Open and Trusting: Accountability 2026

Open and Trusting is more than a tick box, or a pledge on paper. To ensure that the commitments are living, evolving and embedded in practice, we ask every community member to take part in our Accountability Process.  

“The most valuable conversation I’ve been part of in the funding space.” – Funder, 2024 peer review participant  

The Accountability Process comprises self-reflection; peer review sessions with trained and paid charity reviewers; and ends with the chance for every funder to renew their commitments.

Key Dates

Accountability FAQs 

Are you expecting everyone signed up to the eight Open and Trusting commitments to take part? 

Everyone who will have been signed up for more than 12 months as of 1 September 2025 is required to take part. For funders joining after then, participation is optional. 

What are we being held to account for?  

You will be asked to reflect on progress against your own commitments which you shared when you signed up to Open and Trusting. We’ll provide a reminder of these as part of the self-reflection guide.  

We will also ask you to think about adaptations to your practice in light of what charities have said matters most (through The Funding Experience Survey); and what’s achievable for you. 

We recognise that everyone is on a journey in relation to Open and Trusting Grant-making – all we’re asking is that you continue to reflect, engage and learn.  We can see opportunities for adaptations across all foundations who are part of this community. We hope that this process will bring a fresh perspective on what matters most to charities.  

Who from my organisation needs to take part? 

The accountability process is a distinctive and meaningful aspect of what it means to be part of the community of practice around O&T, keeping us thinking critically about how well we are living up to our commitments.” – Nick Addington, William Grant Foundation   

One representative per funder attends the peer review session. We’d encourage you to choose someone with enough seniority and knowledge of your funding practice to reflect meaningfully and make commitments on your organisation’s behalf. That being said, this can still be a shared process: other members of your team can play a valuable role, especially in contributing to the self-reflection form, and we would strongly encourage wider members of your team to get involved when refreshing your commitments too.

Two-and-a-half hours on Zoom feels like a significant time commitment. Is it really necessary? 

Our judgement is that this kind of time commitment is reasonable for a review process that takes place every other year – not least when compared to the time commitments required of grantees by most of their funders. It will be a participatory experience, with a mix of peer review and reflection. We will build in a break, as well as an opportunity for debriefing, so the time allocated to each foundation’s review will be around one hour. 

How are charity reviewers selected and trained? 

I got involved because of the promise of openness, transparency, and real positive change. And this process delivered that.” – Laura Ateyo, Open Harmony CIC, 2024 charity reviewer   

Since IVAR’s first Accountability process in 2022, the pool of charity reviewers has been growing. Throughout our wider projects and initiatives, IVAR identify charity leaders who are engaging, confident, empathetic and are attuned to the realties and challenges facing the sector. We then invite them to become charity reviewers. 

All charity reviewers receive facilitation training focused on supporting honest, exploratory conversations with funders, whilst holding an empathetic and positive space to identify where progress is most needed. 

What is shared, and with whom? 

Your self-reflection form is shared only with IVAR researchers, the charity reviewers and funder facilitating your peer review session. Notes from the session will be shared with you promptly afterwards, so you can use them to inform your refreshed commitments. 

By the end of February 2027, you will need to publish your eight refreshed commitments on the IVAR website. We will also publish a summary of how the community as a whole is committing to go further – but this will not attribute anything to individual funders beyond their published commitments. 

The aggregated findings from across all peer reviews will shape our programme of work for the coming year, including Community of Practice sessions, webinars, and research questions. We will share this openly with the whole community. 

More questions?  

You’ll find a lot more information in our information pack. Otherwise, whether this is your first or third Accountability Process we would be happy to answer any additional questions. Please email keeva@ivar.org.uk.