In a sector built on service and solidarity, it’s striking how many decisions are still made at the top. But this week, Matt Hyde, CEO of Lloyds Bank Foundation, issued a bold challenge to the UK’s largest charities: change how you work or risk becoming irrelevant.
Speaking at a Civil Society Futures conference, Hyde argued that large organisations are increasingly disconnected from the communities they serve. Top-down structures, corporate-style management, and risk-averse governance are stifling innovation, and more importantly, stifling the very people at the heart of the work.
At the core of his message? Shift the power.
“The future belongs to charities that are rooted in relationships and led by communities,” Hyde said.
What does that mean in practice?
This isn’t just about being ‘community-friendly’. It’s about fundamentally rethinking how decisions are made, how programmes are designed, and how resources are distributed. It means:
- Handing decision-making power to local leaders and lived experience experts.
- Moving away from restrictive KPIs and outputs toward trust-based, long-term goals.
- Embedding co-production and listening at every level of strategy.
Put simply: less command-and-control, more trust and collaboration.
For large charities accustomed to boardroom planning and centralised control, this shift isn’t small. It’s structural. But it’s also essential.
Why this matters for funders, and funding seekers
Here’s where this conversation hits especially close to home for us at Fundin: the funding landscape is already changing. Funders are increasingly drawn to organisations that can demonstrate:
- Deep, active relationships with local communities.
- Evidence of participatory decision-making.
- A willingness to share, or even surrender, power.
This is part of the wider movement toward trust-based philanthropy, where funders recognise that the best solutions are often hyper-local, deeply relational, and not easily captured in a spreadsheet.
We see this play out every day. Our clients who secure the most competitive grants are those who:
- Involve communities from day one of programme design.
- Use plain language to articulate community needs.
- Build applications around what the community asks for, not just what looks good on paper.
The funders notice. And they respond.
But what if you’re a large charity?
This doesn’t mean abandoning infrastructure or throwing out every operational process. Large charities still play a vital role in the sector, they bring scale, networks, and stability. But the future will favour those who:
- Share power with grassroots groups and frontline workers.
- Decentralise funding decisions wherever possible.
- Rethink monitoring to focus on learning, not compliance.
As Matt Hyde put it, charities must “resist the gravitational pull of centralisation.” That doesn’t mean chaos, it means flexibility, humility, and authentic partnership.
Fundin’s takeaway
The message is clear: funders want to see community voice at the centre, not the periphery.
Whether you’re a small grassroots organisation or a national charity with hundreds of staff, now is the time to ask:
- Are we building with or for communities?
- Are our funding applications just polished documents, or reflections of real, lived experience?
- Are we willing to let go of control, to gain real connection?
Power-sharing isn’t just a moral imperative. Increasingly, it’s a funding one too…
