Community engagement

Community engagement means different things to people and organisations. For us, community engagement is closely linked to our Mission, where consumer protection is at the heart of regulation.

Volunteering

We encourage our people to take part in volunteering opportunities, whether in communities in London, Edinburgh, Leeds or close to where they live. This helps us to make a positive impact on society. 

Volunteering also brings organisational benefit by developing employee skills and bringing consumer knowledge back to the FCA.

Our community engagement aligns to three themes:

• future skills – school programmes and Inspiring Futures
• developing skills – charity trustee positions
• utilising skills – personal employee volunteering

These themes ensure that we give our people the chance to be involved in their communities, linking their volunteering to their learning and development. 

The themes also enable us to better understand those using (or not using) financial services, and to connect what we learn with our core function of financial regulation.

Inspiring Futures

Inspiring Futures is our flagship corporate responsibility programme. It aims to build skills, confidence and resilience in young people. 

As part of the programme, we've partnered with three secondary schools in Newham, London:

• Sarah Bonnell Secondary School
• Rokeby School
• Lister Community School

The programme supports our social mobility agenda and is delivered through a series of school-based activities, which have recently been adapted and are currently being delivered virtually and face to face.

We believe working with young people can help prevent future societal issues and provide effective and sustainable change.

CEO Challenge

Each year, as part of the CEO Challenge, our new cohort of graduates and apprentices are split into teams to work on a social impact project within our local community. The projects primarily focus on providing financial literacy to support young people and vulnerable adults.

The CEO Challenge has run since 2011 and since then we have supported dozens of charities and community organisations.

Projects have included:

• developing financial literacy resources for domestic abuse charities
• working with people experiencing homelessness to support with access to bank accounts
• working with prison-leavers to support them with the life skills they need to re-join the community
• providing financial literacy advice to refugee communities 
• working with care leavers and young carers to support them with life skills
• providing resources and delivering workshops to young people about the dangers of cryptocurrency

These projects complement our business goals, benefit the community, and help our new graduates and apprentices develop professional skills.