Dr Mike Fearn
Member of AandR
Mike Fearn brings blended knowledge of public, voluntary and private sectors. With an eclectic range of qualifications ranging from religious studies, social psychology, education, management and IT service delivery, and with practical experience gained in a range of contexts he brings a broad base of knowledge to the role and an enquiring outlook.
Mike leads third-sector engagement for a UK-based international technology company. Before this, Mike had a varied career with the largest of the UK National Lottery distributors. During this period, he started as a Grants Officer, assessing grant applications for a range of funding programmes and gaining broad insight into organisations and activities within the sector. In this role he also carried out grant management work, requiring focussed and detailed work with the organisations receiving lottery funding. Mike progressed into service design, improving the tools and processes employed by the fund when interacting with applicants and grant-holders. This led to a move into technology, ensuring that the process improvements were reflected in the Fund’s main grant-making system. He left the Fund as Senior Head of Systems with a broad remit for IT delivery from business case generation through design, implementation, management through to benefits realisation.
This background in the Lottery Fund led Mike to a career in IT with a specific focus on the requirements of the third sector. Mike joined the board in 2020 when seeking local opportunities to contribute to the sector. Inspired by overwhelming positivity and voluntary effort in response to the COVID crisis, he wanted to engage directly in the sector.