Accountability
Transform is a registered charity and a recipient of public funding. We are a festival and producing company focused on reflecting society and supporting a wide range of people from different walks of life to explore their creativity and experience performance. We are committed to critiquing our own practises and procedures and being accountable across our work.
We see this as an ongoing process which will never be ‘complete’. However, at this moment, more than ever, we think there is much value in arts organisations like Transform sharing their practise and procedures as they evolve and being transparent about their work.
Our Commitments
At Transform we are committed to:
Contributing to thinking and innovation around what a festival of the future can look like and represent, with consideration for environmental sustainability, access and inclusion
Embracing and promoting equality and inclusion as fundamental to our core ethos and activities
Taking an equity-centred and inclusive approach in the way we engage with, support and collaborate with creative people, artists and team members
Taking an intersectional approach when developing our company and our programme, with consideration of ‘protected characteristics’ such as age, gender, race, disability, sexual orientation and considering marginalised positions and their barriers
Holding ourselves accountable for representation within the organisation, our partnerships, collaborations and programme and seeking to redress imbalances of power and representation across our work
Supporting and amplifying artists and creatives from a range of backgrounds; including those who are ethnically and culturally diverse and who experience racism, who are LGBTQI+ and non-binary, and who identify as disabled or neuro-diverse
Taking an intersectional approach when developing our company and our programme, with consideration of ‘protected characteristics’ such as age, gender, race, disability, sexual orientation and considering marginalised positions and their barriers
Holding ourselves accountable for representation within the organisation, our partnerships, collaborations and programme and seeking to redress imbalances of power and representation across our work
Our Board & Team
The representation across our current core team and board is 82% female, 36% LGBTQI+, 46% are people who are ethnically and culturally diverse and experience racism in our society, 18% identify as neuro-diverse and 9% identify as disabled. Transform is a relatively young organisation – 36% of our team and board are between 20-29 years old and 36% are between 30-39 years old. We are committed to further building representation across our team in respect of protected characteristics and are dedicated to ensuring access and care is embedded at Transform in terms of the direct experience that trustees, staff and artists have when working with Transform. As a small and non-regularly funded organisation this work is active and ongoing and we look forward to sharing further details as we progress a well-being policy and define key approaches in future.
Policies
Transform has a number of active policies in place to support and guide the trustees, team and our wider collaborators in their work. All our policies are available on request but at this time we particularly want to draw attention to our Equality and Inclusion Policy and our Safe-Guarding Policy. We are in the process of developing a new Sustainability policy and Braver Spaces policy which will also be shared publicly in due course.
Anti-Racism
Transform commits to being an anti-racist organisation, working to disrupt white normative approaches and entrenched racism within theatre, the wider arts sector and society more broadly. We commit to this as a practise, taking the approach of Accomplices; working to create change, treating this work as focused and ongoing, finding ways to relinquish power.
We aim to shape an organisation where artists and creative people who are ethnically and culturally diverse and who experience racism, can feel supported and realise their potential. We also aim to contribute to creating a fairer cultural sector that is more reflective of our intersectional communities and (inter)national context. We acknowledge this work is an ongoing process and will never be ‘complete’ however at this time, we have set out a handbook for our trustees, team and collaborators which focuses on identified aspirations and actions that we will be focusing on over the next three years and which will continue to be reviewed and evolve. Read our handbook.
Accountability
Over the last year we have been considering how an arts organisation can be accountable and remain active in terms of its commitments to societal change. We want to think about accountability less as a destination, more as an ongoing practise, and make sure we are creating ongoing space for listening, reflection, transformation and renewal as a team and organisation.
With this in mind we have created two new areas of practise:
Accountability Practise Group
We have assembled together a number of representatives from our team and board to form an ‘Accountability Practise Group’ who will meet quarterly to reflect upon, consider and scrutinise the company’s practices and approaches. Particular strategic objectives and focuses of this work will include Transform’s anti-racist practice, the company’s approach to and support for trans rights, the company’s strategic objectives in regards to access and disability justice, and the company’s approach to environmentally sustainable practices in relation to the global climate emergency.
Listening Model
As part of this practise, we want to promote a Listening Model, where we can make ourselves available for listening and conversation with our wider community. Anybody working with Transform or accessing Transform’s work can offer feedback, make a suggestion, raise an issue, question or provocation. We want to challenge ourselves, and actively listen and understand how we can evolve our practices for the better. To participate, please contact Transform’s Producer (Creative People) Lily Lavorato, who will explain the process in more detail including options around anonymity, and set up a conversation with someone from the team or the appropriate person external to the organisation.
Complaints Procedure
The process outlined above is separate to Transform’s evaluation model for festivals and projects, and distinct to the company’s formal complaints procedure (where a formal complaint can be made in writing to the Creative Director, Chair or Deputy Chair). The Listening Model is designed to ensure we are available and accountable to our community in an ongoing way, which can in turn help shape and inform our ongoing work.
Members of Transform’s Accountability Practise Group are currently:
Amy Letman, Jane Bhoyroo, Toni Dee Paul, Ingrid Banerjee Marvin, Jay Millard. Facilitated by Lily Lavorato. We are currently consulting with our wider community around focuses of the group and possibilities around extended representation from beyond the core trustees/team.
Financial Accountability & Access
Transform is a non regularly funded arts organisation, with the majority of our funding coming from grant applications to national and local government, and trust and foundations.
Following each festival, we produce and share a detailed report including a financial breakdown of our income and expenditure (which can also be accessed publicly via the Charities Commission website). Our latest festival report on Transform 19, can be found here.
As part of our commitment to inclusion and accessibility, Transform is trialling a Pay What You Can ticket model. Audiences can select from a range of ticket options, making a choice based on their individual financial circumstances.
We hope that this approach, inspired by some fantastic organisations in our home city and across the world, will mean that a greater number of people can have access to the performances and events we present, and that finance will be less of a barrier. We hope this approach will enable more people to take more risks on discovering extraordinary, unusual and international performance. By trialling this approach and through our next festival, we want to be able to have more of a transparent conversation around the costs that go into realising the festival and the kinds of projects Transform is known for.
Find out more.