🚀 In case you missed it: Last week, The National Lottery Community Fund launched our new ‘missions framework.’ These are the community-led missions where we will be focusing our funding, learning, and efforts. The foundation of this approach is rooted in what we’ve heard from communities: a desire for us to be more ambitious, more long-term, and more focused on tackling bigger challenges while supporting continuous learning across communities.
My colleague Thomas Walters has shared a blog and video about this (see below), so if this is your first introduction, start there. I’m adding some wider reflections to complement his.
💡 Why a mission framework?
For us, a mission approach is about translating the 'why' into outcomes ('what') and identifying the target group ('for whom'). It provides a sharper focus on specific community goals without restricting flexibility on 'how' these goals are achieved. In fact, by being firmer on missions, outcomes, and target groups, we create more space for different, new, local solutions in delivery. It’s central to our commitment to agility, partnership, and, ultimately, solutions rooted in ‘it starts with community’.
🔍 Balancing priorities
There’s often concern about whether missions can reflect the entirety of what an organisation can or should do. We recognise that while they can’t cover everything, setting clear priorities supports transparency and intentionality. At The National Lottery Community Fund, we expect more than 90% of grants will align with one of our four community-led missions. This still leaves room for responsive funding, ensuring we remain adaptable to emerging needs.
🌍 Complex vs. Complicated
Some argue that the world is too complex for mission-based approaches. But I believe missions help us break down the often-complicated systems at play and develop a deeper understanding of the assumptions, learning, and evidence required to make meaningful progress. By defining clear goals, we seek to enable community led solutions to approach challenges more confidently, fostering curiosity, learning, and improvement.
In short, the framework is about being bold, strategic, and community-focused. And when done right, it creates opportunities for greater collaboration, innovation, and long-term impact.
This is a brief reflection on a big topic: there’s lots that Nesta, the Institute for Government and others have written about missions-led approaches.
But if you want to hear more about our experience The National Lottery Community Fund, I’m looking forward to joining NPC (New Philanthropy Capital) Ignites Conference on 15 October! And as Tom says in his blog, we welcome reflections and feedback.
Dan Corry
![View organization page for The National Lottery Community Fund, graphic]()
“It’s one of the great pleasures of my work to help share the impact of the amazing projects we support day in, day out. At the same time, I’m passionate about focusing our funding, influence and work with our partners to make an even bigger impact in the years to come.” Tom Walters, Deputy Director of Impact
Our funding priorities and the impact we plan to make are guided by our four community-led missions, which support people to come together, be environmentally sustainable, help children and young people thrive, and live healthier lives .
From providing inclusive local spaces and activities, to giving babies and children a positive start in life, these are designed to meet what communities told us they want from our funding.
Today, we’re sharing our new missions framework and guidance to bring each of these to life, and help you understand what we expect projects supporting each mission to achieve.
This will help us work with you to ensure the greatest results for communities.
Visit Tom’s blog to find out more: https://ow.ly/ANZL50TujOI
Co-Founder at Inner Explorer
1moCongrats!