Our Leading with Hope strategy marks an exciting evolution in our approach - from national and Southeast regional grant-making to deeply rooted, place-based investment in three communities: Portsmouth, London, and Birmingham.
In each place, we are listening deeply to young people, communities and local partners to resource welcoming physical spaces - community-led hubs for young changemakers. We’ll also invest in the local organisations and networks surrounding them, strengthening the wider ecosystem so youth-led change can truly thrive.
Over time, we will support communities and young people to play a leading role in how our assets are used and governed, building approaches rooted in community stewardship and democratic governance. This is about enabling young people, in place and alongside their wider communities, to shape decisions, grow their agency, and create lasting change.
As this work unfolds, we’ll share what we learn so this approach can help inspire others to consider aligned approached.
In early 2025 we commissioned research to help us guide the decision of where to focus our efforts. This research, conducted by Clearview, identified a longlist of local authority areas that would provide fertile ground for our intentions of community wealth building, an approach that creates a resilient and inclusive economy for the benefit of the local area, ensuring that economic value is held and reinvested locally, with young people at the centre. The longlist identified cities with a high density of young people, high levels of poverty and deep-rooted inequality, and where the youth sector needed support, but also held enough infrastructure for us to be able to work alongside active partners.
From the longlist, we consulted widely with colleagues across the funding sector to place our work within national context. We also looked closely at opportunity, need and existing relationships. This included where we already have partnerships, long‑standing connections, and a practical ability to support work on the ground.
This strategy builds on how our thinking and approach have evolved over time.
Over the past few years, we’ve explored how our assets can better support our mission - including developing ethical investment approaches, co-founding the ESG Olympics, and more recently the Endowments Investment Challenge. Through this work, we’ve learned that there are more ways to further our charitable aims when we focus less on maximising financial return alone, and more on how our resources can actively create impact.
As a result, we are aligning all our assets more closely with our purpose. Over the next decade, we will focus on supporting young people and their wider communities in Birmingham, London and Portsmouth, using most of our assets in ways that directly advance our charitable mission.In practice, this means resourcing community spaces - including buildings that can act as hubsfor young changemakers and their wider communities - alongside the wider local infrastructure around them, and supporting young people and communities to help shape how these resources are used over time. We want these to become rooted in community stewardship, so they continue to benefit young people well into the future.
At its heart, this is about making sure everything we have is working towards our mission - creating lasting benefit for young people and contributing to a fairer and more hopeful future.
In our three focus areas, we will support buildings where young people and their wider communities can come together - spaces that can act as a hub for young changemakers. These will be shaped by local young people and communities, so the activities that happen there will reflect what is needed and wanted in each place. This could include space for social enterprise, creative activity, advice and guidance, and much more.
We see these spaces not just as buildings, but as part of a wider approach to building strong local infrastructure around young people. Over time, we want them to become financially resilient, locally accountable, and rooted in community stewardship, so they continue to support young people into the future.
This work is inspired by the principles of community wealth building - practical ways to ensure that assets, skills, employment and investment create lasting benefit in the places they are intended to serve. Through this approach, we aim to strengthen local youth leadership, capacity and opportunity for young people and their communities to drive positive change in their communities for generations to come.
The strategy is rooted in years of listening to young people, not a single consultation exercise. Our approach has been shaped through long-term trusting relationships with young people and those who support them.
What you see in the new strategy reflects the solutions, priorities and insights young people have consistently shared with us over time. Their input has shaped not just this document, but our wider culture and way of working.
Yes, but grants will increasingly align with our new strategy - supporting youth-led initiatives, organisations supporting young people and youth hubs in our three focus areas. Our approach will be co-created with local partners and young people. We don’t currently have any grant programmes open to application. Eventually, we anticipate that our traditional grant-making strategy may transition entirely as resources shift into permanent local property and community investments in Portsmouth, London and Birmingham. This is a gradual, long-term goal over the next 10-years,. Any evolution of our funding model will be carefully managed by our trustees to protect our charitable aims and support partner readiness.