Devant helps Catch22 charity find more ways out for young people

London, 18th May 2009 – Devant, (http://www.devant.co.uk) a specialist in commercial contracts and negotiation, today announced the success of a leadership development programme with young people’s charity Catch22, to help it to deliver its programmes more effectively to more young people across the UK.

Like many organisations in the voluntary sector Catch22 is dependent for most of its funding on contracts with local authorities and others that commission its services. Although it is a non-profit organisation, Catch22 needs to maximise revenues and minimise risks in order to minimise losses and ideally generate financial surpluses from its work. Sufficient surpluses are critical to help Catch22 to sustain and develop its infrastructure and delivery capability and so help more young people to achieve.

In mid-2008, as Catch22 was formed from the merger of two national charities, the senior management team recognised an ideal opportunity develop the commercial awareness and competency of the leaders and senior managers of the new organisation.

Tiffany Kemp, Managing Director of Devant, worked with Catch22 executives to define the objectives of the programme to win more projects on better commercial terms in order to invest more in service delivery and so help more young people.

Devant designed a programme of workshops and follow-up support covering commercial contracts, commercial management and contract negotiation.

Chris Wright, National Director of Operations for Catch22, undertook the training with his operational management team, over two days in December 2008.

In Chris’s view: “Devant’s approach to the subject (of commercial contracts) is far removed from the ‘dry as dust’ legalese that I anticipated. The training is founded on pragmatic, business-oriented principles that made it very easy for us to relate important commercial and contractual issues to our everyday activities. Prior to the Devant training we often found it difficult to negotiate effectively with commissioners because we didn’t always understand where our risks were, resulting in projects that drained our resources and constrained our ability to compete effectively for more projects.”

Training and support for eighteen senior managers continued over four days in February 2009.

Now that the Catch22 team is using the skills and knowledge acquired through the Devant training and support, Chris says he is already seeing a difference: “Managers are being more proactive about commercial issues. They are raising more questions about proposed contract terms from commissioners and are able to enter contract negotiations with their eyes wide open. In addition, they are now more confident about setting appropriate expectations with commissioners which is improving the risk profile of projects and, hence, the operational and financial outcomes for Catch22.”

Tiffany Kemp commented: “We were delighted to have this opportunity to work with Catch22 and it’s great to see a client making such good progress so quickly following our programme. We have also been pleased to see the extent to which the Catch22 team continue to keep themselves refreshed with the training through our online resource centre.”

Fran Pollard, Catch22’s Director of New Business Development, added: “As Government relies more and more heavily on the voluntary sector to deliver services in support of its social policies, the potential for delivering significant benefits to young people has increased – but so have the risks to providers, both commercial and operational. It is essential that the voluntary sector is equipped to negotiate a fair balance between the risk taken by commissioners and that taken by themselves. Catch22, with help from Devant, is at the very forefront of this drive.”

- ends -

About Devant
Devant Limited is a UK based company, established in 2003 to provide Contractual and Commercial Management services. Devant services enable clients to create, negotiate and implement contracts that reflect how companies sell, deliver and support their products and services as well as how they manage their commercial partnership/reseller or distributor relationships.
In addition to their consultancy practice, Devant also offers accessible, targeted and relevant training for executives, sales teams, and project managers in all aspects of contract structuring and negotiation. For more information, please visit www.devant.co.uk

About Catch22
•     Catch22 works with 34,000 young people in more than 150 towns and cities in England, Wales and Northern Ireland. It helps young people find ways out of tough situations by building strong relationships with them and tackling the problems they face through specialist projects.
•    Catch22 is the new charity formed by the merger of young people’s charity Rainer and crime prevention charity Crime Concern in July 2008. It has 200 years of experience working with young people.
To find out more go to www.catch-22.org.uk