Victoria Miles
Northamptonshire Community Foundation has begun its search for a new chief executive.
Victoria Miles, who has held the position for the past 15 years, is leaving to take on a new role as chief executive of The Parks Trust, which manages and maintains more than 4,000 acres of green space and parkland in Milton Keynes.
Rachel Mallows, chair of trustees at the foundation, said: “We are looking for a very special, committed person to lead the foundation in the years to come, someone who can build on Victoria’s work and continue to grow the organisation so it can support people and communities and for decades and generations to come.”
Ms Miles took over as chief executive five years after the Northamptonshire Community Foundation was set up. The charity has grown to one that awards around £1.4 million a year in grants to voluntary and community organisations around the county and has a £20 million endowment. In 2020-21, during the pandemic, it awarded a total of £2.6 million.
“The Foundation were literally life savers,” said Ms Mallows.
Ms Miles received a MBE in the New Year’s Honours list in recognition for services to the community in Northamptonshire during Covid-19. She has also been a Deputy Lieutenant of Northamptonshire since 2016.
“I am forever in awe of the groups we support,” she said. “We are the voice of those community and voluntary groups and that is what I am most proud of – shouting for people who do not have a voice because they are busy on the front line fighting to make a difference and improve lives.
“We have made this organisation utterly sustainable, fit to support those in need for generations to come. I would not leave if I did not know the foundation was in such a great place. The time is right.”
Ms Mallows says: “Victoria has been extraordinary and The Parks Trust will undoubtedly continue to thrive under her leadership. I would like to take this opportunity, on behalf of my fellow trustees, staff and all the groups Victoria has worked with, to offer our profound gratitude and best wishes for her future career.”
Ms Miles is already preparing the organisation for her successor. She will, she says, remain a supporter and Friend of the Foundation.
“I am so proud to have been a custodian of this incredible charity, one that continues to build something that is forever, not just for now,” she says. “The Foundation is here for the problems, challenges and issues of the future. What a privilege it has been to head up this incredible organisation and what an exciting role this will be for my successor, the Foundation’s new custodian.”
To find out more, visit www.ncf.uk.com
