methods offset over 40 million tonnes of CO2 emissions per annum while also contributing 6.6 million of their earnings to the cause of helping women every year.

Solar Freeze, Kenya. A developer of portable cold storage units powered by solar energy for rural smallholder farmers of perishable products. This technology directly benefits 3,000 smallholding farmers, 80% of whom are women who have accessed the Solar Freeze cold storage solutions that have reduced post-harvest loss by 95%.

ShortKode, Nigeria. Founded to combat the noticeable decline in student school performance in Nigeria due to poor teaching and low levels of support for students.

ShortKode aims to develop better teachers for better classes, help youths get out of unemployment and provide schools access to quality teachers by negating fees held by students after employment.

Sikadan Homes, Ghana. A poverty management firm using technology and financial innovation to provide affordable housing solutions to low-income populations in Ghana. This tailored solution offers renters a non-loan renting plan using sustainable revenue models to combat the requirement of advanced yearly rental payments.

PharmaServ, Nigeria. Created with the mission to trigger highperforming supply-chain functions, boost resilience, increase satisfaction and better position their customers to achieve their growth ambition. Through PharmaServ’s SaaS product, manual sales processes are streamlined and less labourintensive.

AfriTech XYZ

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Introducing the Racial Justice Index

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Since 2019 we have championed racial justice organisations across the UK, by focusing on: their financial sustainability increasing their networks and access, and providing them with the expertise they need to increase their influence and impact.

We've done this by: providing training programmes direct funding between £3k£40k, and co-producing evidence-based research that helps to contextualise their impact and develop a case for support that ensures their future sustainability.

The research we co-produce informs the development of initiatives and projects that we deliver to our community, grantees and potential grantees.

Racial Justice Index

Black-led organisations are overwhelmingly lived experience led. Through research conducted

by Centre Black, we've found that 97% of the 601 Black-led organisations surveyed say they have directly experienced the problem they are trying to solve.

and sustainable growth and development of Black-led impact organisations. We have made it our business to create direct solutions and influence key stakeholders to do the same by collaborating with us as we co-create a better system with our community.

As we all know, being a lived experience leader comes with its challenges. For our own Founder and Chief Executive’s experiences building Do it Now Now, as someone on benefits or any connections to funders, it was extremely difficult to get where we are today.

If you've ever been to the Do it Now Now website, you will have been greeted by these words, "the future needs us all". This statement is central to our organisation's philosophy and directly speaks to the reason for this article. As an organisation, we are committed to reducing the barriers racial justice organisations face when seeking funding from institutions such as trust and foundations, commissioners, government bodies and corporate funders. To create the future we want to see, each of us, on all sides of the table, must work together to determine the best solution for all.

Today, we are a 28-person team with the expertise and capacity to address the problems our Chief Executive was experiencing at the time of our founding. We now have the opportunity to significantly contribute to the evidence base that organisations like ours can use to support their own racial justice-based systems thinking.

Over the past couple of years, we have worked to identify the barriers that lead to negative outcomes for Black people and other people from Global majority backgrounds. For example, access to funding has been highlighted as the single most important barrier to the establishment,

To that end, we are introducing the Racial Justice Index, an independent measurement tool that will be accessible to organisations and funders alike.

This tool will allow grassroots organisations without the in-house expertise and fundraising talent to discover their opportunities for further development in the racial justice space and give them a stronger understanding of the racial justice theories they are applying to their work to better advocate for funding and commissioned work from local, regional and national funding bodies.

In a sector where we understand the importance of capacity building for grassroots organisations, very little support is provided in relation to the racial justice ambitions that many funders are particularly looking to support in the coming years. The Racial Justice Index and its accompanying assessment will empower funders and organisations to understand their work in an evidence-based context and deliver better interventions as a result.

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Funders have always grappled with the challenge of measuring the racial justice impact of their funding products. This tool will help them determine the impact of their funding on each organisation's ability to deliver racial justice within specific projects and at a core level too. In other words, the tool will measure not only the capacity of each organisation to deliver racial justice outcomes , benefitting an under-served racial group, but it will also be used to determine where organisations need to improve their capacity to deliver more impact on that front, at a single project level or across all activities within their organisation.

This is not the first time we have delivered something of this nature.

Towards the end of 2022 we began working with Impact on Urban Health as an intermediary grant-maker to deliver the Climate, Health and Community fund. This has been a great opportunity for us to build out an index focused entirely on the specific use case of Black and Brown-led grassroots organisations, in the Lambeth and Southwark area, that are working in the intersection of climate, health and community.

Racial Justice Index

As you can imagine, that is a much more niche use case than what we are introducing in this article, and we have been able to develop an assessment that is now populating an index on that topic that will provide clarity to decision-makers working on that fund.

One of the most difficult things for funders to measure is racial justice.

As a racial justice organisation, we have been grappling with the challenge of evidencing our impact beyond direct delivery into influencing and advocacy, and we know this is a similar concern for other organisations in our area.

While considering that work for our own sake, we began considering how we could support funders to understand our work and the work of other racial justice organisations as well.

There are three clear use cases for the Racial Justice Index and its accompanying Assessment. We look forward to reporting on the developments of this index in our next impact report.

Use case 1: constructive support to racial justice orgs. The assessments we develop will support the organisations in identifying their strengths and weaknesses across key pillars relative to their sustained ability to deliver racial justice as an outcome.

Use case 2: specialist support from funders that have placed racial justice as a key to their mandate. Within that context, it would be valuable to have potential grantees undertake this assessment with lived experience experts and racial justice practitioners as a way to support the grants panel to make a decision when it comes to the racial justice element of the work that funding is being sought for.

Use case 3: rate the overall funding portfolio annually. Use the assessment on a sample of grantees to evaluate the overall quality of racial justice work that is being delivered across a funder’s portfolio. For example, if a funder’s grantees had an average index score of 3 out of 5 in 2024, that number could be compared to the average index score in 2025, which may be higher depending on the interventions applied by the funder.

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DiNN Vision To be the Black community’s foremost champion enabling the systemic development and co-production of equitable opportunities and outcomes for Black people.

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How we are fortifying the Black community through a Global Recession In 2008 our world was rocked by a financial shift; some argue our global economy has never truly recovered. What remains true then and now is that the Black community is disproportionately affected when these seismic shifts in our economic landscape occur.

Over the past three years, the Black community has endured extremely tough times, and it seems they will continue until 2025. Scholars of the phenomenon say the Recession will last a year, and the GDP will fall by 2%. Worse still, they expect unemployment to increase to 4.9% by Q4 of 2023 and 6.4% by the end of 2025.

Inflation and the cost of living crisis have already negatively impacted our community. The impact sector has seen a dramatic rise in the need for our services.

Simultaneously we have found a significant reduction in the amount of funding available, even more so when seeking grant funding for racial justice organisations like ours, Black-led and Black-focused (compared to the highs of Summer 2020).

Still, we must work to curb the effects of this shifting ground while continuing to support the people in our community who need it most.

Supporting our Service Users Over the years, the initiatives we have built deliberately tackle people's essential social mobility needs when a financial crisis hits.

The skills we develop are: Financial Literacy Impact based Entrepreneurship Employability

In addition, we are a grant-funder supporting our community of Black-led and Black-focused charities and social enterprises across the UK to weather the financial storm and build in the markers of sustainability to ensure the long-term impact of their organisations. In an ever-changing landscape, the needs will also change exponentially. In 2021 we began investing in our capacity to deliver high-quality research on the topics that concern our community, and that investment will be of utmost importance in this context.

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Through this crisis, we will ensure that we understand the specific needs of the Black community in its specificity. We are doubling down on our position as the Champion of the Black community by working closely with them to co-design each of our services to ensure we fit for purpose.

Ensuring our Sustainability As a social enterprise dependent on a pressurised grant funding sector for our income, we spent much of 2022 contemplating the impact of a Recession on our ability to deliver our services continuously to 2026. In these stringent years, Do it Now Now will focus on the following:

Maintaining our position as a Champion of the Black community by focusing more of our capacity on systems influencing Adjusting long-term budgets to be resilient, focusing on maintaining our existing slate of services at their current capacity Increasing flexibility to manage rapid and slow changes by building multiple PESTLEbased scenarios that support our strategic planning Fortifying our team so that we are more dynamic in our ability to adjust to changes and needs Though capacity is lacking, we encourage other organisational leaders serving the Black community to do the same groundwork to best position themselves and their teams for overall resilience and to mitigate the negative impact of the coming Recession.

Global Recession

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We need you in 2023 - 2024

We cannot afford to sit back.

It is time to act. It is time to do something about the issues that we face in our communities and in our world.

We cannot afford to sit back and wait for someone else to fix these problems. We cannot wait for politicians or corporations to take action on our behalf. It is up to us, the individuals, the citizens, the community leaders, to make a difference.

Every day, we are bombarded with news of inequality, injustice, and environmental degradation. We see people suffering, and we know that there are solutions to their problems, but for some reason, nothing seems to change.

DiNN was founded on the principle that action speaks louder than words. We believe that every one of us has the power to make a positive impact, and that if we work together, we can create real change.

We believe the time is now.

We are not afraid.

We are not afraid to tackle tough issues, whether it's fighting for racial justice, supporting small businesses, or protecting the environment. We know that these problems are complex, but we also know that they are not insurmountable.

We are a team of doers, not talkers.

We roll up our sleeves and get to work, and we don't stop until we see results. And we want you to join us.

Together, we can make a difference. We can create a world where everyone has equal opportunities, where businesses thrive, and where our planet is healthy and sustainable. But we cannot do it alone.

So we implore you, our fellow community leaders, to take action.

Join us in our mission to create positive change. Let us be the change that we wish to see in the world.

Let us do it now, and let us do it together. Thank you.

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ENGAGE

CONNECT

SUPPORT

Are you a Black person seeking support?

Have access to resources you think could help our mission?

Are you wondering how can you contribute?

Check out our initiatives' overview to see what we have to offer.

Get in touch with us so we can figure out how we can work together.

Donate to our organisation to ensure the future sustainability of our important work.

We need you

THANK YOU

Follow us @dinnhq @dinnhq

Contact us team@doitnownow.com

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