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In this episode of all about business, James speaks to Alex Day, Managing Director of Big Give. Alex explains how his small team of ten has managed to raise hundreds of millions of pounds for charity. They also discuss how technology is transforming the charity sector, why philanthropy is good for business, and the psychology behind giving money away.
Alex Day is Director of Social Impact at Reed and Managing Director of the Big Give, the UK’s biggest match funding charity.
Every year, Big Give runs a variety of match funding campaigns, including the Green Match Fund, Kind2Mind and the Christmas Challenge. Since 2008, they’ve raised over £300 million for charities all over the world.
02:31- how big give's match funding works
03:38- the psychology behind match funding
05:38- campaigns and themes of Big Give
08:18- digital transformation in charity fundraising
12:53- running a lean and effective team
16:37- engaging big figures in philanthropy
23:42- identifying your passion for a cause
25:16- setting ambitious goals
27:37- the importance of ambition in social impact
29:26- supporting smaller charities
30:50- innovative match funding strategies
31:59- the contagious nature of generosity
32:32- the Christmas Challenge campaign
34:18- philanthropy in business
37:18- the philco model
41:33- quickfire round
43:38- conclusion and final thoughts
Follow the Big Give on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/big-give/
Visit the Big Give website: https://donate.biggive.org/
See what difference you can make: Big Give #ChristmasChallenge 2024 Campaign Video
Double the difference this Christmas: https://biggive.org/christmas-challenge/
Follow James Reed on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/chairmanjames/
All about business is brought to you by Reed Global. Learn more at: www.reed.com
This podcast was co-produced by Reed Global and Flamingo Media. If you’d like to create a chart-topping podcast, visit Flamingo-media.co.uk
[00:00:00] Alex: We've raised over 300 million pounds, uh, for thousands of good causes. Comrade Kralij, they're raising sort of similar amounts of money to us each year, but employ sort of 150 staff. We're doing it on, on ten. Uh, yeah, I like that. Everything that we do is, is in campaigns, and it's trending on social media, celebrities want to be involved, we get press coverage.
You are what I would call a field tech pioneer. We've got a really fantastic collaborative team. Last Christmas, particularly given the sort of economic climate that we were in, we weren't sure how well it was going to do. And I think we thought we might sneak 30 million. You'd
[00:00:38] James: increase the target to 30 million.
Right, exactly. Oh, wow. Yeah. So we smashed it. The other thing that you've done is connect with sort of big figures in business. You've managed to secure their support and funding. How do you win them over?
Welcome to All About Business with me, James Reid, the [00:01:00] podcast that covers everything about business, management, and leadership. Every episode, I sit down with different guests of bootstrap companies, masterminded investment models who built a business empire. They're leaders in their field, and they're here to give you top investment advice.
I'm often asked by small business owners and entrepreneurs how they can grow when they have such small teams. With so much to do and so few resources, it can seem impossible to take the business to the next level. So how do they do this without adding and hiring more employees than they can afford?
Joining me today on All About Business is Alex Day. He's the director of Big Give, the UK's biggest match funding platform, which raises millions for charity every year. Alex has garnered [00:02:00] the support of some big names, including Leonardo DiCaprio, Dame Judi Dench, and Stephen Fry, with a team of just ten people.
That's why he's the perfect person to talk to us about raising millions in funding, even when you have a small team.
Alex, very good to see you. Thank you for joining me today. You're the managing director of the charity platform, The Big Give. It's described as a match funding platform. What's the big idea behind the Big Give? How does it work? Because you've raised phenomenal amounts of money in pretty short periods of time.
And I think it's something that could be a very exciting model for other people in other walks of life, but also people who want to get involved in supporting charities. So how does it work? What is the, what's the big idea?
[00:02:49] Alex: Yeah, so the big idea is about doubling the difference that people can make. And we talk about our audiences in three groups.
So firstly, we work with match funders that we call champions. So traditionally that's trust and [00:03:00] foundations. Philanthropists, companies, government. Second audience is our charity partners. They're the ones that raise money on the platform. And the third is the sort of donating public who are giving their tens, fifty, a hundred pounds on the platform.
And the model and the idea is quite simple, is that when the public give to a charity on the Big Give platform, our match funding champions will double that donation. So your ten pounds becomes twenty pounds, fifty pounds becomes a hundred pounds. And it's a model that's proven really successful. So as you said, sort of since 2008, we've raised over 300 million pounds, uh, for thousands of good causes.
And it's a model that just continues to, to grow and culminate in, in a lot of good things happening, uh, for, for good causes.
[00:03:38] James: So what is it about doubling the differences? So what's the psychology here? So why do people come through the big give when maybe they wouldn't, wouldn't bother otherwise, or how do you sort of connect?
I mean, cause that's clearly what's happening. Yeah. And It's interesting that people seem to prefer to make donations in this way. So what are the real key ingredients?
[00:03:57] Alex: Yeah, I think the I think the really [00:04:00] interesting thing we commissioned some research back in 2016 and as a as part of that research we said we surveyed over a thousand people And the sort of key finding from that was that more people give and people give more when their donations are matched.
So that really plays into the psychology. It's a bit like a buy one get one free offer in the supermarket. The supermarkets do that for a reason. They know it's going to be a compelling way to attract people to buy that product. And that's the same for our match funding idea.
[00:04:26] James: So you're literally saying, you know, if you give 50 quid, I'll give 50 quid.
Absolutely. And you've set it up to work in that way digitally. I can see why that's appealing and more likely to give 50 quid if someone else is doing the same. Absolutely. But it goes beyond that, doesn't it? Because you've made it more sophisticated for big donors and philanthropist corporations where they can multiply their money four or five times.
Can you just tell me quickly how that works?
[00:04:46] Alex: Yeah, for our match funders, we use a variety of sort of match funding models. Our most successful model is, uh, is called a pledge model where the charities themselves also have to source some of the match funding. So if we have a champion [00:05:00] who's, let's say, a trust and foundation that's putting in a hundred grand, They will support a portfolio of charities, um, who have also sourced 100, 000 worth of match funding themselves.
There's 200, 000 in the match funding pot, and when the public come to give to those charities in one of our campaigns, that 200, 000 is matched to become 400, 000. So, and often it's a lot more when you factor in gift aid and unmatched donations. So for that trust who's putting in 100k, they've helped leverage 400k of sort of value.
So that's very
[00:05:28] James: exciting if you're a philanthropist or someone who's made some money and wants to give something to charity. Yeah. That's a good way of doing it, because you're increasing your leverage, your impact. by going through the big give and it's not you're not giving to the big give you're giving through the big give that's exactly so tell me about some of the charities that you'd find on the platform what have we got going on
[00:05:46] Alex: yeah so all everything that we do in the big give is through our campaigns um and we run a number of campaigns throughout the year our biggest and most successful campaign is called the christmas challenge that last year raised 33 million pounds in a week for over [00:06:00] a thousand charities and that is a cause neutral campaign so we support Everything from household charity names like the Prince's Trust or Friends of the Earth, all the way down to very small grassroots charities across, across the UK, um, and everything in between.
I think one thing that we're really proud of at the Big Give is that, um, despite supporting some of these sort of larger charities, the median turnover of charities that we support is around the half a million pound mark. So yes, we do support the big sort of charity names, but the long tail of charities that we support are these sort of small to medium sized organizations.
So Christmas Challenge, Cause Neutral, really wide variety of charities taking part in that. Um, we also run themed campaigns throughout the year and we took this decision sort of four or five years ago. We knew that we had this model of match funding that was working really well and we asked ourselves the question as an organization, you know, how can we apply this to areas where A, we know there's interest from our philanthropic community in doing more in this space And [00:07:00] secondly, sort of where is there a need to raise more philanthropic capital?
And some of the themes that came out from that discussion was the environment, uh, women and girls, mental health, um, and arts. Sectors that have been really under the cosh in recent years, but ones that we know there's a, there's sort of a telling need, uh, to raise more money. So, uh, we run those themed campaigns.
We also have the ability to spin up emergency campaigns whenever there's a sort of domestic or international crises as well. So we We can quickly, in an agile fashion, respond to things that are happening around the world. So it's a, it's a really broad range of themes, and I think that's part of the attraction of the Big Give for our donors is that there is something for everyone.
So whatever injustice you're passionate about, whatever cause you care about, there will be something for you, um, on the Big Give.
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That's fantastic. And I know the green campaign has really grown. Yeah. Forgive the pun. Yeah. And that, um, you know, you have big ambitions for that going out to the future because we've, you know, so much concern in the world at the moment about what's happening to the planet. Yeah. So, um, I wish you well with that.
Thank you. One of the things I observe is Big Give is very different to some other previous big charity campaigns. I'm thinking of Comic Relief or the BBC's Children in Need, um, which have relied on, let's call it old media. Um, you're the Big Give, you're really digital first. What's the sort of difference and why do you think that's a better approach?
[00:08:44] Alex: I mean, we've got huge admiration for Comic Relief and Children Leap going for sort of a number of years and what they've achieved in that time. But if you look at the sort of impact that they've had in recent years, you can see sort of a decline in what they're able to achieve and move away from that sort of more traditional [00:09:00] telethon model.
I think the fact that we were sort of founded in the mid 2000s at the time where digital was really sort of taking off and, you know, your father identified that sort of gap in the market is that at that time. The read online part of the business was really growing, a place where job seekers and employers could matchmake online.
Um, applying that to philanthropy, uh, was a really smart move. So, um, applying that sort of model of matchmaking philanthropists and charities, um, was really the sort of genesis of the Big Give. And I think that sort of digital approach has served us really well. It's, it was great foresight by Cyrillic in terms of thinking that that would be a great place to position the Big Give.
Um, but I think it's served us particularly well over the last few years, if you think about the COVID pandemic. That accelerated everything digital. The way that we shop, the way that we bank, the way that we live our lives, sort of accelerated in terms of digital fashion. So we've seen sort of exponential growth since the pandemic.
We've seen a sort of higher rate of growth on the Big Give because we were [00:10:00] positioned to be a sort of digital offering for our charity partners. I
[00:10:02] James: mean, it's So easy to give now. I mean, I've been giving through the Big Give for a long time, but you can do it from your phone on Apple Pay and it takes no time at all.
So it must have become an easier experience for the public or people who want to make a donation through this channel. Yeah, absolutely. That's what we hear. And it's also, I imagine, easier to find the charities you want to support.
[00:10:23] Alex: Yeah, and I mean, that's also, I suppose, a key difference between the Big Give and other sort of more traditional fundraising campaigns or models.
is that we have a choice for our donors to give to charities that, as we mentioned earlier, charities that really inspire or, uh, inspire them or that they're passionate about. Whereas, you know, Comic Relief is you give to a single charity and then they distribute money. Um, this is kind of a new model where we're giving, putting the power in the hands of the donors to have that choice.
Which
[00:10:52] James: is good, huh? I find myself making a nuisance of myself sometimes at tube stations when someone's rattling a can, or trying to sign you up for a charity, saying, you should [00:11:00] get on the Big Give, and I'm trying to reverse the sale. Yeah. Because, I mean, the other great thing is it, it's It's viral, isn't it?
And you've been able to get organizations to promote themselves, and with it, the Big Give. Yeah. Very effectively. Mm. And partly using sort of celebrity endorsement. Absolutely. How does that work?
[00:11:18] Alex: Yeah, so I think that the power of the Big Give is in bringing people together at a moment in time that makes sense.
And the power of the Big Give is, you know, that classic adage of the sum is greater than the individual part. So all of everything that we do at the Big Give is through campaigns. Um, and so bringing charities together at a moment in time and going out to the public and saying anything that you give to this charity, uh, or a charity during this week will be, will be matched.
And we do that in times of the year that make sense, so our environmental campaign, which you mentioned, we launched that on World Earth Day. So on World Earth Day, the 250 charities that are taking part in our green campaign, [00:12:00] you know, they could be doing their own thing, they could be going out to their audiences and saying, you know, look at us, aren't we great, look at the impact that we're achieving.
But the fact that they're all talking about being part of a singular campaign collectively creates a lot more noise. As a result of that, you know, it's trending on social media, celebrities want to be involved, we get press coverage, and as a result of that, we get more passing trade traffic coming to the Big Give.
So for our charity partners, it's a really effective way for them to meet new people, to connect with new audiences, to gain new supporters, and that's a real value add, not just the pounds and pence raised through the Big Give, but the sort of connections that they can make through our campaigns.
[00:12:39] James: There's a really interesting message to business in that, by doing things together, you can achieve more often than just being competitive, which is, um, I think they call it co op petition, which I think is an interesting model.
You run a tight ship, you have nine colleagues, I mean, many people are amazed that you're able to [00:13:00] raise, what, over 300 million since 2008, with ten or fewer people. Yeah. How does that work? I mean, because we keep, a lot of people were worried about doing the charity because they think they're overstaffed, lots of people on salaries, uh, yeah, but the big is different in that respect.
How have you managed to keep it so lean?
[00:13:18] Alex: Yeah, that's a good question. I think there's probably three things in that. I think the first team, first thing is the team itself is really strong, and I think I would much rather have a team of nine highly competent, highly motivated colleagues rather than a sort of team of 30 average.
Um, and so we, we recruit well and we've got a really fantastic collaborative team. I think the second thing is sort of leveraging the power of our networks. So, you know, we have a great relationship with the read business. And as a result of that, we get sort of free office, uh, free office space and sort of back office support.
So as a charity, that's a really, um, excellent thing for, for us to have and sort of reduces our, our overheads. The third thing is the technology that we've built. As you [00:14:00] mentioned earlier, you know, Big Give is a, is a digital platform, is a digital offering. And as a result of that, we can, um, we can automate a lot of the process and make things as efficient and as effective as, as possible.
Um, you know, we are a charity. We are a registered charity, but we're also running a tech platform, which is quite unique, I think, in the charity sector. And so I think we've been able to see gains. from having that digital experience in house with our sort of development team. So I think those are probably the three things, James, that sort of helps us to be that effective, excellent team, power of our networks and friends that we have, um, and the fantastic technology that we've, we've built.
[00:14:38] James: So, the two things I want to follow up on that really, I mean, you are what I would call a Phil tech pioneer, I mean, and there are many, but when I say Phil tech, I mean philanthropy technology. This is applying technology that's widely used commercially into the philanthropy space. You've done that, dare I say it, brilliantly because you're able to run this wonderful platform, so few [00:15:00] people.
And you said that you recruit great people, now, that's easy to say and in my experience it's hard to do. Yeah. What do you look for in those people?
[00:15:10] Alex: That's a good question. I mean, I think for us, because we're a purpose driven company, our purpose is about doubling the difference. And we are on a daily basis sort of having a demonstrable social impact with our sort of partners.
You know, we see that people are attracted to that and people want to be a part of that. And so having a really strong purpose and values as well as an organization is something that we really sort of test in the recruitment process. But that's about
[00:15:34] James: you. I mean, what is it about them that you're looking for?
[00:15:37] Alex: Right. I think most, the most sort of attractive proposition for me as a leader when I'm sort of bringing people into the team is a desire to to learn and work hard. And I think that learning particularly is sort of what I've seen sets people apart, really keen to grow better themselves, not just sort of be complacent with where they're at, but sort of that [00:16:00] ambition to, you know, as cliche as it sounds, be the best version of themselves, um, and that hunger to to sort of grow.
And I think we can support that at the Big Give despite being, you know, a small team, there's not sort of a natural goal. You know, necessarily a sort of career path upwards, up the chain. But what we do do is really sort of value, um, the, the people that work for us and sort of create an environment where they can learn and grow, make a role their own, and sort of run with what they're passionate about, and what they're sort of keen to, to invest more in.
[00:16:30] James: I mean, one of the great things about being in a small team is you can see the impact of your work. Absolutely. And I think that's obviously rewarding to people. So the other thing that you've done, I think brilliantly, is connect with, sort of, Big figures in business, in philanthropy, um, you know, senior people, and not only connect with them, but you've managed to secure their support and funding.
And a lot of the people in business are interested in that. Yeah. How do you reach out to people, win their [00:17:00] trust, um, get them on board in a way that, um, that, um, works because, you know, they're fundamental. I mean, these champions, as you call them, are fundamental to the success of the campaigns and to the growth of the big key.
Yeah. How do you win them over?
[00:17:14] Alex: Yeah. I mean, I think there's probably a few things in that. I think, firstly, you know, success breeds success. And I think the fact that we have been able to grow, particularly over the last few years, quite, quite significantly, has meant that we are now in a position where We're getting people coming to us saying, how can we work
[00:17:32] James: for you?
Let's roll that back though. Right at the beginning when no one knew who the hell you were. Yeah. Just starting out. Yeah. I mean, you've been with a big give how long? 10 years. 10 years. So 10 years ago was a different picture. Absolutely. What did you do? I mean, how did you get that ball rolling?
[00:17:45] Alex: I think it's being really clear about your value proposition for, you know, I talked about the three audiences that we have, our champions, our charities, and the public.
For each of those audience, me and the rest of the team are very clear on what the value proposition is, what we can [00:18:00] offer people, what we can offer those. So I'm a potential champion. Yeah. Why would I choose to work for the big game? Yeah, so we've got a few sort of things that we talk about and we sort of work a lot on trying to understand the audience.
The people that we have sort of conversations and relationships with, but there are a few sort of levers that we can pull in terms of discussion. Pull some for me, yeah. So the first is our multiplication effect, so the model that we talked about, there's sort of four times, five times multiplier, that is attractive for a lot of people.
The fact that you can put in, 1 and get 4, 5 return for the charities that you care about most. That's, that's a really important thing. The second thing is we're helping build sustainability into our charity partners. So we're not just giving them access to funds, we're giving them access to training. So all of our charities that take part in that campaigns have access to free training resources.
So we're building sustainability into the organizations, even if they only take part in one of our campaigns. We, we see that charities come off the back of our campaigns, more [00:19:00] confident about doing campaign planning, fundraising in future. So we're building sustainability. And the third is really being part of a community.
So we bring our champions together, we connect them with like minded people. We can sort of give them publicity if they want. So we have sort of a lot of PR that goes on around our campaigns. And if our, if our corporates, for example, are quite keen to sort of put their brand out there and align it with a big give campaign, we can offer that as well.
So. Yeah, the sort of multiplier, the sustainability, and the community are the sort of three things that we talk about with our, with our champions.
[00:19:33] James: How do you make sure that they stay? I mean, what's the sort of The retention rates. Yeah, yeah, how does that work? And what's, what's the play in play there?
[00:19:42] Alex: I think, I mean, our experience, pleasingly, has been very high retention rates amongst our champion partners.
And I think they see the value, having sort of been in it and taste it. And sometimes, um, You know, sometimes one of the hurdles that we have to overcome sometimes is sort of explaining [00:20:00] this match funding thing. It's not a, you know, it's not a commonly sort of understood concept. Um, so that sometimes provides a bit of a hurdle to get people through.
Yeah, but once they understand. And once they understand it, once they see it, once they hear back from the charity partners that are taking part in the campaign, around not only the difference that the pounds raised and the match funding has enabled them to achieve, You know, whether it's researching cancer or, um, feeding children or making sure that older people aren't lonely, whatever impact they're creating, not just that, but the impact that taking part in the Big Give campaign has had on them as an organization, it helped us collaborate better as a team, it helped us connect with new supporters, it helped us build our confidence in, in fundraising.
So. Hearing the impact back, you know, has a, has a big role to play in terms, in terms of keeping up. So a
[00:20:49] James: lot of your job is in fact communications. Right. You have to be a good communicator. I hope so. I mean, clearly, I mean, because you've got to communicate with the charities, you've got to communicate with the [00:21:00] champions, and ultimately with the public.
Right. And everyone's going to have to want to get involved. Yeah, yeah. So communications is a very important skill. Absolutely. Absolutely. In that respect, what sort of problems have you encountered? I mean, what would stop someone becoming a champion? What's the sort of It's a good question. You don't know that every sales
[00:21:22] Alex: pitch succeeds, does it?
No, absolutely. I think there are, you know, I think probably the biggest thing is what we've just sort of been talking about in terms of that sort of misunderstanding what match funding is about or perceiving that doing it through the Big Give is just sort of adding an extra layer in the step and it's sort of relinquishing control.
Um, where it's not, you know, in reality, that's not the case. We allow our champions to choose the charities that they want to support specifically, or the cause area that they want to support. For us, a few hurdles that we need to get over, in terms of, simplifying the message or ensuring that it's, it's well understood.
And, you know, that journey of communications isn't, it's, it's never [00:22:00] solved. It's never, you know, we, we've sussed this and we've nailed the message. We're constantly iterating and refining our, our sort of messaging and learning what works or what doesn't work. Um, so yeah, that's sort of a never ending journey, I don't think, for the big I think,
[00:22:14] James: for me, one of the things I like about it is you're solving a potential donor's problem.
If they've decided they want to give some money to a good cause, and they want to support green charities, and they want to do something for children, education, whatever it is, you've given them a way of doing that that is, I would say, super efficient. Because not only does the donation get multiplied four or five times if they do it in the right way, But it also, you do due diligence on the charity, so that they know that they're bona fide in places like that.
But the third thing I've heard people say is that it sort of makes their giving much more efficient. Um, because they don't have all the administration around it, they can just do it all through the big give. Um, and also, and it won't surprise you, people don't like being asked for money very much, do they?
[00:23:00] Yeah, absolutely. Guilty myself.
[00:23:01] Alex: Yeah.
[00:23:02] James: And so it's great to be able to say, Thank you. Well, I give it all through the big gift because when I do that, it's multiplied four times. So those are sort of messages I imagine
[00:23:12] Alex: land a bit with some of these people. Absolutely. I was talking to one of our sort of champions the other day and you know, the, the sort of the rationale for them as a, they were a foundation, you know, the rationale for them is how easy we make it for them.
And actually, you know, giving money away sounds like a, a fun and easy thing to do. But if you speak to sort of people who are holding wealth. It's not, and it's difficult and it's challenging and it's burdensome. Um, and so I think as you, you know, you rightly said, yeah, a
[00:23:39] James: lot of people would be surprised by that, right?
I mean, why is it difficult to give money away, Alex?
[00:23:42] Alex: Well, I mean, I think it's, it's, I I guess it's around, you know, if you, if you are passionate about a specific thing, firstly, have you identified what that thing is? And my hypothesis is whether someone has taken the time to consider it or not, there will be one.
Cause at least [00:24:00] one cause. That people feel passionate about whether they've sort of given time and space to sort of consider that Um, so as I said, you know, whether it's the fact that you know in the uk More than a million older people, uh go over a month without speaking to anyone whether it's child poverty So if you take an average class of 30 children in the uk Nine.
'cause
[00:24:22] James: I wanna support those older people. Right. What you are saying to me is hard to give the money away.
[00:24:26] Alex: Well, where would you go? Where, how would, I'm asking you that exactly Go, how would you, how would you, that's a big give. Help me with how would you start looking? Where would you go? The big Give has expertise of sort of identifying charity partners during doing the due diligence.
Identifying high impact charity partners that are working in sort of cause areas so we can help you to put a portfolio of charities together to say. You're interested in reducing isolation amongst old people. Um, we've got this portfolio of charities that we've vetted, done the due diligence on, and identified as good [00:25:00] organizations to support high impact.
Um, and not only can you support them, but you can sort of multiply the impact that you're having for those charities.
[00:25:08] James: So you're in a sense solving that problem for that donor. Yeah. Which is a really important, important thing to know. So the other, the other thing I've observed with the Big Give is you keep setting bigger and bigger goals.
Yeah. So you've got this target, this huge target of raising a billion for good causes by 2030, which is the biggest goal of all. Yeah. And you recently stepped up the goal for the Christmas challenge. Yeah. Got another one coming soon. Yeah. From 20 to 30 million. Um, this is a big step up. Yeah. And it reminded me of that business author Jim Collins, who wrote about big, hairy, audacious skulls, bee hags.
Yeah. This was years ago. Yeah. Um, but you're actually doing this. So what's behind, you know, a successful B Hack? Talk me through moving from 20 to 30. How do you do it, or why do you do it, and what happened?
[00:25:58] Alex: Yeah, I think, I mean, I think [00:26:00] first is, it's definitely sort of around timing and ensuring that The building box blocks are in place to, to sort of actually be able to sustain that.
So, you know, so
[00:26:09] James: you just go into the office and say to the 10 people who work with you, we are gonna go from 20 to 30 now and say, oh thanks Alex. Is that what happens?
[00:26:16] Alex: What do you mean the building blocks in place? So, I mean, if you think about our technology or our systems or our processes, you know, probably seven, eight years ago, we probably couldn't have been that ambitious and we did a big.
You know, technology change project back in 2018, 2019, which at the time was anyone who's lived through a big tech change process will know the pain that comes with that and it was painful for us at the time. It was, it was short term, um, stress and hardship, but we're sort of reaping the benefits from, from that now.
Um, so the sort of big investments in the, in the technology, in our processes and our system. So having those foundational building blocks to enable us to scale was sort of really key. I mean, I think the second thing is that [00:27:00] So if you were an analog thing,
[00:27:01] James: you would be increasing your capacity, basically.
[00:27:04] Alex: Yeah. But with digital, it's almost infinite. As we've touched upon earlier, you know, that question around, you know, why digital? And, and the sort of impact that that's had on us. It has enabled us to scale a lot more quickly than if we were, you know, I think, again, we've got massive admiration for, for Comic Relief.
They're raising sort of similar amounts of money to us each year, but employees of 150 staff. Yeah. Um, we're doing it on, on 10. So there is something to be said about sort of having this Something. I mean, if you're a business person, that's a kind of huge difference. Right.
[00:27:35] James: Massive. If you're running a company.
[00:27:37] Alex: Yeah. And I think the other thing, James, is that I think people really value ambition, especially when it comes to social impact, purposeful businesses like, like we are. You know, people look around and see the need in their communities, in the country, in the world. And, you know, not being ambitious, it's not enough.
Um, you know, if we were to sort of [00:28:00] say, well, we're going to go from 20 to 20. 1. Yeah, that that's not enough. There's not very inspiring. It's not very inspiring. I think people buy into the fact that we have ambitions and we've got confidence in our own product and our own ability to, to be able to deliver that.
So it's not just sort of picking numbers out of the air, you know, to, to come up with a sort of big, You know, a big number is actually we do have confidence that we can get that because we've got, yeah. It's not like
[00:28:24] James: you're running a boiler room with people hammering the phones. Right. Either, is it to get the numbers up.
Right. You're, you're doing it through intelligent use of tech. Yeah. And for And relationships. And good networks and relationships, which is very interesting. Yeah. Yeah. Read is proud to support the big give. If you would like to make a donation this Christmas and have it doubled, please visit big give.org.
All donations are doubled, which means you can make double the difference. When you think about the future, these sort of ever rising goals, does that daunt you?
[00:28:57] Alex: I mean, obviously as you, you know, you grow, [00:29:00] the, the sort of, um, the ability to grow gets harder and harder. Yeah, where's that
[00:29:05] James: journey going? I mean, because you can't go to infinity and beyond.
No,
[00:29:07] Alex: absolutely. I think, I mean, I think for us, it's about sort of continuing to look at particularly those thematic campaigns that we looked at and sort of stay attuned to. What our partners are saying about sort of areas of interest where they would like to grow more. So, yeah, we're having conversations at the moment amongst a group of stakeholders.
There's a real strong interest in doing more for, um, smaller charities in the UK. Um, if you look at sort of survival rates of charities. Unfortunately, because of the sort of climate over the last few years, a number of sort of small charities have sort of gone, um, gone under because they're, they're not,
[00:29:43] James: Well, there's going to be a sort of Darwinism involved in that, just like there is in business.
Some are going to be better run than others, some are going to be more relevant than others.
[00:29:50] Alex: Yeah, 100%. But I think there is a sort of, in the, in the charity sector is this sort of squeezed middle, where you've got this sort of very tiny organizations that have the, [00:30:00] You know, don't have the overhead and sort of can survive and you've got these sort of big players that have the Have the networks and the brand awareness to survive.
You've got these very often effective medium sized charities that don't have either of those two things and they are going under. And yeah, sadly, several of our charity partners over the course of the last 12 months even have, have sort of not been able to survive that despite having great impact. And, um, so, so I think there is that just going back to your question around, you know, how do we continue to grow?
Um, I think it's for us, it's about sort of staying attuned to where the areas of interest in giving are and where the need is. Um, but I also think it's about, you know, what we've really honed in on is being specialists in match funding. And I'm excited to see how we can apply that in different ways. So, for example, one thing that we are sort of considering and looking at the moment is, um, if you look at over the course of this last year or two with this [00:31:00] sort of cost of living crisis, understandably, a lot of people have cancelled their regular gifts to charities.
But as the economy seems to be stabilizing somewhat, um, We're considering doing a matched regular giving campaign to try and provide that incentive going back to what we know about match funding More people give people give more when their donations are matched Could we incentivize the first three months of a new regular gift to reverse that trend of people canceling direct regular gifts?
That's good idea. Yeah. And, and sort of, um, so
[00:31:28] James: bringing fresh thinking to the core idea. Absolutely. That's another way of Yeah. I like that expression. You know, when someone says, you know, someone should do something about this. Yeah. And then they think, well, I am. So, yeah. Yeah. You are actually doing something.
Yeah. And I suppose listening to you there, I was thinking, well, the needs aren't gonna disappear, are they? No. The needs of anything are gonna grow, unfortunately. So there's a, there's a sort of constant demand. Yeah. and what you're doing, I believe, is trying to find an efficient way of meeting at least some of those demands.
Yeah, yeah. Through very effective fundraising.
[00:31:58] Alex: Absolutely. [00:32:00] Yeah, and I mean, I think generosity is contagious, and I think, yeah, I think the Big Give has a role to play in the, in the UK, and you know, potentially wider field as well, in terms of, you know, making us more generous as a, as a society, as a, as a sort of nation.
And it is. You know, it is, as I said, it is contagious. Once you get a sort of taste of that, you can see and hear and experience the difference that it makes, as people just sort of come back and want to do more. So I think we just need to sort of hook more people in. Yeah,
[00:32:29] James: I like that. And I like the jeopardy involved with the Christmas challenge.
You only have one week to make your donation for it to be doubled. How does that work? Tell me about that because I like that.
[00:32:38] Alex: Yeah, so as I said earlier, everything that we do is, is in campaigns and what we, what we've tended to find and learn about over the last sort of decade that I've been around is that, um, you know, one to two weeks is about the sort of optimum time to run a campaign.
So you have that, you have that very sort of narrow window. Imagine if you got [00:33:00] sort of an email from your favorite charity saying, Great news, James. Anything that you give to us will be matched, but you've got three months to do it. It doesn't really provide that sort of urgency for you to, to give. So doing it in those sort of time limited windows, um, provides that sort of sense of urgency for people to get up and, uh, and do something.
Um, and it is really exciting during the week of the Christmas campaign. You see, you know, you get addicted to sort of, uh, clicking refresh and seeing what the latest total is. Um, and I, you know, I think it's fair to say that, last Christmas, you know, again, particularly given the sort of economic climate that we were in, we weren't sure how well it was going to do.
And I think, you know, we, between us as a, as a team, we thought we might sneak 30 million. You'd increase the target to 30 million. Right. Exactly.
[00:33:46] James: So we smashed it. We got 33 million. So congratulations. That's very good. Thank you. So what's the target this year? Oof. You're
[00:33:55] Alex: putting me on the spot there. And it's being recorded, so there's no There's no way of [00:34:00] getting past it.
I mean, I would love to see us go up to 40. That's a big, hairy, audacious goal, Alex. I wish you well. And I hope
[00:34:07] James: anyone listening to this will take note and visit thebiggive. org when the Christmas campaign starts because it's the wonderful way to make a donation which will be doubled while funds last.
Absolutely. So, Alex, this is a strategy that clearly works well in the world of philanthropy. Yeah. The old tech, philanthropy technology. Is it, is it a strategy that can be applied, do you think, in the business world?
[00:34:32] Alex: Yeah, I mean, I, I think it can. And I think, um, I, I think one thing that I'm sort of acutely aware of is my, my, understanding my hypothesis is that there are more and more sort of investors looking to align on values and purpose.
And of course you need to have a business and a model that is commercially successful. But I think where values really align is where people get excited. And I think, you know, if you think about [00:35:00] any sort of relationship that investor sort of business relationship is a, is a relationship. And I think if I, you know, reflect on my marriage, for example, like I've been married 14 years now.
And why is that, why have we lasted that long? I think it's because we align on sort of fundamental things about what we believe in our own lives and how we see the world and world views. And of course we have disagreements and we think differently sometimes. Um, but I think the fundamental values are the same.
Four values at the Big Give, together, trustworthy, purposeful and generous. And I think that, you know, when we comes to our sort of relationships with our, Uh, team with our partners, with our stakeholders, those values have sort of really alive for us and something that we test and make decisions against.
So
[00:35:43] James: suppose your values are aligned. So what you're saying is it's about trust. Yeah. And about relationships.
[00:35:49] Alex: Yeah. And I believe sort of from from an investment perspective, I think more and more people, particularly the sort of next generation of philanthropists, investors are wanting to [00:36:00] align on. Purpose and values, not necessarily just commercial success, although you obviously cannot forget that.
[00:36:07] James: But I don't think they're separate. I mean, commercial success for me comes, I mean, I suppose you can be in certain industries which are long established. Maybe aren't values driven, but I think having a clear purpose is a very important part of being successful in business. Because it means you know what you're trying to do.
[00:36:23] Alex: Absolutely. And
[00:36:24] James: you're
[00:36:24] Alex: trying to serve. Exactly. I think we, I mean, you know, I've done some sort of research on this recently around So the companies that place purpose and in, in our sort of, in our research, philanthropy at the heart of their business is that they are more resilient and they last more longer.
They last longer and they're able to attract more people. More and better talent,
[00:36:46] James: but in the big give context you're clear about your purpose, which is raising money Yeah, as efficient as possible through match funding because then your logo is a triangle, isn't it? That's right. A triangle has three sides.
That's right. [00:37:00] What are those three sides represent? So they
[00:37:01] Alex: talk about our sort of three audiences that we work with our champions our charities and and our and the public and You know, the triangle is is the strongest shape when it comes to
[00:37:12] James: sort of Yeah. So that's a sort of three way collaboration.
That works really well. Yeah. But in the business example you're talking about, you've, you've, you've come with the view that philanthropy companies, this is something we at Reed are aware of because we consider ourselves to be one, which is a company that has more than 10 percent of its shares owned by a charitable foundation.
Yeah. In our case, it's 18%. But you're of the view that a philanthropy company has certain advantages over other companies. What are they and why? Well, it's a
[00:37:43] Alex: really interesting topic, James. If you look in to Europe, um, and I don't think this is well understood here in the UK, but a lot of the big brands in Europe adopt this same model that Reid has, i.
e. having foundation ownership baked into the [00:38:00] organizational structure. So, IKEA, Bosch. Novo Nordisk, which is the sort of company with the highest market cap in, in Europe. Um, Ikea, Heineken, Rolex, these are companies, big brands people will be aware of, but yet on that sort of ownership structure, foundation, um, is, is sort of baked in.
And this is something that we're keen to bring to the UK. This idea of having charitable foundations as part of your shareholding makes you more resilient. is more attractive to people to want to come and work for you and ultimately has a bigger difference for your people and planet in that, you know, anytime you're sort of paying out to shareholders, you're also paying out to a charitable foundation and you're able to do great things with that.
And I think that's definitely been the, you know, experience of, of read. If I speak to sort of colleagues at read about sort of why They're attracted to work for the business or why they stick around for so long. You will often hear that sort of phrase of, well we work one day a week for charity because just under 20 [00:39:00] percent of the business is owned by a foundation so effectively 20 percent of the value created is going to charity.
And that's really a strong proposition and people want to be part of something good and part of something meaningful and purposeful. So
[00:39:13] James: that attracts people to work in the organization and also is a Part of them staying. Right. I guess which is an advantage. Right. It's interesting those companies those well known brands, you know, they're old I mean, there's a there's quite a lot of evidence that these companies that have longevity you have different DNA Yeah, because they've got this charitable element.
Yeah, and so this is what you're calling Philco Philco Yeah, and you believe that more companies should become Philco's. Yeah,
[00:39:41] Alex: and I Absolutely is the answer and I think Yeah, there is an increasing move, I think, of sort of purposeful, purpose led, um, businesses. And this is a sort of another addition to that menu, if you like, in terms of options for companies to be able to take.
Well, it [00:40:00] kind of
[00:40:00] James: is the menu, isn't it? Right. Because, I mean, a lot of people are talking this stuff and these are people actually doing it. Right. I mean, this isn't ESG, this is something, this isn't the, this isn't pages in the annual report. Exactly. This is changing the ownership structure of the business Exactly.
To introduce a charitable foundation.
[00:40:15] Alex: Yeah. And it's, it's a, it's a one-off change that has a, you know, decades long impact, enduring impact. Yeah.
[00:40:22] James: The CEO's come and go, but the charity foundation is still a shell.
[00:40:25] Alex: Exactly. Exactly. And it, and it's not something that can be untangled necessarily. Um. It's a, it's a sort of decision in perpetuity for your business to have a social impact.
So
[00:40:34] James: if you're an entrepreneur or you're a business leader and you want a legacy, this is a good thing to think about.
[00:40:40] Alex: Absolutely. Yeah. And I, and again, I think As we've said, those, those, those brands in Europe are sort of generations old, um, but we would love to see more sort of up and coming entrepreneurs, business leaders choosing to adopt this model.
And, you know, we were just talking the other day about, uh, Raspberry Pi, which is a sort of low, low [00:41:00] chip, um, tech company based out of Cambridge, spun out of Cambridge University. Um, recently IPO'd, um, but they decided to keep the foundation of ownership baked into that structure. So a number of their shares sort of were, were listed.
Um, but they decided to keep that sort of foundation as a core part of that, because it's such a big part of their identity and their sort of mission as a business. And they're doing really well. And they're doing really well.
[00:41:22] James: Exactly. So this is a model that I, I would urge other business people to have a look at.
Absolutely. As well as supporting the Big Give. Definitely.
You know, I love Mondays, I mean, so, what is it that gets you up on a Monday morning?
[00:41:38] Alex: Yeah, I think there's probably a lot of things. Mostly my young son, who often wakes me up. Um, but, but, So it's gonna get you up when he's a teenager. Exactly. And I think, I mean, for me, yeah, as we've talked about in our conversation, James, you know, the needs are not going away.
And I'm inspired, you know, we are in a really fortunate position that we give to be able [00:42:00] to. support, incredible, impactful work and one of the biggest privileges of the job is going to visit our charity partners and witness and see firsthand the impact that they are creating. And I only have to think to one of those, just one of those to get me out of bed on a Monday in terms of sort of that energy and drive to want to continue to grow and, you know, make the Big Give the best that it can be.
Um, so I think, yeah, the, as cheesy as it sounds, the sort of impact that we're helping to, to create, the Big Give, is, I mean, there's no better thing than that for me.
[00:42:33] James: Thank you, and the, the last question I'm going to ask you is, where do you, this is one from my interview book, Why You, which is up there on the table behind us, is, you know, there are 101 questions in that book.
Yeah. The one I'm going to ask you is, where do you see yourself in five years time?
[00:42:48] Alex: Well, in five years time we'll be approaching 2030, um, and as, you know, as we've talked about, we have a big audacious goal to, to reach a billion by 2030. And I, I hope by [00:43:00] 2030 we'll have sort of got the big give in to a position where we're, we're nearing that, that big target.
Um. You know, as we, we've said multiple times during this chat, there is, you know, the needs are not going away, and by 2030, the needs will still be there, and there may even be needs that we don't even know exist, um, and so I think the Big Give is in a sort of good position to be able to, to support them.
Well, you might smash that target
[00:43:23] James: like you did last Christmas. Yeah, fingers crossed. So, you know, I hope everyone listening will help you, um, uh, in your, in your ambition and goal to achieve that target because that would be a very good thing. Thanks, James. Thanks, Alex. Thank you very much. Thank you to Alex for joining me on All About Business.
If you'd like to learn more about Alex Visit BigGive. org I'm your host, James Reid, Chairman and CEO of Reid, a family run recruitment and philanthropy company. If you'd like to support a cause that's close to your heart, while also doubling the [00:44:00] difference, check out our charity partners, BigGive. All links are in the show notes.
See you next time.
