Annual Conference Workshops: Thursday 25 September 2025

Option 1) Practical AI Lessons for the Sector

Summary: Join Ben Cohen (Good Innovation) and Peter Bloomfield (Macular Society) for an energising session that cuts through the hype to make AI practical and useful for the sector.

The workshop will kick off with the inside story of the cross-charity AI Collaboration: why ten UK nonprofits teamed up, what they learned, what responsible AI really means, and the myths they busted (spoiler: AI is a people challenge before it’s a tech one). Peter will then share Macular Society’s own journey: wins, stumbles and top tips.  Next, delegates will work in small groups to map where their organisations sit on a three-level adoption framework, swap ideas with peers and choose one practical AI use case they can implement tomorrow.

Audience: Leaders and Trustees, with content relevant for all sizes of organisations.

Geography: UK wide

Facilitators:

Ben Cohen, Director, Good Innovation

Ben Cohen is a Director at Good Innovation, where he led the cross-sector AI Collaboration: a programme that equipped leading nonprofits with an AI roadmap, toolkit and guidance for responsible adoption

Drawing on a decade of innovation leadership at the British Red Cross and Macmillan Cancer Support, Ben now helps mission-driven teams grow their income and reach.

Peter Bloomfield, Director of Research, Macular Society

Peter is Director of Research at the Macular Society and is expanding research programmes across academia and industry. He is a neuroscientist by background and his PhD from Imperial College London focused on human brain imaging.

Option 2)  Is your governing document fit for purpose or creating an unexpected tax risk?

Summary: Gain a solid understanding of your governing document; the importance of its key provisions and what it can mean for your tax obligations.  This session will cover:

• the central role of your organisation’s objects and powers;
• what your governing document can mean for VAT and other taxes;
• the role of members and the board; and
• the process for amending your governing document.

This seminar is essential for anyone involved in the governance or finance functions of a charity.

Audience: Trustees, CEOs and Senior Managers

Geography: UK wide, but where law is referenced, this will be the law of England & Wales

Facilitators:

Andrew Studd, Partner, Russell-Cooke LLP

Andrew advises charities, social enterprises, trade associations and other membership and not-for-profit organisations on a wide range of charity and company law issues and commercial matters. He helps guide charity boards through challenging situations and renewal.  He provides advice on constitutional and governance matters, commercial contracts, restructuring, mergers and incorporations, funding issues, joint ventures and collaborative working arrangements.

Ian Brown, Director – VAT, S3TAX

Ian is a not-for-profit and public sector VAT specialist. Ian works with not-for-profit organisations to ensure they pay the right amount of VAT at the right time by providing advice and support on issues such as VAT registration, VAT recovery and the application of charitable VAT reliefs.

Russell-Cooke logo

Sponsor: Thank you to Russell Cooke for sponsoring and co-facilitating this workshop and to S3TAX for supporting the conference.

Option 3) Sharing a central team – an alternative to mergers?

Summary: The session will present the joint working model that three neighbouring sight loss charities have developed, using a shared operations team to enhance service delivery and operational efficiency for their respective service users.

The joint working arrangement was developed by Sight Support West of England, Insight Gloucestershire and Wiltshire Sight to ensure people with sight loss have access to comprehensive and high-quality services across the wider local region, whilst maintaining the local identities of the three charities involved, and ensuring the charities benefit from shared cost and management efficiencies.

The model centres on a shared operations team who support three teams of front-line support workers at each charity.  The central team are jointly employed by the 3 organisations and include:

• all senior management posts, including shared CEO,
• Volunteer Coordinator,
• finance and administration,
• fundraising team,
• communications & marketing,
• monitoring and evaluation.

The format of the session will be a presentation of the model followed by Q&A. The presentation will cover a range of issues we have had to work through, including addressing cultural differences, developing financial models for cost sharing, sharing sight loss assessment processes and CRM systems, joining staff teams and adapting management structures, data sharing and VAT implications.

Audience: Trustees and leaders of small to medium size organisations

Geography: UK wide

Facilitators:

Mike Silvey, CEO, Sight Support West of England

Mike lives in Bath and has led the team at Sight Support West of England since the charity was formed in 2018. Mike has worked within the charity sector for more than 30 years, from working on rehabilitation of ex-offenders in the UK, to managing education and disability programmes in Cambodia and Rwanda.

Jen Hall, Head of Fundraising and Communications, Insight Gloucestershire, Sight Support West of England and Wiltshire Sight.

Jen has been a fundraiser for more than 20 years; working for organisations big and small from nationally recognised brands to local causes.  Jen specialised in individual giving, fundraising strategy and compliance and developing teams and individuals to excel and deliver great campaigns.  Jen joined Sight Support West of England in 2020.  As well as fundraising through “unprecedented times”, Jen developed new processes and ways of working to talk publicly and positively about how and why two charities (Wiltshire Sight and Sight Support West of England) work together.  Along with Mike Silvey and Head of Services Glenda Prall, Jen has led the development of the collaboration with Insight Gloucestershire over the last two years.

Option 4) Who Holds the Power? Influencing Health Decisions that Matter.

Summary: Lisa Cowley, CEO at Beacon Vision and NHS Non-Executive Director and Steph Cartwright, Group Chief Community and Partnerships Officer at Royal Wolverhampton and Walsall Healthcare Trusts share how, together, we can transform health services and communities.

This workshop will give you an insight into how the health system really works in England and the ways to make connections which will influence decision makers and improve provision for our communities.  Join Lisa and Steph to find out which are the meetings, board and roles that really have the power and the language that will get people to sit up and listen.

Learn from Beacon Vision’s experience and find out what you can actually influence, which meetings to target, what roles really have the power and how to communicate with these role holders in a way which will influence how services are delivered.

Audience: Everyone from organisations of any size

Geography: England focused from an NHS operating model, but principles are relevant across the UK

Facilitators:

Lisa Cowley, CEO, Beacon Vision

Lisa’s career has been built across the voluntary sector and now she has a foot in both camps as CEO at Beacon Vision and an NHS Non-Executive Director.

Steph Cartwright, Group Chief Community and Partnership Officer, Royal Wolverhampton and Walsall Healthcare

Stephanie is passionate about partnerships, the integration of services and co-ordination of care, and leads the place – based partnerships and implementation of neighbourhood health across Wolverhampton and Walsall.

Option 5) Getting it right, by getting real: Building safe spaces for Lived Experience.

Summary: Join Joanne and Shari for an interactive workshop, helping teams in the sight loss sector build psychologically safe spaces where both visually and non-visually impaired people feel heard, respected and empowered. Through guided discussions, real world scenarios and practical tools, participants explore the shared fear of getting it wrong and how it can create barriers to inclusion.

Audience: Everyone.  Please note this workshop has a limit of 20 delegates.

Geography: UK wide

Facilitators:

Joanne Ardern, CEO, Sheffield Royal Society for the Blind

Joanne has 24 years of experience in the field of vision impairment at SRSB, joining the Community Advice Officer team in 2001 and then becoming their team leader in 2005. She spent 4 years as Deputy Manager and took over as CEO in 2022. Working her way through the ranks has given her an invaluable perspective of this local charity. She supports the delivery the charity’s services, whilst also supporting all its staff and volunteers. SRSB also operates a residential care home in Sheffield and a division in Rotherham which also offers services for deaf people and hearing aid users. SRSB is 165 years old, Joanne is a bit younger!

Shari Attuh, Lived Experience Leadership Projects Officer, Thomas Pocklington Trust

Shari is the Lived Experience Leadership Projects Officer at TPT, with a background in tech, personal branding, and storytelling. She brings a strong focus on inclusive leadership and is working within the sector to amplify underrepresented voices.

RNIB logo

Thank you to RNIB for sponsoring this workshop.

Workshop Session 4: 12:15 – 13:30

Option 1) Beyond the Entry Fee: Uncovering the true cost of fundraising events.

Summary: Are you capturing the full value of participating in place purchase events, such as the London Marathon places and fire walks? This workshop helps you measure both the hidden costs and benefits that determine your events’ true impact.

Beyond entry fees and materials, we’ll explore comprehensive costs including staff time, volunteer coordination, admin expenses, and staff wellbeing considerations. Equally important, we’ll examine the powerful hidden benefits: raising awareness of sight loss, converting participants into long-term supporters, building community connections and creating ambassadors for your organisation.

We will explore measuring the true return on investment that goes beyond immediate fundraising income. Learn to capture and quantify the full value including profile raising, ongoing engagement opportunities and outcomes that resonate far beyond the event itself.

Perfect for fundraising managers, charity trustees, and leaders of nonprofit making organisations who want to make strategic decisions based on complete information and maximise the total impact of their fundraising activities.

Audience: Anyone involved in fundraising and planning events.

Geography: UK wide

Facilitators:

Joanna Waton, Fundraising Manager, MyVision Oxfordshire

Joanna has worked in fundraising since 2010, with a strong background in Trusts and Grants fundraising. For the past four years, she has been the Fundraising Manager at MyVision Oxfordshire, where she leads the organisation’s fundraising and communications strategy. Her work includes community and events fundraising, individual giving, and trust-based income, helping to support the charity’s vital services.

Matthew Limb, Community and Events Fundraising Manager, Royal Society for Blind Children

For the 2026 London Marathon, Matt will be leading The Royal Society for Blind Children (RSBC)’s campaign for his fourth consecutive year as a Community and Events Manager. His track record includes spearheading one of The Children’s Society’s most successful London Marathon presences. Matt is driven by a desire to continually innovate how charities approach the London Marathon, understanding the significant opportunities it presents.

Option 2) Unlocking the Potential of AI Wearable Technology Outline

Summary: Join us for a panel session exploring the potential of AI wearable technology and sight loss services response. This session features demonstrations of the latest devices alongside a panel discussion examining how these innovations can complement and enhance existing services.

Audience: Everyone

Geography: UK wide

Panel Host:  Clare Burgess, CEO, Sensory Services by Sight for Surrey

Clare is the CEO for Sensory Services by Sight for Surrey. She has worked in the third sector for around 20 years and started her career with Guide Dogs before moving onto roles within mental health and pan-disability charities.  Clare is a technology enthusiast, with a particular focus on ‘tech for all’ having previously set up digital inclusion programmes.  Clare is the former Chair of TAVIP.

Panellists:

David Quarmby, Chair of Trustees, Outlookers.

David has been registered blind since a teenager and has developed his interest in technology over the years. He has been employed in numerous capacities in Social Work and Probation and was seconded to work for the National Offender Management Service as Assistive Technology Coordinator for 6 years.

Matthew Horspool, General Manager, The Braillists Foundation

Matthew has been blind since birth, with a career spanning over ten years in the visual impairment sector in roles which bridge the boundaries between braille and technology.  As a freelance trainer and consultant, he specialises in helping visually impaired people to make the most of assistive technology in the workplace.  Matthew is also the General Manager of the Braillists Foundation, championing braille through a mixture of work on the ground and international standards-setting efforts,  In his free time, he is a Trustee of Coventry Vision Hub and sings in the choir at Coventry Cathedral.

Tommy Dean, Operations Technology Specialist, Guide Dogs

Tommy Dean is a Technology Specialist at Guide Dogs. He tests accessible mainstream and assistive technologies, then supports specialists across the organisation to build the skills they need to use and share them effectively.

Sponsor: This workshop is funded by the Tech Hub Project, a Vision Partnership project led by Guide Dogs UK

Option 3) Developing positive and productive relationships between Trustees, Chair, CEO and SLT

Summary: An opportunity to consider how you develop and maintain positive relationships between trustees and senior management. We will consider the respective roles of trustees and senior managers and how to get the best out of these relationships – looking to find the right balance for sharing and understanding responsibilities as a team and how best to support each other in doing this.

Audience: Chairs, Trustees, CEOs and other senior management.  Please note, this workshop has a limit of 20 delegates.

Geography: UK wide

Facilitator:

Alison Oliver, Director, Alison Oliver Consulting Limited

Alison has spent over 25 years working in the commercial and third sectors as a consultant, executive director and non-executive director. She has been working in the third sector for the last 12 years, most recently as a charity consultant specialising in finance, governance, strategy, transformational change, stakeholder engagement and relationship management. Prior to that she was Director of Strategic Partnerships at Thomas Pocklington Trust (TPT), the CEO of Visionary, and Finance Director at TPT. Alison is a chartered accountant and, in her earlier career, worked at PriceWaterhouseCoopers leading consultancy projects and then as Finance Director of a private property group. She has also held various trustee roles over the last 17 years.

Option 4) Community Voice

Summary: This interactive session will explore what we have achieved through the Community Voice Partnership; for our community and for the partner organisations.

The Community Voice project has secured £920,000 over 7 years and brings together two charities supporting: disabled people, vision impaired people, people who are deaf or hard of hearing, people with autism, neurodiversity, learning disabilities, and long-term health conditions.

We’ll talk about our engagement, and the benefits and complexities of taking a participant led approach across such a diverse community.

We will share our experience of making the Partnership an attractive business case for funders as well as the impact, lessons learnt and where to go next…

We hope everyone will leave the session with some ideas for participant engagement, tools for effective partnerships and strategies for developing a business case for funders. We want the session to be interactive, so please bring some examples of your own!

Audience: Service Managers, Project Managers and operational staff of small to medium sized local organisations.

Geography: UK wide – although Lottery Funding experience in England

Facilitators:

Sarah French, Chief Executive, Sense Ability Matters

Sarah’s experience of working in the public and charity sectors started in the days of the Single Regeneration Budget and European Regional Development Fund…. Fast forward many years and she’s still trying to find security and sustainability for our community and colleagues. Maybe partnerships are the answer??

David Appleton, Community Voice Coordinator, Sense Ability Matters

David joined Sense Ability Matters in 2022 as the Community Voice Coordinator. He sees every conversation as an opportunity and his experience, passion and commitment makes sure that every outcome is achieved! David will share his own experience of creating networks, navigating partnerships and enabling our Community’s Voice.

Utility Aid logo

Sponsor: Thank you to Utility Aid for sponsoring this workshop.

Option 5) Supporting blind and partially sighted children, young people and students through education

Summary: Come and find out about Thomas Pocklington Trust and Guide Dogs working in partnership to support children, young people and students, their families and the professionals that support them. We provide expert information, advice and guidance supporting students to navigate primary school from year 2 onwards, secondary school, college and university.

In the workshop we talk about how the partnership came together, our approach to advice and advocacy, what we are trying to achieve and explore possible ways of working together to support more people to navigate education.

Audience: Everyone

Geography: UK wide

Facilitators:

Tara Chattaway, Head of Education, Thomas Pocklington Trust

Tara lives in Bristol and is Head of Education at Thomas Pocklington Trust (TPT). The Education team at TPT works to support children, young people and adults in education. This is through information, advice and guidance, providing high quality resources, working with students, sharing their experiences and shaping services. They also lobby and influence government and decision makers to improve access to education for blind and partially students of all ages.

Tara has worked in the sight loss sector for over 17 years and has a strong background of working in policy and campaigning roles.

Kerry Kernan, Children Young People & Families Operations Lead, Guide Dogs

Kerry lives in Worcester and is the Operations Lead at Guide Dogs for Children, Young People and Families, working across the whole of the UK.  She leads a range of the CYPF services at Guide Dogs including Habilitation, Technology, Buddy Dogs and Family Outreach.  Most recently Kerry has worked in close partnership with TPT in establishing the exciting new education partnership.

Kerry has worked at Guide Dogs for five years and before this worked in secondary education for over 20 years with a strong background in education leadership.