The Parish Giving Scheme (PGS) provides specialist services to the Church of England (CofE), offering secure and simple ways for people to give regularly to their chosen church. After operating as an independent charity for more than a decade, 2024 brought significant change for PGS as it officially became part of the CofE National Church Institution (NCI).
The Challenge
Communicating through change
PGS had been owned by its members, the 35 Church of England dioceses who had chosen to use the Scheme. Each member diocese contributed annual fees, making the Scheme freely available for all their parishes to use, with no costs for the churches or givers. By the end of 2023, PGS was processing almost £80m annually, from 80,000 regular givers, to almost 5,000 parishes.
Giving through PGS has proven to be one of the most effective mechanisms for growing regular giving, which is why the National Church and PGS carefully explored how to make its regular giving platform freely available to all churches in the Church of England.
At the end of 2023, PGS members voted to change the structure of the charity and it became part of the CofE NCI, funded centrally with additional investment to secure the long-term development of PGS services for givers and all churches.
Our Solution
Communications support
Unlike commercial mergers and acquisitions typically conducted in secrecy, this change of ownership required sensitive communications with multiple stakeholders throughout the process.
Team Target provided strategic communications counsel to PGS, alongside legal specialists in the advisory team, and worked in partnership with the NCI’s communications team, ensuring alignment of messaging.
We followed four key communications principles:
- To communicate internally with colleagues (PGS/NCI teams, PGS member dioceses and Giving Advisors) before we communicate externally with parishes, givers, the wider church community and the media.
- Respect the process for voting, giving members the space to consider then discuss the proposed change of ownership within the privacy and governance of the Extraordinary Members Meeting (EMM).
- Move swiftly to inform internally and externally, following the outcome of the vote and funding decision from the Archbishops’ Council.
- Provide open and ongoing support for answering questions, whether in a group setting online or in one-to-one meetings and correspondence.
Reactive media management
An anonymous ‘leak’ to the Church Times brought the proposed change of ownership to their attention, at a critical time while the members were registering their votes. Both comms teams and leaders for PGS and the National Church agreed an approach to provide clarity on the process that was taking place, while not pre-empting the outcome.
We prepared a written response, quote from the PGS CEO, and supplied a quality head shot. This swift and comprehensive response resulted in a positive and factually correct article, incorporating PGS key messaging.
The communications plan was quickly adapted and brought forward to ensure stakeholders were updated ahead of the article appearing in the press.
The Results
Positive outcomes
Working closely with PGS and the NCI we created an effective and agile communications programme that was critical to delivering a positive outcome for the change of ownership, including:
- Exceeding the threshold of member votes required for change of ownership
- Internal teams felt well informed and motivated
- Positive feedback from multiple parishes and diocesan contacts
- Minimal negative comments or queries from parishes
- Minimal gift cancellations
- Positive media coverage
”With Target’s wisdom and expertise, we have communicated effectively through significant change and transformation. As CEO, I love working with Target as I can lean into their counsel and access the support I need to shape strategy, deliver change and hold true to our values. What differentiates them as a key partner is their integration into our core team and ability to use our tone of voice. They deeply understand what we are trying to communicate and how we want to achieve our ambitious goals, which means they join us on the adventure, making our work life-giving and fun. I highly recommend them!"
Grant ForrestCEO, Parish Giving Scheme