Lead to Change: A New Network for Migrant-Led Organisations in Leicester, Leicestershire and Rutland

What happens when different organisations are hearing the same concerns from the communities they work with?

That is one of the questions behind Lead to Change, a new initiative from Afro Innovation Group bringing migrant-led organisations across Leicester, Leicestershire and Rutland together to identify shared issues and decide what we can do about them collectively.

Why We're Starting Lead to Change

Through our own casework and projects, we regularly hear about challenges around housing, employment, healthcare, accessing services and establishing a life in the UK.

Other migrant-led organisations have their own experiences and insight from the communities they work with.

Individually, these experiences help us respond to the person in front of us. When organisations bring them together, they can also help us spot patterns.

If the same barrier is being raised across different communities and organisations, we want to be better at documenting it, understanding it and asking: what needs to change?

That's where Lead to Change comes in.

What Will Actually Happen?

Lead to Change will hold regular meetings where migrant-led organisations can bring forward the issues they are seeing through their work.

Together, we will:

• Compare experiences from across our communities.

• Identify recurring challenges and emerging needs.

• Establish where there are shared priorities.

• Gather stronger evidence around those issues.

• Develop practical recommendations.

• Raise them with relevant partners and decision-makers.

• Explore joint action where it could make a difference.

The discussions won't end when the meeting does.

Where there is enough evidence around an issue, we want to turn what we're hearing into community insight reports, recommendations and clear asks for change.

Why Migrant-Led Organisations?

Migrant-led organisations often have relationships and conversations that larger institutions don't.

People come to us for practical support. They tell us when something isn't working. We see where people struggle to navigate systems and where the same barriers keep appearing.

That knowledge has value beyond individual service delivery.

Lead to Change is about making better use of it, while ensuring organisations retain their own voice and communities are involved in the conversations that affect them.

Not Another Networking Group

There are already valuable opportunities for organisations to meet and connect across Leicester, Leicestershire and Rutland.

Lead to Change has a different purpose.

The starting point is what organisations are seeing. The outcome should be action.

That could mean presenting shared evidence to a service provider, developing recommendations, responding collectively to a consultation, raising an issue with local decision-makers or working together on a practical response.

Not every conversation will result in a campaign or policy change. But the issues we take forward should be backed by what our organisations and communities are actually experiencing.

We Want You at the Table

We're now inviting migrant-led charities, community organisations, grassroots groups and social enterprises across Leicester, Leicestershire and Rutland to register their interest in Lead to Change.

If your organisation is hearing about challenges that need greater attention, we want to hear what you're seeing.

If other organisations are seeing the same thing, there may be something we can act on together.

Join Lead to Change and bring your organisation's experience to the table.

Register your interest → https://www.afroinno.org/lead-to-change