Throughout the 30-year history of Chance for Childhood, we’ve never been afraid to adapt or evolve to ensure that we are providing critical support to the children who need it most whilst keeping true to our values.
Over the past few years, we have made some big changes. We have localised our approach by establishing offices in Ghana, Uganda and Rwanda and shifted decision-making and strategy towards our African staff, partners and the communities we work with. We have challenged ourselves to deliver more inclusive approaches in harder-to-reach contexts to ensure that no child is denied their right to safety and education. And in the most uncertain times of the pandemic, we became first responders to children and communities who experienced soaring poverty, isolation and vulnerability. All the while, we have been finding our voice and consolidating our values into every part of who we are, who we help and what we represent.
We are immensely proud of all the steps we have taken in our commitment to shift power to the communities we work with. However, when we took a step back, we couldn’t see any of this reflected in our brand. With so many changes to the way we work, we suddenly realised that we had failed to communicate this to the outside world. Our brand wasn’t speaking our values. Our team of passionate and deeply committed staff were proud of the work we’re doing but we are struggling to connect with our communications and were failing to inspire partners and donors with a brand that hadn’t evolved with us.
Our brand was telling a different story. It wasn’t doing our work the justice that it deserves and without a unified voice we weren’t able to fully engage with funders, allies or supporters.
We wanted our brand to live and breathe our values; to show our partners and donors what we believe in without having to spell it out. But most importantly, we wanted to put the children and communities we work with at the centre of our communications with the dignity and respect they deserve.
So, we set about examining all the ways our brand could better represent the children and communities we work with. We asked ourselves some really challenging but important questions about how to ensure that children have their voices heard. This meant not only changing our visual identity but examining our language.
We wanted to make sure that we use a strengths-based approach in our language that recognises the strength, resilience and potential of the children we work with, rather than labelling them by their situation.
We’ve been hugely grateful to receive significant pro bono support from the wonderful team at Bright Sparks Agency to help this transformation. Bright Sparks understood how important this brand refresh was to us and has taken the time to truly understand the brand values and attributes that would best reflect our work. This process has allowed us to create consistency and tone of voice and a platform to ensure that children from all the communities we work with can be heard. This consistency is a metaphorical megaphone that all staff can now use to convey the impact of our work with authenticity to our funders, allies or supporters.
Over the next few months, you might notice a few changes as we continue this journey to ensure that our brand is truly child-centred. We are fortunate to have amazing donors and friends, many of who have supported us since the very beginning. We hope that these changes will allow us to better communicate to you the incredible impact of your donations and the difference you are making for children. And although we may look a little different, the heart and soul of the organisation remain the same.
