Date: Wednesday, June 10, 2026 

Topic: Team Leadership Behaviours, Networking, and Psychological Safety in Charities 

Host: Dawn Newton (Communications Consultant) 

Technical Co-Host: Clare Nightingale

 

Executive Summary

This online meetup focused on team leadership behaviours, psychological safety, and practical, low-cost strategies to support staff wellbeing and combat burnout within small charities. Moving away from theoretical models, the session combined interactive discussions, peer-to-peer networking, a guest presentation from Leela Shanti (Raising Futures Kenya), an action-learning mastermind breakout, and a physical stress-release exercise.

Key themes centred on identifying structural barriers to returning to in-person sector events, defining actionable workplace behaviours that build “kindness” and “trust,” and outlining organisational policies that improve talent retention under intense funding pressures.

    

Key Discussion Themes

1. Rebuilding In-Person Engagement & Local Commuting Realities

The session opened with a reflection on how drawing a crowd in real life has become harder post-pandemic due to many factors, including social anxiety and financial strains.

• • The Regional Network Experience: A participant reported that their local IoF events group in the Chilterns disbanded during the COVID-19 pandemic and has faced massive, persistent challenges getting people to come out and be together face-to-face.  

• • Financial & Logistical Strain: High travel costs and complex commutes serve as major disincentives to travelling for networking events.   

 

2. Networking Mindset & Session Goals

Dawn Newton introduced the meetup by setting a clear, highly interactive tone. She emphasised that networking should be reframed from an “icky” behaviour into an active process of mutual support.

• • The “Three Connections” Goal: Every participant was challenged to establish at least three new professional connections during the event.   

• • Networking Tactics: Attendees were encouraged to shamelessly push past traditional boundaries by asking about others’ needs, leading with how they can help, and committing to follow up via Zoom or over a coffee.    

3. Defining Leadership Kindness & Trust

The group transitioned into an exercise exploring how vague corporate values translate into concrete workplace behaviours.

• • Trust as a Foundation: Breakout groups—featuring reflections from Clare, Tomas, and other attendees—converged on trust as the essential foundation required for “above-and-beyond” team performance.   

• • The Remote Challenge: Participants noted that virtual and remote environments significantly reduce casual small talk and interaction, making it far more challenging to build, earn, and maintain trust compared to working in a physical office.    

• • Distributed Leadership: Leadership was reframed not merely as a line manager’s executive responsibility, but as a distributed behaviour that any team member can practise at any level to foster a healthy, collaborative culture.   

 

4. Case Studies in Toxic Culture vs. Support

The attendees highlighted the stark irony that non-profit organisations often extend a high level of empathy to external beneficiaries while treating internal staff strictly as business machines.

• • Case Study A (The Core Values Disconnect): A participant shared an incident from a domestic abuse and sexual violence support setting. When a female staff member became a victim of an incident herself, management offered inadequate counselling and failed to live up to its own values. Management pressured her by asking, “We’re pretty busy, are you sure you need time off?” and pointing out she had already been off a week, which ultimately forced her departure.    

• • Case Study B (Poor Bereavement Handling): Another participant recounted starting a new role where her granddad passed away unexpectedly a few weeks in. While trying to get her head down and work, a co-worker asked how she was doing. The participant shared a comforting, lighthearted anecdote about placing a ridiculous monkey-sound-making clock into his coffin to focus on fond memories. Later that afternoon, management reprimanded her for creating a “hostile work environment” by sharing details people didn’t need to know, telling her she should strictly say she was “fine”. She resigned the very next day.    

• • The Power of Validation: To counteract these destructive cultures, attendees and Leela highlighted that regular positive feedback is crucial to combating imposter syndrome and remote isolation. How leaders respond to feedback stands as a primary indicator of organisational health.
       

Guest Presentation: People-Centred Practices

Leela Shanti shared her personal journey through burnout and toxic leadership, which informed her dedication to building psychological safety at Raising Futures Kenya, a vocational training charity for young people. She detailed the tangible, low-cost operational policies her charity utilises to protect staff under the intense fundraising and operational pressures of the sector:

Leela’s Top “5-Minute” Low-Cost Suggestions for Any Charity

1. Embed short, structured check-ins at the start of team meetings and 1-to-1s to ask how people are and actually mean it.
2. Add email signature disclaimers normalising flexible working (e.g., stating: “I work flexibly and send emails outside standard hours, but please do not feel any pressure to reply outside your own working hours”).
3. Create a “wins-and-worries” WhatsApp channel between senior leadership and boards to quickly share and distribute the emotional weight of challenges so they do not sit on just one person.
4. Update monthly 1-to-1 templates to prioritise structured wellbeing discussions right up front.
5. Explicitly review leave policies to ensure progressive inclusion (such as providing paid compassionate leave following a miscarriage or stillbirth).

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Virtual Interactive Exercises

Laughter Yoga Break

To physically lower biological cortisol levels and release pent-up stress, Dawn Newton transitioned the unmuted group into a simulated laughter yoga framework.

 

• • Oxygenation & Rhythmic Clapping: Attendees practised deep inhalations followed by synchronised rhythmic left-and-right clapping, chanting “ho, ho, ho, ha, ha, ha”.

• • Imaginative Play: The group high-fived their webcams, simulated a “slow-motion smile” starting from a completely neutral facial expression, and acted out being on burning hot beach sand, shaking out virtual sandy towels, and frantically licking a fast-melting ice cream cone on camera.

• • The Takeaway: Dawn noted that while children laugh roughly 300 times a day, adults average only a few seconds daily. The exercise aimed to intentionally bring shared silliness to the workspace and diminish the intimidating power of stressful workplace scenarios.

 

Mastermind Session

The session moved into a breakout mastermind modelled on action-learning principles. Participants shared a current professional hurdle or hurdle from the past and practised the specific, difficult “muscle” of explicitly articulating the words: “What I would like support with is…” Group members were strictly instructed to avoid giving prescriptive advice (“I think you should do this”), focusing instead on asking supportive, open-ended coaching questions to help the individual explore and map out their own solutions.

 

Sector-Wide Constraints & Governance

The meetup concluded with an open plenary discussing the macro systemic pressures impacting small charities. While smaller charities are highly agile, nimble, and deliver outsized local impact, they face severe sector-wide structural strains:

• • Underinvestment in Staff: A severe lack of training budgets and a running operational assumption of deficit management leaves staff feeling under-resourced, deeply threatening long-term recruitment and retention.   

• • Societal Narratives: Pervasive media and public expectations that charity work should be entirely unpaid or low-paid drive chronic under-resourcing.   

• • The Call to Action for Trustees: Goodwill alone cannot sustain a charity’s mission. Participants agreed that board-level attention, diversifying trustee backgrounds, and enforcing concrete cultural policies are absolutely critical to stopping the haemorrhaging of good talent from the sector.

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Action Items & Next Steps

All Participants

• • Post-Event Networking: Follow up on LinkedIn with the participant list provided by Dawn in the chat and establish at least three new professional connections via Zoom or coffee.

• • Structural Check-ins: Implement structured check-ins (such as “Roses and Thorns,” “Win and a Worry,” or the “Four Hs” framework: Headaches, Highlights, Horizons, and Help) into upcoming team meetings.

• • Flexible Signatures: Encourage or add flexible working disclaimers to personal email signatures.   
       

Leadership / Senior Management Teams

• • Communication Channels: Set up an informal “wins and worries” communication channel (like a WhatsApp group) for quick leadership-to-board updates to share operational weight.

• • Board Agenda Updates: Add a formal review of flexible hours and progressive, inclusive wellbeing leave policies to the next SMT or board meeting agenda.

• • Folder of Flattery: Encourage staff to start a desktop document (such as a “Folder of Flattery” or “Positive Pants” folder) to systematically preserve praise and combat workplace imposter syndrome.   

Thank you to everyone who joined the session and contributed to the discussion.