The Vodafone UK Foundation has launched a call to action for charities to apply for Reach, its flagship funding programme. The foundation is inviting charities to apply for £5m funding across three years for work helping 16-25 year olds facing exclusion from society.

Watch Sarah Shillito, Head of Vodafone UK Foundation and Kate Aldous from the Collaborative Working Unit at the NCVO, explain how you can participate and what your charity can achieve with Reach

H: Hello and welcome to the Good Causes Show, I'm Mark Ryes. Well today we're here to talk about an exciting new program launched by Vodafone UK Foundation, aimed at charities here in the UK. The program is called Reach, and joining me here in the studio to talk about it is Kate Aldous from the National Council for Voluntary Organisations, and Sarah Shillito from the Vodafone UK Foundation. Sarah, first of all can you tell us a little bit about the foundation and what it does?

S: Well the Vodafone UK Foundation is a registered charity. It's one of 19 local operating company foundations around the Vodafone world but with the UK what we specialise in and focus on is 16-25 year olds and preventing exclusion. So we've been working in that space for quite some time, we've had quite a lot of research done and feedback and within the UK we are actually known for that space so it's quite a strong message that that should be where we're working

H: So what exactly is the Reach program that's just been announced?

S: It's a £5 million, 3 year funding opportunity for charities that are working in collaboration, specifically helping young people in the age range 16-25 at risk of exclusion from society

H: Ok let me bring you in at this point, this is about charities working together to help young people, but what kind of advantages does collaboration like this hold?

K: Collaboration can take a huge range of forms, so the benefits are very varied. What all collaborations have in common is they have some sort of exchange which has mutual benefit for the partners, and basically organisations do it to try and improve their efficiency and effectiveness with the end result of better services for the beneficiaries and ideally what you would aim to achieve through collaboration is what we call collaborative advantage which is something that they couldn't achieve alone. And examples of collaborative advantage are things like creating a stronger voice through organisations speaking together on behalf of more organisations, sharing back offices for efficiencies or more in-depth services, or there's a good example of service delivery where Marie Curie Cancer Care work with British Heart Foundation and combined their expertise so that heart patients could spend their last months at home, because Marie Curie has palliative care expertise and the British Heart Foundation has nursing, heart condition expertise, so that's an example where the two expertises together created a new project and area of expertise.

H: It's a very good example that, but surely some charities and some organisations think about the challenges first, and there must be a lot of challenges to overcome?

K: There are a huge number of challenges, but collaboration isn't technically difficult so anyone with a good range of management skills should be able to do it, and actually people collaborate all the time in their personal lives and in their working environment, from informal networking through to working with consultants and commissioning services, it's all a form of collaboration and what the unit that I manage focuses on is the more formal end of that spectrum where there may be legal implications for what they're doing which need to be explored, and there's lots of information about all of this on our website, which I recommend people look at, because it covers – we've got information that points out to people there may be VAT implications of collaborating, but also softer issues like do you – what are the personalities like, do they find it easy to work together, is there trust, all of which have an impact on how easy the processes of collaborating is.

H: So really the benefits of collaboration Sarah are what Vodafone UK Foundation are actually trying to achieve here?

S: Yes sure, we've had a very positive experience with our last partnership program, and that brought together Shelter, Samaritans and Youth Net, and that was different in that they all approached us separately and then we said we would like you to work together, and that's a very different concept, so I believe that they all think that has been very positive for all of them and have come out of it saying would we do it again? – absolutely we would. I think the difference this time is if we're going to deepen that potential for learning and for shared experience, you cannot say “we'd like you to work together” what it has to be is organisations coming to us saying “we have chosen to work together and we would like you to fund that to be possible” and that could be in a range of ways I think – we don't have a defined what that collaboration looks like, but it's trying to go to a next level I guess of cooperation and participation

H: So Kate if organisations are feeling anxious about collaboration, have you got any top tips to help them overcome that?

K: Look at our website because there's lots of examples of other people who have done it and if they're still anxious having looked at our website then give us a call because we can talk them through the process, we can also put them in touch with people who've done similar things to what they're aiming to do. Put things in writing. If they're at the initial stage where they haven't yet approached someone, be very clear about what it is they aim to do, what they envisage the partner doing –

H: They're really the first steps aren't they?

K: They're first steps but it would be an iterative process because once they've met their partner it might change everything, so I think being very clear about what the bottom line is for their collaboration, what they are prepared to compromise on and what they won't, is very important when they go into a collaboration, and then putting thing in writing so that as far as possible you're clear about who's doing what, what you're bringing to the table and how you're going to do it, and we have support material about putting – you know what you should include in a written agreement on our website as well

H: Thank you very much. Sarah for any charities watching right now, how do they go about applying for funding from the Reach –

S: Well all the information will be on that website which is www.guardian.co.uk/vukf/reach , but the idea is basically to allow anybody that wishes to apply will be able to apply, we're putting that information out in a lot of spaces so that everybody can know about it that possibly wants to know about it, and the idea is it should be as broad as possible, so we're not – potentially any organisation can be this collaboration

H: And there's £5 million of funding that's available – this is for charities specifically dealing with young people, 16-25s?

S: Yes and the program delivery would need to be in that space. It may be the wider remit of that charity is beyond 16-25s but our money is available for that age group specifically, so yes their wider organisation may do more but that's for this age range

H: And what happens if a charity hasn't worked collaboratively with another organisation before, are they locked out of this or is this a way of bringing more organisations to work together?

S: It's absolutely about inclusion, it's about us saying we want any organisation potentially to benefit from this if you work in this space. It's a great thing, if they haven't worked collaboratively before, we all have to have a first time of trying that type of thing. We try to create some sort of step change and some sort of catalyst for change, and if this is the opportunity then great. I think there is a lot of information out there as Katie's said, and I don't think necessarily that it's easier when you've done it before, we see all sorts of different sizes of organisations being involved you don't have to be a large charity you don't have to be a small one you could be volunteer-based or all sorts of structures I think are possible

H: So Kate the benefits of working collaboratively can really be great for all organisations involved?

K: Yes and ultimately for the beneficiaries which is what we always need to keep in mind, and I think with the example of young people, you can see how having services working together can mean that there's one point of entry, you know one door that they knock on to find a whole range of services, rather than having to traipse from one organisation to another to find what they want

H: So if you're in a charity interested in working in a collaboration to bid for the £5 million funding available from the Vodafone UK Foundation, then just go to this website www.guardian.co.uk/vukf/reach

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