Who We Are
Change Grow Live is one of the largest charities in the UK, and the UK’s largest third-sector provider of health and social care services. Since our earliest days we’ve been committed to confronting social, economic, and health inequalities head-on, delivering:
- Local impact – we work hard to improve services and experience.
- Inclusive, quality services – built on partnership and multi-disciplinary expertise.
- Research and evidence – learning and sharing what works.
- A voice – collaborating with and sharing the personal stories of people with lived and living experience to drive systemic change.
- Compassionate care – a commitment to everyone’s right to the support they need to live a better life.
Our areas of expertise are:
- Drug and alcohol prevention, treatment and recovery support for children, young people and adults.
- Supporting people during and after involvement with the criminal justice system.
- Helping people we support into work and training.
- Street outreach, supporting and connecting homeless people to essential services and accommodation.
- Encouraging and helping people who want to stop smoking.
Established in 1977 as a volunteer-led initiative in Sussex, we have evolved into a nationwide organisation.
Each year, we deliver support and care to more than 200,000 people across more than 250 services in England and Scotland.
We are one of the largest employers of healthcare professionals outside of the NHS, thanks to our teams of medics, psychiatrists, nurses, pharmacists, trained staff and lived experience volunteers and peers.
Together, our teams work with the people who access our services to help them transform their lives, meet their goals and achieve their full potential.
Our Mission, Vision and Values
Our work is guided by a simple principle that experience tells us works: believe in people.
We believe that, with the right opportunities and support, anyone can change their life for the better.
Our mission is to transform lives by providing services built on evidence and compassion, rooted in the communities we serve.
Our vision is a world where people are seen for their potential, not judged on their problems.
Our values work together as principles that guide the way we act and the choices we make: be open, be compassionate, be bold.
Our 2025-2030 Strategy
Last year, we launched a strategy built around a simple idea: Helping more people, sooner.
The idea was simple. The challenge, in a world where resources are never enough, was anything but.
Our strategy is driven by a belief that people have a right to high quality healthcare. In 2023 we conducted a review of our governance activities against the Charity Commission’s Governance Code, to ensure that the people who access our services are receiving the highest possible standard of care.
Over the past year, that idea has begun to shape how we work and how people experience our support.
We’re on a journey to making it easier to find help, extending support beyond office hours, across weekends, and into places and formats that fit more naturally around people’s lives.
We’ve taken steps to confront stigma head-on, challenging the narratives that reduce people to their problems. Alongside this, we continue to advocate for policies and conversations that leave people feeling less judged and more able to ask for help.
Behind the scenes, we’ve started giving staff and volunteers more time to care. Smarter systems, better tools and more automation are beginning to take pressure off everyday tasks, giving our people back more time for the work that matters most.
We’ve also begun understanding the things that distract us day to day. The ambition is fewer meetings and emails, quicker and easier access to training and specialist expertise, and a stronger focus on quality clinical supervision are helping to create the conditions people need to do their best work. Because care only works when the people delivering it are supported too.
There’s plenty more to do. But the direction is clear. Sooner is better. And working together makes it possible.
Why join us as a trustee?
As a trustee, you will play a crucial role in helping us achieve our 2025-30 strategy which provides us with a roadmap for using innovation, flexibility and our sector expertise to reach more people than ever and deliver lasting change.
You will help to guide our strategic direction, ensure excellence in our governance, foster a culture of learning and innovation, and uphold the charity’s mission to transform lives and communities for the better.
If you want to help us make a difference, we’d love to hear from you.
“The trustee role at Change Grow Live is exceptionally interesting because you’re dealing with a multitude of different factors, with a primary focus on the safety and positive experience of the people who use our services.
There’s digital transformation happening, and organisational transformation, and part of the role of a trustee is helping the executive and leadership team to think about and develop that change in a way that creates a better experience for the people we serve.
It’s exciting because it’s already a successful organisation, but now it’s transforming into something else beyond that and as a trustee I can help to guide that change.”
Michael Vavakis
Trustee