Skipton Group: Driving change in society through giving

For the Skipton Group, their giving programme is a way to live their values and do tangible good in areas that are important to them. As a group headed by Skipton Building Society, a mutual with nearly 175 years of history, being community-centric is par for the course, but in the last few years they have placed more focus on governance and impact in their approach to charitable giving.

The approach

For 2022 and 2023 they committed to giving away 1% of their pre-tax group profits and will continue to do this each year – for 2023 that equates to at least £3m to good causes. This formal commitment was born from a board-level desire to marry their corporate purpose to change on the ground. However, as General Counsel David Travis points out, the more focussed approach to their giving implied a different kind of relationship with charities:

“In the past there had been a more piecemeal approach, with a higher number of smaller donations across the year. While we continue to support the Skipton Building Society Charitable Foundation and other colleague and member schemes, we now want to align   our giving with three pillars and have a clear understanding of what we’re achieving with that money. That has meant focussing in and choosing primary strategic charity partners.”

The three pillars they have put their focus on speak to their history, their business purpose and to key societal issues that they want to help tackle: ‘helping people have a home’,  ‘championing warm and efficient homes, particularly for those living in fuel poverty’ and ‘enhancing financial education and wellbeing’. But as Travis notes, these goals don’t exist in a vacuum and play a role in a number of aspects of Skipton Building Society’s activities:

“By formalising our giving, it has allowed us to engage our members and our colleagues. We presented three potential charity partners to our members at this year’s AGM - each aligned to the pillar of ‘helping people have a home’ – and they chose Age UK. Next year we’ll have a similar vote on who to partner with on the next pillar - ‘enhancing financial education and wellbeing’ - which continues to demonstrate our commitment to driving societal change.”

Our support

Perhaps most excitingly though, a targeted giving programme gives the Skipton Group a legitimate platform to speak about and advocate for further change that will benefit their causes of interest. With CAF’s help, their strategic partnerships with charities will give them clear oversight of where their money has gone and what impact it has had. The evidence that will flow back to them will show that they’re walking-the-walk and position them to understand what more needs to be done and then put pressure on those that could or should be helping do it.

While the Skipton Group has voluntarily chosen to make that 1% commitment, they’re keen to encourage other businesses to follow suit:

“It’s a really powerful initiative [to donate 1% of pre-tax profit]: all businesses have a social dimension. Company law and corporate governance are evolving more and more to consider the impact businesses have on stakeholders, including wider society, and I think that all businesses should have a moral obligation to give back to society in some way."