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The Global Fund for Children has appointed co-chief executives, aiming to diversify gender as part of a new shared leadership structure.
Hayley Roffey has joined current chief John Hecklinger as co-chief executive of the grantmaker, which invests in community-based programmes that engage with vulnerable children and young people.
Roffey has spent the past three years as the charity’s global managing director but has worked for the organisation since 2018.
Before joining GFC, Roffey was a development manager at the foster and care consultancy Asphaleia, which became a grantee of GFC in 2011.
Hecklinger has been president and chief executive of GFC since November 2017, having previously worked at the Global Giving Foundation as a chief programme officer.
GFC said Roffey’s appointment to join Hecklinger as co-chief executive comes as part of a raft of changes to the charity’s leadership structure, made in an effort to “decentralise authority and decision-making”.
Other changes include the introduction of co-chairs of GFC’s global board, regional co-directors, an extended leadership team and a youth leadership council to provide advice and guidance on strategic and operational matters.
The charity said that establishing a co-chief executive model was a “natural next step”, and that Roffey’s appointment aimed to diversify gender at chief executive level.
A spokesperson for the grantmaker said the change was “not solely for gender diversity”, but added: “In the UK, we know women are vastly under-represented at the chief executive level in the sector; women do 68 per cent of the work with only one in three women becoming chief executive.
“We are proud to have a woman, from a working-class background and the leader of a former partner of GFC, become our co-chief executive in our 30th year.”
The funder said its new leadership structure would bring “new ideas, broader, deeper expertise and enthusiasm while also creating increased capacity, promoting work-life harmony, and ensuring leadership continuity”.
It added that the job of running the organisation had “become increasingly more complex and multifaceted” and the scope of responsibilities had become “so great” that the time was right to adopt a co-leadership model.
GFC recorded a total income of almost £15.3m in the year to the end of June 2023, according to its latest accounts filed with the Charity Commission. Last year, it awarded nearly £6m in grants to 293 grassroots organisations across 40 countries, the grantmaker said.
Roffey said: “I am looking forward to embracing this new model for the organisation, approaching it with great seriousness and care, because this deeply matters, and I can’t wait to see what space this co-model opens for talent in the future.
“As a former partner of GFC, I know what it means to have a funding relationship with this incredible organisation, how much the support, flexible funding and trust from the team meant, and how rare it continues to be. My commitment and dedication to this work have never been stronger.”
Hecklinger added: “I’ve been inspired by GFC partner organisations and peers that have adopted co-leadership models, with an explicitly feminist view of mutual support, shared decision-making, and the intention to disrupt hierarchical organisational structures.
“On an extended trip to West Africa to spend time with GFC partners, I had deep conversations with them about their aspirations to advance shared leadership within their organisations. From those conversations, I became convinced that it was time to share my role more formally.”
Greg Wallig, co-chair of the GFC, said: “I believe the willingness and courage to engage with this co-CEO model extends directly from GFC’s vision of partnering to achieve better outcomes for children and youth.
“I’m confident the result will be new tools and a more flexible and adaptive working model that will benefit our partners and the children we serve.”