The Foundation ( a small Charitable Incorporated Organisation) was set up in 2018 in the memory of Jeremy Heywood, former Cabinet Secretary, to promote innovation and diversity within the UK public sector. There are currently two main areas of activity. The first is to help support the work of a Heywood Fellow. The purpose of a Fellowship is to allow a Senior Civil Servant the opportunity to explore issues relating to public service and policy, outside of the immediate responsibilities of Government duties. The current Heywood Fellow, Jonathan Black, is focusing on policy making at the intersection of economic prosperity and national security. The second activity to date has been to run competitions ( The Heywood Prizes) which seek to find and reward the best ideas from the general public for improving life in the UK. Given the Foundation’s good links with the Civil Service and Government ( of whatever party), we are able to feed these ideas into the Government machine so they can be considered and, hopefully, the best ones implemented. The overall winning prize from 2021 – creating an NHS Reserve Force – was picked up by NHS England and The NHS Reserve Programme launched in March 2022. The results from the 2022/2023 competition are being announced in July 2023. We have been particularly keen to attract entries from the younger generation in this competition and 11 prizes have been set aside for such youth entries. Another type of Competition is also currently under discussion for later in 2023 0r 2024.
Why the Heywood Foundation is supporting Boardroom Apprentice
At our core, is a desire to increase diversity within the UK public services as we believe passionately that the best decisions are made by feeding in a range of views from different backgrounds and experiences. By welcoming another Apprentice to the Board, potentially providing a unique perspective of her/his own, the Foundation itself would be benefiting by increasing its own diversity. Through this excellent programme, society in general will benefit from have a larger and more diverse pool of people willing to take on the responsibility of becoming a Board Director/Trustee and we would be delighted to help by allowing an Apprentice to gain experience with ourselves.
Location of Board and Committee Meetings
Usually Zoom and occasionally Central London.
Frequency and timing of board/committee meetings
Trustee Meetings are held quarterly. Times vary, but often lunchtime or towards the end of the day.
Date of Board Meetings (January 2024 – December 2024)
Not fixed, but likely March, June, September and December
Committee of the Boards and meeting dates (January 2024 – December 2024)
NA
