Anne Baxendale

What I Do

Helping large charities to take on new challenges

I am a charity consultant working with CEOs and directors who need an extra pair of hands and a fresh perspective at times of transition.

Whether you are looking to fix an existing problem or scope out potential major change, I can provide strategic, operational and moral support to share the load and make things happen.

I draw on experience at board and director level in national organisations including Shelter, Child Poverty Action Group, Women's Aid Federation of England, Department of Health & Social Care, and global PR consultancy Edelman.

How I Can Help

How I can help

If you are curious, please drop me a line at info@annebaxendale.com or via LinkedIn to set up an initial no-cost exploratory conversation.

Crisis support and problem solving

Get alongside you to help navigate an urgent situation, make sense of things and prioritise effectively.

Provide senior cover to fill an unexpected gap, bring stability, and keep the show on the road.

Support with assembling a team to solve your problem, including finding appropriate specialists to contribute where needed.

Strategic development

Assess a specific challenge, define your options, and recommend the next steps.

Scope out and develop a roadmap to guide your approach to a potential major change.

Insight gathering and horizon scanning.

Analyse current strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats to inform future strategy and resource allocation.

Define the critical questions and future options for your organisation.

Support with leadership and team development.

Practical implementation

Operationalise strategic goals, so they jump from the page to real life.

Establish cross-organisational matrix programmes.

Develop governance processes and frameworks.

Manage complex and/or challenging projects efficiently and to successful completion.

Support and engage your teams to overcome cultural blockages for greater effectiveness.

My Background

My background

I have had a demonstrable impact in the public, private and charity sectors across housing, health, social welfare, and education, through:

Leading outstanding teams at executive and board level
Driving complex organisational change
Successfully managing major crises
Developing influential campaigns that have shaped public debate and secured significant policy change.

My career began in corporate consultancy and progressed into charity campaigning. As my experience in leading large teams developed, my fascination with the process of building and running effective teams inspired a career pivot towards supporting CEOs to navigate organisational challenge and change.

My background gives me a unique standpoint on this, because I have:

A senior perspective: having navigated many challenges at board and executive level, I’ve ‘been there’ and appreciate the burden of leadership and how the messy reality often differs from perception.
A rich ‘outside in’ understanding of the external political, economic, social and technological context in which we operate, drawing on my policy and communications experience.
A strong strategic grasp, allowing me to align internal culture to the organisational mission and desired external outcomes.
A track record of operational delivery and the ability to execute and project manage as well as advise.
A holistic point of view based on experience working with specialists in a range of domains including income generation, HR, and frontline services.

Experience

My experience

Women’s Aid Federation of England

As part of the executive team at the Women’s Aid Federation of England, I provided emergency senior cover and trouble-shooting for the CEO. I also worked with the board and executive team to develop the organisation through:

Managing and implementing the findings of a review of board governance.
Introducing a new pay and benefits framework.
Supporting trustees to develop a position on the contentious issue of single sex services.
Leading the insight-gathering, analysis, and generation of a framework and foundations for the next organisational strategy.

NHS Test & Trace

On a fixed term contract at the Department of Health & Social Care, I established a new team and programme under exceptional pressure as part of the government's Covid-19 response. This involved setting up a new work stream to strengthen local/national collaboration and tackle ‘enduring transmission’ of Covid-19 in the worst-affected areas, bringing health inequalities higher up the agenda. I also contributed to the early development of the new UK Health Security Agency.

Shelter - strategy implementation and culture change

I worked with the CEO of the national housing charity Shelter to implement a transformative strategy and drive a radical culture change programme across a dispersed and diverse workforce of 3000+ staff and volunteers. Highlights included:

Creating new cross-organisational matrix programmes and a change board to oversee delivery.
Cultivating a new campaigning ethos in local advice and support hubs through helping to introduce community organising and a systems approach to service delivery.
Developing an updated organisational behaviour framework and establishing a network of staff ‘beacons’ to champion new approaches.

Shelter - policy & campaigning

I led the communications, policy and campaigns directorate at Shelter, a high performing department of 100+ people , achieving successful integration across PR, public affairs, strategic communications, marketing, digital, creative, research, and policy functions to produce award-winning and impactful campaigns including:

Making housing a top 3 election issue in 2015 (from barely breaking the top 10 in 2010) through running a multi-year campaign, rooted in public insight, to connect mainstream voters with the salience of the issue for them and their families.
Winning numerous protections for private renters including a ban on letting fees; protection against discrimination; commitment to end ‘no fault’ evictions; and action against criminal landlords.
Running a high-profile commission on a bold new future for social housing, aligning at pace a diverse group of commissioners (from former ministers, to leading economists, to tenant activists) behind an agenda for change.

I also guided the organisation through the public fallout of a governance crisis and industrial dispute, during the aftermath of the Grenfell Tower tragedy.

Board governance and advisory

I am highly experienced in charity governance and developing effective boards, having served as a trustee of the Child Poverty Action Group for several years and established a new children’s charity Horizons as founding chair.

I currently serve on the Advisory Council of Persuasion UK, a not-for-profit research initiative which aims to understand what's shaping public opinion on the issues that define British politics.

As chair of governors at a primary school in one of the most deprived areas of the country, my impact included:

Helping to steer a turnaround from under-achievement to success, with the school bucking the national trend to excel in the SATs.
Securing an ‘outstanding’ rating in four out of the five areas assessed by Ofsted.
Building a far more diverse, committed, and rigorous governing body with a secure leadership pipeline.
Supporting the Headteacher through staff bereavement and pandemic-related crises.

Get In Touch

info@annebaxendale.com or via LinkedIn

Contact