Finance and Endowment Committee Members

Finance and Endowment Committee Members (voluntary)

Recruitment Pack, Spring 2026

Investment professionals sought for voluntary roles

Would you like to be part of an Islington-based grant-making charity,
helping to make a positive difference to the local community?

No previous committee or charity experience needed

Cloudesley is an Islington-based charity which makes grants of around £1.8 million
each year to people, organisations and churches. We are looking to appoint new
voluntary co-opted members to our Finance and Endowment Committee to help us
continue to make effective decisions, including on our investments.

To support you with this role, we offer:

•  Training

•  1:1 support from a Trustee buddy

•  Expenses to cover any related childcare, carer and travel costs so that you can

attend committee meetings

This pack provides more information about Cloudesley, what being a co-opted
committee member involves, who we are looking for and how to apply.

If you have any questions about this role or Cloudesley,  please contact the charity’s
Director, Melanie Griffiths – melanie.griffiths@cloudesley.org.uk, 020 7832 5803.

About Cloudesley

Cloudesley is a local charity that makes grants to people, organisations and Church
of England churches in Islington. Our grants budget is used in two ways:

•  Our Health Grants Programme supports local people with health problems

and/or who are disabled and who have low or no income

•  Our Church Grants Programme supports Islington’s Church of England

churches to help look after and repair their church buildings.

A Board of Trustees are responsible for overseeing the charity and looking after its
assets, with additional specialist support and expertise provided by voluntary co-
opted committee members. A small staff team carry out Cloudesley’s day-to-day
management and administration.

The charity dates back to 1517, when Islington resident Richard Cloudesley wrote his
will and left two ‘Stony Fields’ to Trustees.

Cloudesley has invested assets of £59.3m, split £29.4m in residential property in
Islington and £29.9m in an investment portfolio managed by Cazenove. The charity
adopted total return accounting in December 2019 and has since increased its grant
giving. The increase in grant giving has brought considerations about asset allocation
to the fore, particularly relating to which assets to sell to fund the increased grants
budget and therefore the desired balance between the charity’s property and
investment portfolio. The split between the two has been relatively even over recent
years by chance rather than design and we would like to be more intentional about
the ideal asset allocation. In this context, in 2025, Trustees agreed a new Investment
Strategy.

Cloudesley is a signatory of the Funder Commitment on Climate Change and ESG
considerations are increasingly important to us.

Who are we looking for?

In early 2027, two long-standing Trustees with significant investment experience
come to the end of their terms with Cloudesley. We are therefore looking for two
new co-optees to join our Finance and Endowment Committee who will bring
significant experience and knowledge of investments. Ideally, the new co-opted
members will start with us in Summer 2026 to allow for an effective handover before
the two Trustees move on.

To help make sure that the charity’s decision-making continues to be effective and
well-informed, Cloudesley is keen to recruit people to these roles from a range of

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backgrounds, and with different expertise, experience and knowledge. The co-opted
committee members will work as part of a team with the charity’s existing Trustees.

We want to make our committees more diverse and representative of the groups
and people that we support and we are particularly keen to receive applications
from people who:

•
•
•
•

Are disabled
Have a long-term health condition
Are from Black and minority ethnic communities
Are under 35.

Although half of our grant-making is used to support the Church of England churches
in Islington, we welcome applications from all members of the community, from any
religious background or none.

What’s involved?

The new co-opted committee members are likely to be appointed for 1-2 years
initially. They will join our Finance and Endowment Committee which oversees  the
management of the charity’s investments, properties and budget, and other
financial  matters. Our investment manager, Cazenove, and property manager,
Daniel Watney LLP, report to the committee. The Finance and Endowment
Committee meets four times a year, usually 5.30pm – 7.30pm, and occasionally at
other times as required. To prepare for each meeting, a pack of papers is emailed to
committee members a week beforehand for reading.

To learn more about the charity, the co-opted committee members will be invited
to attend other meetings and events if they would like to/are able to. These may
include:

•  Attending Board meetings as observer. Board meetings are held three times

a year in the early evening

•  Attending the Grants Committee as an observer

•  Visits to Cloudesley’s residential properties, or to local charities and churches

In the past, some of our co-opted members have gone on to become Trustees of the
charity when suitable vacancies have arisen. To be a Trustee of Cloudesley you need
to either live or work in Islington or have another Islington connection, however the
Islington connection is not needed for co-opted committee members.

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Training and support

To support the co-opted committee members to carry out this voluntary role, we
will:

•  Provide background information, which we will talk through during an

introductory session

•  Give initial training about Cloudesley and charity finance, with further

training and support to enable you to fully take part in committee meetings

•  Link you with a Cloudesley Trustee who will act as a buddy. Before each

committee meeting, they will offer support with preparing for the meeting
and discuss any key issues with you.

Although this is a voluntary position, Cloudesley can cover reasonable childcare,
carer and travel costs if these are required to enable you to attend committee
meetings.

How to apply

To apply, please email the following to admin@cloudesley.org.uk by 9am on
Monday 20 April 2026:

i.  An explanation of why you would like to join Cloudesley as a co-opted

member of the Finance and Endowment Committee. Please include a brief
description of the skills, experience and knowledge you would bring to the
charity.  If you have a CV, you are welcome to email that to us as well.

ii.  A completed recruitment monitoring form (optional). The form can be

downloaded here. If you complete a monitoring form, we will separate it from
your application and it will be used to help us monitor our recruitment
practices.

Please get in touch with us (admin@cloudesley.org.uk) if you would like some
support with your application or if you need us to adapt the application process for
any reason including disability.

We will email you by 5pm on Friday 24 April to let you know if you have been
shortlisted.

Shortlisted applicants will be invited to meet with us in the week beginning 27 April.
Please let us know in your application if this week is difficult for you. This meeting
will be a chance for us to find out more about your experience and the reasons why
you are interested in becoming a co-opted member. It will also be an opportunity

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for you to ask us questions, find out more about the charity and what being a co-
opted member of the Finance and Endowment Committee involves.

Cloudesley’s Trustees are responsible for appointing committee members. At this
stage, we expect that Trustees will consider any recommendations for a new
appointment at their Board meeting on 24 June, with the newly appointed
committee members taking up their appointment after this point.

Further information

To find out more, please:

•  See our website at www.cloudesley.org.uk

•

Join the optional online information session on Tuesday 14 April, 12.30pm-
1.30pm. This will be a chance to meet with some members of the Finance
and Endowment Committee and Cloudesley staff to find out more about the
charity and what being an FEC co-opted member involves and to ask us
questions. For further details and to register for the information session,
please email info@cloudesley.org.uk by midday on Monday 13 April.

•  Contact Cloudesley’s Director, Melanie Griffiths for an informal discussion:

melanie.griffiths@cloudesley.org.uk, 020 7832 5803.

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