Leading safe cultures

Following revelations over recent years about the sexual exploitation and abuse of beneficiaries within the international aid sector, as well as reports of abusive organisational cultures within this sector and more widely, there has been a rise in public, political and sectoral concern about the possibility of misconduct taking place within charities in England and Wales, including bullying behaviour.

In response, government, the Charity Commission and umbrella organisations have initiated urgent work to address immediate safeguarding challenges as well as to prepare for longer term developmental and awareness raising activity to strengthen the health of charity workplace cultures. As a result, charities in England and Wales are now undergoing a process of significant revaluation – of values, systems and organisational cultures.

Research and reports:

• In August 2021, we launched a project together with NCVO and led by Becky Hewitt, about flexible working. The final report, ‘Time to Flex’, was published on February 2022. 
• In November 2020 with Mental Health First Aid England we released the ‘Workforce wellbeing in charities‘ report.
• In February 2019 ACEVO and the Centre for Mental Health received a grant from DCMS [Grant offer letter, Annex 1 project expenditure] to research bullying in the charity sector workplace. In June 2019 we released the ‘In plain sight: workplace bullying in charities and the implications for leadership‘.
• In July 2018 we released ‘Leading with values: creating a safe organisational culture‘. This report was part of a cross-sector tiered project, led by ACEVO and NCVO covering leadership and culture respectively.

Our research is part of a wider domestic and international programme of work on safeguarding. You can download a summary of the activity that has taken place, what is due next and links to new guidance by downloading the following document: Safeguarding programme update.

You can read ACEVO’s harassment and bullying policy, and the job descriptions for our wellbeing trustee and senior leader.