The Multiplier is a brand new programme helping people to develop their own bridge-building initiatives in their own communities in their own ways. Over the next five years, the partnership between The Cares Family and UnLtd will support 50 leaders who are building connections across divides in their neighbourhoods to adapt and grow, building capacity and changing lives. In this first year, the eight-month programme will include leadership workshops, coaching, storytelling and networking. They’re looking for 10 inclusive, thoughtful, ambitious Multipliers to join that first cohort.

Multipliers will be people responding to the huge challenges of our time. You may have set up a Mutual Aid group during the pandemic and now want to harness the energy in your community to create solidarity and support that endures. Maybe you’re leading a movement that brings people together to tackle racism in your hometown. Or maybe you have a nascent organisation which is bringing older and younger people together in your own way – and you need support to take your idea to the next level as The Cares Family has done over the past nine years.

Criteria

• Bridgers – bringing people from different backgrounds together to build new power;
• Inclusive – passionate about diversity, equity and access as routes to togetherness;
• Experienced – facing systemic or cultural barriers, but conscious of the power of community in overcoming those challenges;
• Iterative – open to learning and willing to risk making mistakes;
• Brave – ambitious, authentic and action-oriented;
• Generative – driving wider change that ripples out and distributes learning.

Eligible applicants will also have:

• A locally run, agile, community-led initiative working in the UK that is at least six months old, and ideally less than five years old;
• Identified a social issue and developed a model that works to solve it;
• Already demonstrated impact;
• The ambition and a plan to expand that impact;
• A model that has the potential to make systemic or cultural change.
• Ideally Multipliers will be people who can work on their projects full time, but we appreciate that community work requires flexibility, especially during the pandemic, so we’re happy to consider applicants who are working flexibly.

They are also looking for 50% of Multipliers to be working on intergenerational issues or with intergenerational solutions, or to be over 60 themselves. And they’re seeking a group with diverse lived experience, from backgrounds that are often marginalised in discussions about power and social change.

To support this special first cohort, over the eight-month programme they will:

• Give all Multipliers £10,000 grants (provided by UnLtd) towards project or living costs;
• Run eight half-day workshops over eight months (starting in January 2021), on community-building, storytelling, adaptive leadership, evaluation in the age of new power, systems change, inclusion, fundraising and coalition building;
• Connect you to further optional training from UnLtd, for example on governance and finance;
• Set you up with a coach for monthly calls to help you meet your potential;
• Make and distribute a film about the local relationships you have built or sustained through your work;
• Profile your work online;
• Invite you to events and speaking opportunities;
• Connect you to a community of nine other local leaders (and later to another 40) to share ideas and learning with.
• As this is the first year of The Multiplier, this is also an opportunity for you to shape the programme for future years.

Deadline

Tuesday November 3rd at 11am 

https://www.thecaresfamily.org.uk/the-multiplier#