Mermaids have appointed a new CEO

Or 'skirting' - please don't be so exclusionary towards skirt-wearers. Who can be men or women, of course, or neither.

News on Mermaids potentially trousering £250k

grahamlinehan.substack.com/p/are-mermaids-about-to-receive-a-quarter

It may be that what Trustees think they want is a fundraising expert to keep funds flowing in. They may not realise that this only the start of their problems.

I don’t know if there are templates for youth sector charities and organisations, but the Sport England Club Mark requirements are not a bad place to start. Initially they seem overwhelming but as you go through, you realise that everything in the many pages: insurance, evacuation procedures, core training requirements for staff and volunteers (including safeguarding), equalities, is important. My best guess is that Mermaids are some way away from being a professionally run organisation.

I don't think so. I am a turnaround leadership and governance practitioner. It would take at least six months in ordinary times to set something up, and the career history would be explicit.

I think a charity that supports parents of gender questioning children is badly needed. These parents need a lot of help

unwashedanddazed There are already support groups for parents- eg Bayswater and Our Duty.

My thoughts completely! We ALL know what the root causes are and what should be done to address them!
She’s read a how to be a great manager book hasn’t she? And the trustees of Mermaids have fallen for it - they must have read the chapter on what to look for when appointing a great manager from the same book.

While she does actually have relevant experience in the sector, it's in fundraising.

I don't envy her.

I’m sort of going to disagree with him. Safeguarding is not stand alone. You need a functioning organisation. You need HR policies and recruitment policies and whistleblowing policies and policies for residential activities and so on, as well as functioning management structures, financial controls and transparent policy making processes. Safeguarding is a core part of all of this. An obvious example is proper DBS checks when recruiting. Or indeed proper protection of personal data. Safeguarding is not bolt on.

My own experience of achieving Sport England Clubmark compliance in a voluntary organisation is that doing things properly leaves little place to hide. Going in and requiring enhanced DBS checks could result in some staff leaving. Requiring proper financial control and audit might result in some staff leaving. Requiring clarity of the separate roles between staff and client, including in chat rooms, might lead to different behaviours. Safeguarding, for staff (eg anti bullying policies) and clients, should be fundamental and integral.

I think she is right not to highlight or prejudge any particular aspect of what is assumed to be a dysfunctional and unprofessional organisation. The CC will have given her some pointers, and hopefully the Trustees will as well. It looks as if she is also doing her own informal research. If she is good, problems will become apparent and are best resolved by applying good practice. Whether she can do that fast enough or in a way that will retain founders or attract new ones is a different matter.

To me the biggest problem is around Mermaids core aims. Is it a an affirmation only vehicle which justifies decisions made by both parents and younger staff. Or is it a broad church support organisation for parents and children which allows for a watchful waiting and detransition, as well as transition. Support for all affected by gender dysphoria or confusion is needed but would need, at minimum, a name change and a pretty wholesale change in approach.

I think a charity that supports parents of gender questioning children is badly needed. These parents need a lot of help. Mermaids was trying to be that pre-SG. If they can get back to their original focus maybe it can be rescued. This women seems to have the experience needed to sort the organisational stuff out and I wish her well in doing that.

Meanwhile the trustees need to take long deep look at what they want to achieve - is it transitioning children or is it supporting parents? I hope it's the latter and they leave everything else to the professionals in the new GIDS services, with their promised focus on psychoanalysis.

If they bow to pressure and go on to appoint a trans person to appease the TRAs then I think they'll fail. Allowing ideology to dictate practice is what got them in to this mess. They need a family support focussed CEO.

Interesting point: If TWAW and TMAM, why is a transperson necessary as CEO?

James Esses is spot on: twitter.com/JamesEsses/status/1602299432648712193

I thought "bring your whole self to work" had been largely discredited now by HR types?

Ergh roller Derby people are the worst. A step down from ultimate Frisbee people

Eee good god mermaidsthrowaway it doesn't sound like she's got a clue what she's going into 😬

And you did well to sit on that for a week...!

😂😂😂

I’ve name changed for this but I do know Lauren and knew she’d been appointed a week or so ago.
We had a quick text conversation about the job and when she said about going in to find out what went wrong, I replied with “SG changing the whole ethos of the charity to make her feel better about her choices was where it went wrong”. She did sort of agree with me so there might be hope. If Lauren reads this then hi, she’ll know who I am.
I’m hoping she brings some reason to the job, it is a big step but made possible by it being an interim appointment and it’s a bit of a poison chalice.

I am also involved with roller derby and I agree that at an adult level it is a bit of a hot mess, there is the open to all division that is mixed sex. Women choosing to play in this division know that. What I hate is transwomen playing in the women’s division, I think teams should be based on sex.
I just ignore all the pronoun nonsense and try to subvert it where possible.

No mention of safeguarding?

Her role is to get her head down, and start turning Mermaids into a proper organisation with policies and procedures and that sort of thing. She needs to be the listening adult that the CC will want to speak to, she needs to find a response to judgement in the LGBA court case, she needs to deliver some sensible input into current NHS consultations, she needs users, staff and funders on side, and to only fight battles which she needs to fight and knows she can win.

What an enormous mess SG has left behind.

My idea of hell. And people wonder why such massive numbers of people have dropped out of the labour market...

I don’t know what else she should done.

Her role is to get her head down, and start turning Mermaids into a proper organisation with policies and procedures and that sort of thing. She needs to be the listening adult that the CC will want to speak to, she needs to find a response to judgement in the LGBA court case, she needs to deliver some sensible input into current NHS consultations, she needs users, staff and funders on side, and to only fight battles which she needs to fight and knows she can win.

The point is she appears to be a professional rather than a campaigner. That’s what Mermaids need. Inevitably there would need to be some track record of “trans awareness” but the idea is that she is there to sort out the structure.

I am not sure Mermaids can be rescued. It will be interesting seeing someone try.

"We hope to see a trans CEO appointed in due course, but in the meantime we wish Lauren the best of luck and love, and we hope that she is able to sufficiently tackle Mermaids' recent and historic treatment of their staff."

Woah. So nothing at all about the padeophile adjacent trustee, Discord servers, posting binders to teenage girls, or the chat rooms?! Or the dodgy AF fundraisers??

Yup, Stoner clearly missed those photos of MM's Digital Engagement Officer!

I would have thought we’d seen more than enough of some of the staff ‘selves’!

I’m passionate about co-production, equity and culture and want to build organisations shaped by the people we support, where people can bring their whole selves to work.

🤔

Interim CEO is a definite job. It's someone who is brought in for just this kind of situation where everything has gone badly wrong, and when she has done what she can to fix mess she finds, they will appoint a more PR-friendly CEO. That's why she has had several similar posts. I imagine she is being paid a LOT.