Supporting charities with Mike Wild

Meet the Mancunian-10.1- Mike Wild - transcript

Intro

Hello listeners, and welcome to Season 10 of the Meet the Mancunian podcast: social impact stories from Manchester. I'm your host, Deepa Thomas-Sutcliffe, offering you a warm Mancunian welcome.

I'm delighted to bring you Season 10, where I celebrate community heroes across Manchester. I hope, dear listener, you can learn from their life experiences, the challenges they have overcome, and their passion for their cause.

My aim for the Meet the Mancunian podcast is to inspire you to live your life with purpose and impact, inspired by the stories my guests share every Tuesday throughout the season.

You can listen to the podcast on Apple Podcasts, Spotify or my website meetthemancunian.co.uk. Get ready for another season full of thought-provoking conversations and life changing stories.

Welcome to the first episode of Season 10 of the Meet the Mancunian podcast: social impact stories from Manchester.

Meet Mike Wild: Passion for the VCSE Sector

Ep 10.1 - Meet Mike Wild

[00:01:08] Deepa Thomas-Sutcliffe: Passionate about supporting the VCSE sector. We hear from Mike Wilde, Chief Exec, Macc.

In Mike's own words,

[00:01:15] Mike Wild: We support the 3,000, getting on getting towards 4,000 voluntary groups, community groups, faith organisations, social enterprises, charities, all of that social stuff that makes places work well. And basically, I always say it's our job is to make good stuff happen.

[00:01:34] Deepa Thomas-Sutcliffe: Thank you so much, Mike, for taking the time today.

[00:01:37] Mike Wild: Thanks, Deepa. Great to be with you.

[00:01:39] Deepa Thomas-Sutcliffe: What sparked your interest in working with the Manchester community? Is there a defining moment that started that journey?

Mike's Early Journey and First Job

[00:01:45] Mike Wild: I started at school wanting to do, volunteering and charity stuff. And it never occurred to me I could actually do that as a thing. I'd say ‘career’ in inverted commas, because I have no sense of career, really.

And I'm not from Manchester originally. I'm from the Wirral. And I'm a musician and decided to move to Manchester because it seemed like a cool place. It was, more diverse, it was more progressive and thought it would be a good place to be a musician. So, I moved here with a few friends, some years ago.

And thought, okay the music thing's not going to pay me. Try and find a job I could do. And I saw a job at what was then called Age Concern, it's now Age UK working in an office in Burnage.

And it never occurred to me that you could actually get paid to work in the charity sector. And I thought that's good. I could do the nice socially responsible charity stuff and still have time to do music. Because it didn't matter to me, as long as I had a roof over my head and time to do the music, time to do some social stuff, it doesn't really matter where, which one brings in the cash, if you like.

Oh, that was a light bulb moment.

Joining Macc and Early Experiences

[00:02:56] Mike Wild: And then practically on my first day, I met Macc. Because as the reception worker, I had to put phone calls through from this organisation called Macc. Over time, I got to know not just what the organisation I was working in was doing, but the sense of actually there's much more out there.

And because I moved into working on an advocacy project for older people. I became interested in it, it's not just the support you provide individuals, it's how you try and change the systems. If you're not trying to address the causes of problems, you're just solving the effects. So that kind of became the next interest, so I progressed and then a job came up at Macc, so I applied for it and got it.

[00:03:37] Deepa Thomas-Sutcliffe: Thanks so much. That is such an interesting journey. I love that it started in school, volunteering, and then your music and volunteering passions becoming full time work passions coinciding and that bringing you to Macc.

So tell us more about how did you get involved with Macc? You've been there a long time, if I remember right, from the Spirit of Manchester Awards. A little bit about your journey there and what does Macc do right now?

[00:04:05] Mike Wild: I got involved with Macc practically the first day I started working in the Manchester voluntary sector. Age UK is a national charity. So I got involved in doing some work around developing advocacy support for older people in care, lost in the system.

I got quite passionate about that. So it was those kinds of interests that sort of got me into the idea, there's something I could do usefully, I think, here. And Macc was, in those days, it was a very small organisation. It was just focused on health and social care. It had been set up by the old Manchester CVS in the early 80s as a campaign group around community care.

That's where the name comes from originally. And they were looking for a policy. So by this time, I was actually managing a project that I was working on at Age UK and thought, Oh, I'll have a management. No, I think I'd rather just do policy stuff. I was really lucky. I got the policy job at Macc and at the same time, Macc was recruiting for their very first ever chief executive.

It's called coordinator in those days. They didn't appoint anyone in the first round at the same time as I got the policy job. And so they had a bit of a reflection, a few months went by. And they advertised again. And by this stage, I'd got over my anxieties about management and stuff like that. And thought I can see some things I could maybe do here.

I went in and because when I was young, I'd done drama and acting and bits and pieces. And I always think interviews are a bit like an audition. They're looking for your version of the part. That's all you've got. You can't pretend to be, acting is pretending to be somebody else, but there's your interpretation of the role.

And I just thought, I’ve got some ideas for how you could do this role. I still can't, I don't know where the nerve, courage, whatever came to say this., but I actually went into the interview for the Co-ordinator to Chief Exec role as it now is, and said to the trustees who were interviewing, I really like where I am. I love the policy job. So, I'm throwing my hat in the ring. If you find somebody else who you think would be brilliant in this job, please give it to them. I just thought I would say I'm here and these are my thoughts about this role. And if you're interested.

So they did. They gave it to somebody else who after six months or so in a probationary period said, you know what, this isn't for me. I got a phone call from the trustees who said, you said you were interested in the role. Are you still interested? And I said if you like. I think the courage came from, I was quite happy to stay where I was. It wasn't about ambition or profile or anything like that.

It was just, I've got some thoughts. And so, I said, yes and that was 20 years ago in January. Wasn't some sort of big plan. It was just me thinking, I think I could do something useful there. And people taking a chance on me and giving me a go.

[00:07:14] Deepa Thomas-Sutcliffe: That is such a lovely story because it talks about like you are meant to be in this position. It was like everything you were doing, your advocacy work in Age UK. The policy role. You putting your hat in the ring but getting a second chance. It was just meant to be.

[00:07:30] Mike Wild: It does look like a pathway when I look back at it.

[00:07:33] Deepa Thomas-Sutcliffe: It makes sense. And that's the interesting thing about life, isn't it? That at the time, you're not seeing the pattern, but it is there.

Macc's Role and Impact in Manchester

[00:07:40] Deepa Thomas-Sutcliffe: Tell us more about Macc. I know it's hugely influential in the Manchester community, but this is listeners in 50 countries around the world. They'd love to learn more.

[00:07:49] Mike Wild: Macc is an organisation, one way of describing it is we're a charity that supports all the other charities. There's usually something like a chamber of commerce that gets all the businesses together. So, what gets all the charities and the social stuff together? And over the last 110 years or so in the UK, there's been these things called CVSs, Councils for Voluntary Service, or some sort of equivalent.

There was a kind of realisation that you need a good support for all that stuff to happen, to encourage it, in the same way that you do with businesses and other institutions. So Macc is the one of those that covers the city of Manchester.

 An organisation whose basic job is support local social sector, VCSE you will, the language changes over time, but the basics, support them to be really good, help them find funding, help them find volunteers, help them talk to the local authority, help them talk to the NHS, share information around the system.

We may have moved from sending everything out in print to doing everything digitally, but fundamentally that role is still the same. And it seems to be part of the way places work in the UK, certainly, because there are similar organisations up and down the country.

So that's really what Macc does. We support the 3, 000, getting on getting towards 4, 000 voluntary groups, community groups, faith organisations, social enterprises, charities, all of that social stuff that makes places work well. It's not just about tackling the challenges in places. Some of it is about just community stuff like culture and, looking after places, looking after gardens or parks or things like that. Our job is to help support all that. And basically, I always say it's our job is to make good stuff happen.

[00:09:41] Deepa Thomas-Sutcliffe: Sounds like a really great idea. And I am so grateful because that is in a very small way, what the podcast Meet the Mancunian is trying to do, showcase the great work happening, create inspiration for people to go on to get involved and spread good news in a world where there is negativity. And there's lots to celebrate as much as there is to change. I also hear that in some ways these are very big problems. That's, it's cyclical in some ways. And there are things that we're always trying to do to spark change.

Challenges in the VCSE Sector

[00:10:14] Deepa Thomas-Sutcliffe: Tell me about the obstacles you've had to overcome, maybe looking back a year or two. What are the big challenges, let's say post pandemic?

[00:10:22] Mike Wild: There are so many. If I think about one that's come up this week even. Really passionate about trying to solve poverty. Obviously, that's probably the most fundamental thing that our sector does. And living wages issues. Real Living Wage this week the new rate has been announced; it's gone from 12 to 12.60 an hour.

And, Macc has been a Real Living Wage employer since that movement started. I remember sitting down, working out, I wonder if there's any research on what you actually need to live on. Because I always think we should lead by example as VCSE organisations. If we're trying to solve poverty, we should pay people enough to live on and not contribute to the problem that we're trying to solve. That makes sense. But, having conversations with colleagues this week, oh, can we afford this? How are we going to, how are we going to do that? 60p an hour, that makes, and people doing the maths and thinking, oh that's a 5 percent increase.

I'm not getting 5 percent increase on my funding. Most VCSE organisations have been propping up their activities with reserves if they have them or just trying to work harder and cut costs. And obviously, in the last couple of years we saw inflation go up massively and of course inflation doesn't mean the prices come down again at any point. They go high. They stay high. They just stop going high so fast so of course. They're all thinking, alright, how are we going to cover this increase?

Because we want to make sure that we keep to that living wage minimum standard. Things like that are constantly coming up. How can we find ways of getting that message out? If you want to work with good local VCSE organisations, you need to pay them enough to pay their staff.

I've become quite passionate since the pandemic about workforce issues in our sector, because I think there's a tendency to feel like you must burn yourself out for the cause. Cause none of us exactly get into this for the high paying salaries, despite what gets rolled out in the press occasionally.

I'm really trying to encourage organisations not to make their staff, whether they're paid or voluntary, feel like they've got to burn themselves out for the cause, to look after people. Because again, that's a kind of poverty. It's a kind of; we're creating more of the problems that we're supposed to be solving.

So we should be really good employers, we should be really good volunteer involving organisations, and we should, generally help people to be healthy and happy, whether we're providing support to them or actually just employing them.

[00:12:50] Deepa Thomas-Sutcliffe: Thanks so much for sharing that. And I have heard that from some of my guests that mental health and resilience is so important because you're so passionate. That's what draws you to the sector. And you can sometimes forget your self care. Like you said, organisations have a duty to build a little support system that kind of gives people that cushion and a little bit of space.

[00:13:13] Mike Wild: And one of the joys of the sector so often is you're surrounded by incredibly passionate people who care deeply. And I think part of my role is to say, and it's okay to care about yourself as well. And to check in and say, how are you doing? How are we all doing? Because I like that metaphor that you can't pull from an empty vessel. You can't pull from a bucket that's leaking because you've not looked after it. That's become more of a passion thing for me over the last couple of years.

[00:13:41] Deepa Thomas-Sutcliffe: That is really important. And I wish you more power to your elbow, as they say, to you and your team for all the wonderful work I'm sure you're doing in that space.

When you think about the impact that you've made so far, again, I'm thinking last couple of years rather than going many years because Macc made so much impact. What would you say are the big things? And I know Spirit of Manchester is one way to celebrate the wonderful community.

[00:14:05] Mike Wild: I think there's lots of individual things I think I could point to. But in some ways, I suppose it's really hard for us to show our impact. We're an organisation that supports other organisations and the impact we really care about is the impact those organisations create, not ours.

So it's very indirect and you very rarely see the end results. We just have to try and capture those stories of, is it working? Is it making a difference? So I love hearing little stories that tell me that it's working.

Because I've helped design a lot of stuff and create a lot of stuff that wasn't there previous. Even somebody saying, I got my job through your website, that's changed their life, that's changed their opportunities, opened their eyes to stuff is joyous to me.

Supporting the Community: Stories and Initiatives

[00:14:50] Mike Wild: We're supporting the Migrant Destitution Fund for Greater Manchester. It's a cash gift to people who've got no recourse to public funds. It's all done through public fundraising and some applying to grants and trusts and everything. And we offered to just basically, to do the admin for it. For nothing really, ,just as part of our contribution in that space.

We do get a bit of money towards it when there's some available, just to help cover our costs, but I'm not rigid about that on that one. And we've managed to give out thousands of these little, they're only tiny, it's 80 pounds. But if you're somebody who is scared and has fled here. And you are struggling because you can't get into the system and you've got to go through all these hoops and processes, most of which in the last few years have been very hostile.

Then at least having a message from somebody that we recognise the pressure you're under, here's something that might help. And that's done through collaboration across the sector. Because the way it works is, so we've got tons and tons of VCSE organisations in all around Greater Manchester. And those that work with refugees and asylum seekers they're part of our referral network.

So they will say, I've got somebody here who really needs a bit of help with this. They do a quick little online form for us. It goes to a panel and they just check it to make sure that it's appropriate. And then we pay that organisation, and they pay the person. So it's a really clever way of getting money out into people's pockets very quickly, with all proper safeguards and everything in place and some good robust process, because we do need some, handling public money.

But I know from the stories I read, even if the cash could always be more, because these things always can. The message that it sends that there are people who care, ignore what you might be hearing online or might be getting shouted at you in the street because it's been whipped up on social media or whatever.

There are people who care and you are welcome and you are supported. And I think it's that kind of stuff that I'm really proud of that we've managed to create ways of doing that, without it having to be a massive industrial machine that's, that constantly requires feeding and more money. It's just people working together to find ways to help and support. Those sorts of things I'm really proud of.

[00:17:18] Deepa Thomas-Sutcliffe: That is such a beautiful way to say that, like you said, make somebody feel welcome, help them with absolute essentials, or maybe a little luxury once in a while that they could just treat themselves to. People are facing so many difficult situations and almost being forced to leave their homes is terribly tragic. And I can understand they would want to have a sanctuary approach where their new home city is.

[00:17:42] Mike Wild: It becomes corrosive as well. That constantly living in anxiety. I think anything, even if we can just give a little breathing space from that. It's a start.

[00:17:54] Deepa Thomas-Sutcliffe: When you think about your field, and you've been in this VCSE sector for over 20 years, what is something that people often misunderstand?

[00:18:03] Mike Wild: There are a number of cliches about that. And one of them is the one I started with. Oh, you can actually get paid. I thought you were a volunteer. Where'd you get your money from? And I think, why did I never think that people would have got paid to work for these organisations?

Another is, oh, does that mean you work in a shop and sell second hand clothes? Because that's what most people see in terms of charities on high streets and things like that. I think people genuinely don't understand just how much is going on. People can probably name a few, high street charities, basically the ones that have got the shops.

And then if you dig a bit deeper, they could probably think about some more behind that, that they might've come across. And I was looking back over my own history and thought, Actually, yeah, that was a charity when I was very young and my parents divorced, we were involved with Gingerbread for a while, which supported one parent families through it.

And it never occurred to me at the time that these were people who were just doing it altruistically. But of course it had been there all along. It's things like that I find fascinating. That's why Spirit of Manchester is so good because you can see people's eyes pop open at just the wealth of stuff that's going on in the city.

[00:19:17] Deepa Thomas-Sutcliffe: I also love the fact that you include the videos, which kind of brings it to life as well. Those videos, that makes it very special.

[00:19:25] Mike Wild: You know if I said will you come along for an evening and sit and watch 60 stories of voluntary organisations? People go, whatever. Tell them it's a party and that there's voting and it's an awards ceremony. And suddenly you get all those stories in front of people in a very different way.

[00:19:40] Deepa Thomas-Sutcliffe: And I must say, excellent cake, since I was there this time. Very well done.

 I think this is the thing, right? It's about, we don't know what we don't know. So it's only if somebody has to open our eyes and just shine a light in a little way and say, actually, did you know there are 160,000 volunteers? I still have that stat, which you mentioned, which really fascinated me. I was like, wow, that's amazing because that shows you Manchester is a place of the heart, isn't it?

[00:20:06] Mike Wild: Totally. And that's volunteers in the voluntary sector. So it doesn't include people who volunteer in public services and things like that as well. So if you go to Greater Manchester level, it's half a million, which I just think is fabulous, and the the paid staff that work alongside those, so in Manchester, there's 32,000 paid people. Most of them are part time, but when you start to add it all up and you think there's this huge range of people who are there trying to make our places better and more inclusive and more friendly and more welcoming and all of those different things.

And I think in times when it feels quite bleak occasionally, and you see some of the things that are happening in the world, being aware of that is a huge tonic just to an individual. But being involved in it and being surrounded by those people, which I'm lucky enough to do, is amazing. I just meet so many wonderful people and it's a very positive space to be in. I keep wanting more people to do that.

[00:21:12] Deepa Thomas-Sutcliffe: Definitely. And I'm going to try and help through my podcast as well.

Advice for Aspiring Changemakers

[00:21:16] Deepa Thomas-Sutcliffe: What's your top tip for somebody who wants to make an impact in the community?

[00:21:21] Mike Wild: Find out what's going on around you and join in. There's a thing we tend to do where we want to start something new in it for it to be ours. And I think quite a lot of the time that's completely understandable because you're passionate about your thing. But actually, there's already tons of stuff going on and we will work better if we work together.

 I would say, you can look on our website or wherever you are. In other parts of the world, there are foundations and things like that. There are always, there's always something around. If you just spend a bit of time looking, there is always something around that is supporting this stuff. Have a look at that and then see what's your passion project there. There will be some way into it if you're not connected into it. And the online world has made it so much easier to navigate.

The other thing I would say is. You have a right to be there. So in UK model, we have, trustees of charities. And I get so disappointed when I hear people talk about, Oh, you need to be a finance expert or an HR expert or anything. You absolutely don't. You need to be a person who's willing to show up and ask questions in the same way that we do with juries. We trust our entire criminal system to having reasonable people who come along, sit with their peers and make decisions. That's the way charities should work as well.

It should be just local people getting involved to say how are we going to do this? Let's take responsibility for it happening together. So my other thing that I always say to people is if you're interested in finding out more about how these things work, be a trustee, it's free. You're giving up some time, but it's a really useful volunteering role and you will learn so much from doing it.

I've been trustee of a number of organisations, and I always learn more from doing it. So that would be my other tip is get involved in something and think about how you can get involved at that level.

[00:23:18] Deepa Thomas-Sutcliffe: Great tips. And I like that very much. And I've heard that from, again, many guests about collaboration and how together we can do more because we bring our special angles, which make a project even more meaningful and impactful. And the trustee tip is absolutely bang on. I've also, like you, been the trustee now for a number of years in a number of countries. And I totally enjoy that. I think it gives you a different perspective of the organisation and there'll be areas that you're not a specialist in and that's okay.

[00:23:47] Mike Wild: It's great if you're not a specialist because you can say, I don't understand this. Explain it to me. And that's good. That's a way of holding people to account, I think that's incredibly valuable.

Upcoming Events and Initiatives

[00:23:57] Deepa Thomas-Sutcliffe: An opportunity for you to talk about anything I haven't asked you about and anything specifically coming up over a Jan, Feb, March period that you'd like to shout out.

[00:24:06] Mike Wild: In January, we'll start on Spirit of Manchester 2025. Usually around February, March, the nominations open up. So around our different categories and things like that. So, we pick the categories for things that we want to celebrate about the sector, like volunteering and so on. So, keep an eye out for that one.

We're trying to, at the moment, think about how our communities are reacting and responding to the riots that we saw over the summer. Because I don't think it would be healthy to just assume, Oh it stopped now and everything's back to normal.

It clearly wasn't. So just done some work on that and a report coming out soon, which listens to the voices of communities, hopefully. And we'll have some events and bring some people together and hopefully get some, not just some positive activities going, but some really challenging but much needed conversations in communities about, what happened there and how do we avoid that happening again. And how do we make sure people feel safe and welcome again.

[00:25:09] Deepa Thomas-Sutcliffe: Spirit of Manchester 2025 sounds really exciting. And this bit about communities feeling safe and feeling, whether it be psychological safety or other elements of belonging and isolation. So many things I'm sure that will come out. I look forward to reading that if it's available to read.

Signature Questions and Closing Thoughts

[00:25:28] Deepa Thomas-Sutcliffe: I'm now going to move to the signature questions I ask all my guests, and hopefully this is the lighter part of the podcast. So the first one for you is what makes Manchester a unique place for social impact work?

[00:25:40] Mike Wild: Manchester likes to believe that it's radical and progressive. So that's positive. Sometimes I think it likes to have been radical and progressive and maybe struggles with it as a present tense thing. But there are lots of people who are here who believe in that stuff or are keen to see change happen and are willing to work together.

And the most beautiful thing of all of it is the sheer diversity that there is within people. the communities, because that brings all sorts of different perspectives, ways of working, ways of building new things. And that's why I moved here, like I said. And I think that creates a desire for people to find ways to live together happily and healthily and with adequate resources. I think that's something inherent in it. And a feeling like it's okay to be proud of that. It certainly helps.

[00:26:36] Deepa Thomas-Sutcliffe: Love that. As a new Mancunian, only three years or so, I've definitely felt welcomed and seen a really special side, especially with a little focus on the social impact community, as I would call it.

If you could have dinner with any historical figure in Manchester, who would it be with and why?

[00:26:55] Mike Wild: I would like to have probably dinner with somebody who wasn't a big figure in history, an ordinary person from the past, who, just to understand something about what life was like then. And maybe some of the things that we've perhaps forgotten about how hard people have struggled over the years and ways that, you know, because Manchester was very famous as the, the hub of the Industrial Revolution and, there was all that fabulous stuff about the workers protesting against slavery.

And I love the fact that was a movement of, regular day to day ordinary people. I don't really like describing people as ordinary because I think everybody's extraordinary in their own way, but somebody who is in the middle of all that, I think, would be fascinating.

Why is this important? You're living in this sort of machine age where you're used as a worker, but you're still reaching out to solidarity around the world. I'd love to know a conversation with somebody, just somebody totally whose name has been forgotten from history, about why that meant so much to them.

[00:28:03] Deepa Thomas-Sutcliffe: I would love to be a fly on the wall for that dinner. It would be very interesting, and I'm fascinated by history, historical stuff, so it would be great.

If you were to create a social impact superhero, what powers would they have and what cause would they fight for?

[00:28:19] Mike Wild: There's a really good book by an American woman called Joan Gary, and she's a sort of nonprofit guru in the US worked for GLAAD and a few others, but previously worked for MTV and stuff like that. And she starts her book actually with, not going to talk about a superhero. I'm going to tell you who I think is the real person who embodies everything and it's Kermit the Frog.

Because in the middle of the Muppet Show when the whole show is falling to pieces, he's running around trying to hold it all together, keep it going, keep everybody laughing, entertain everybody. And that really sang to me, as the thing. So, I think the most useful ability is the power to tell stories.

I think because that's what gets people in the end. That's what persuades funders. That's what influences those who do have more power to make change when you can really reach into them as human beings with the story. And I think sometimes we depersonalise our systems so much for understandable reasons, but I think sometimes it's become too process focused and not enough people focused.

So that would be a brilliant, storyteller who was compelling and had that. Because it's too glib to say it's always about money. I know money makes a huge amount of difference. I always say, in the voluntary sector, we're traveling through the desert. We do want to talk about water, but it's not the reason we're traveling. We just need to have enough to get us to the other side of the desert.

The money thing is important, but it's not the reason we do what we do every day. So that wouldn't be the superpower. I think it would be the ability to persuade people and enlighten with storytelling.

[00:30:02] Deepa Thomas-Sutcliffe: Think you're so right, that human instinct to sit around a campfire and hear a story and that changing a life or showing you a new path or thinking of a different perspective. So true.

What's the most important life lesson you've learned so far?

[00:30:17] Mike Wild: There's that cliche about nobody's ever on the deathbed said, I wish I'd spent more time in the office. I sometimes think we don't believe that in our sector, because it's not about being in the office, it's about having an impact and making the world a better place.

And I think it's okay to feel like, yes, I would always want to do more. But I think about getting the balance right. You're more effective if you pace yourself.

During the pandemic, there was that thing about it's not a sprint, it's a marathon. And I would say no, it's not a marathon. It's a relay race. We're all doing a bit. We're all passing something to other people and they're doing their bit.

 You know that thinking about it's all down to my personal effort. You're in a system you're with working with people. That's the life lesson I think I've probably picked up most.

[00:31:04] Deepa Thomas-Sutcliffe: Love that about the relay and everyone working in this big ecosystem together to actually make meaningful change happen. Really good one.

How can interested people reach out to you and learn more? Where can they find you and where can they find Macc?

[00:31:19] Mike Wild: So our website is manchestercommunitycentral.org. My contact details are on there. I'm on most social media things as just Mike Wild Macc. I would really encourage people to have a look at our YouTube channel if you need a lift, because it's full of all the Spirit of Manchester stories and everything that we do, and it's a nice one to dip into. So that's just Macc Manchester on YouTube.

[00:31:42] Deepa Thomas-Sutcliffe: Great tip, and I must say I haven't gone to the YouTube channel, so that's one to check out as well. And I will make sure it's in the show notes so people can actually find it easily.

Thank you so much, Mike. It's been amazing to talk to you today.

[00:31:55] Mike Wild: Great to talk to you Deepa. And thank you for all the work you're doing with the podcast. It's really appreciated.

[00:32:00] Deepa Thomas-Sutcliffe: It's a real pleasure.

Outro

Mike, I really enjoyed learning about supporting the charity sector today.

Dear listener, thank you so much for listening to the first episode of the Meet the Mancunian podcast Season 10. I hope today's episode has inspired you to make positive change wherever you live.

Tune in every Tuesday for a new episode or log on to my website meetthemancunian.co.uk to listen to all the episodes and learn more about my podcasting story.

Next week on Tuesday, 25 February 2025, I speak to Jolene Sheehan about supporting wellbeing in the community.

It's wonderful to hear from you, dear listener. You can share your story or send me a message on my website meetthemancunian.co.uk or on social media at the rate. MeettheMancunian on Instagram, Facebook and BlueSky. And at the rate MeettheMancunianPodcast on YouTube.

Thank you to my wonderful community of listeners. Remember, your voice, your story, and your actions matter. Share this episode with someone who needs to hear it. And let's inspire even more positive change.

To a better, kinder world and until next time, let's continue making Manchester and beyond a place of greater impact, compassion and action.