Impact Report 2023-2025
Online Community and Alumni Support: Beyond the Programme
The end of a programme doesn't have to be a cliff edge. From lifetime access to training libraries to alumni dinners and peer-led workshops, discover how Do it Now Now keeps its community connected, learning, and growing long after the final session.
A Living Network
What Happens After the Programme Ends?
For many organisations, the end of a programme can feel like a cliff edge. Support ends. Connections fade. Progress stalls.
At Do it Now Now, we take a different approach. Our commitment to members does not end when a programme finishes. Instead, we offer continued access to learning, connection, and opportunity through our online community and alumni network, a living ecosystem that keeps growing long after the final session.
The Mighty Networks: A Library of Learning
At the heart of our alumni support is Mighty Networks, an online platform where every participant gains lifetime access to:
Recorded training sessions: Watch back key sessions whenever they need a refresher
Resource libraries: Curated tools, templates, and guides
Community discussions: Connect with peers across cohorts and programmes
For example, a participant from Innovate Now with City Bridge Foundation, two years later, reached out to say she wanted to revisit materials from her programme, not just for herself, but to share with her new staff members. This is the power of lifetime access. Learning does not expire; it remains available when members are ready.
"We sometimes find that people come back to the training sessions months after. They are now experiencing some of the things we taught them, and they want to watch it back to relearn."
Our library now spans five years of content. A podcast series on how to start a podcast, recorded in 2020, was still accessible to a member in 2026. These resources are not static; they are a living archive that continues to serve new generations of members.
Events That Respond to Real Needs
Our online community is not passive. We actively listen to what members need, through feedback forms, Critical Friend insights, and informal conversations, and design events in response.
Recent examples include:
Storytelling, PR & Media: How to package your organisation's story to attract your ideal audience
Learning with AI: Using AI to support productivity and social enterprise growth
Wellness Sessions: Check-ins and wellbeing activities woven throughout our programming
These events are not one-size-fits-all. They are tailored to the themes that emerge from the community, ensuring that our support remains relevant, responsive, and practical.
Alumni in Action
From Participant to Practitioner
One of the most powerful ways we support our alumni is by inviting them to become contributors. Members who have completed our programmes often have deep expertise and lived experience that can benefit others. So we invite them to:
Deliver wider skills sessions: Sharing their knowledge on topics they are experienced in
Speak at events: Raising their profile and connecting with new audiences
Facilitate workshops: Becoming trainers, critical friends, or mentors for new cohorts
This creates a virtuous cycle: alumni gain visibility, credibility, and new opportunities, while new members benefit from peer-led learning grounded in real-world experience.
A good example is one of our Critical Friends on CBFI, whose expertise in marketing and business academia was so valued that she now delivers training sessions for the non-grant team. Her insights continue to shape how new members learn to market themselves and their organisations.
Levels Up: From Non-Grant to Grant and Back Again
Our alumni support is also designed to help members progress through the levels. For those who start with us at Level 1 or 2 (SUSO, BHG), we encourage them to apply for Level 3–5 programmes (Innovate Now, Make it Big, Big Business) when they are ready to scale.
But the movement is not only upward. Sometimes, an established grantee may lack foundational business basics, and a non-grant programme might be exactly what they need to build that ground knowledge. We have seen this happen, and it reinforces our belief that learning is not linear. Our alumni support is flexible enough to meet members wherever they are.
Bringing It In Person: Alumni Dinners & Networking
In 2024, we began experimenting with in-person alumni gatherings, starting with an Alumni Dinner that brought together participants from different cohorts and programmes. The response was overwhelmingly positive.
Plans for 2025 and beyond include:
More alumni dinners: Bringing together members from across programmes
In-person networking sessions: Creating space for connection, collaboration, and shared working
Inspired Network: Fireside chats where alumni share their experiences around themes like wellness, social enterprise, and growth
These events are not just about networking; they are about rebuilding community. For many members, especially those who joined during the pandemic, these gatherings are their first time meeting fellow participants face-to-face. The connections forged there often lead to collaborations, partnerships, and friendships that outlast any single programme.
Read More of the Impact Report 2023-2025
-
Community at a Glance
In 2025, our community grew to 2,450 members across the UK, with Black and Global Majority-led organisations at the heart of everything we do. From £2.65 million in grants disbursed to leadership confidence nearly doubling, see the data behind our growing impact.
-
Theory of Change
Our Theory of Change starts with a simple belief: when Black and Global Majority changemakers get the right support at the right stage, they build organisations that transform communities. Discover the five-level system behind DiNN's programmes, and the data proving it works.
-
How Do it Now Now Keeps Lived Experience at the Centre
Our legitimacy doesn't come from good intentions alone. Meet the Community Advisory Board members, entrepreneurs, therapists, strategists, and alumni, who shape how Do it Now Now governs, decides, and stays accountable to the communities we serve.
-
How We Design Learning That Moves Founders From Intention To Action
Discover ASAP: our four-stage framework moving Black and Global Majority founders from Awareness through to Personalisation, helping intention become action.
-
Online Community and Alumni Support: Beyond the Programme
The end of a programme doesn't have to be a cliff edge. From lifetime access to training libraries to alumni dinners and peer-led workshops, discover how Do it Now Now keeps its community connected, learning, and growing long after the final session.
-
From Seed to Scale: What Five Founder Journeys Teach Us About Building Sustainable Social Enterprises
From a solo sip-and-paint business to a parkour gym facing an existential lease crisis, see how DiNN's Level-Based Programmes meet social entrepreneurs where they are, and help them build what lasts.
-
From Fragility to Resilience: What Our Health Checks Reveal
Every organisation we work with completes a developmental Health Check, first at baseline, then months later. Across 64 organisations in our Innovate Now programme, scores rose with significant gains in governance, finance, and community impact.
-
The Evidence for Impact: How DiNN Programmes Turn Learning into Outcomes
A strong programme leaves people encouraged and equipped to act. See the data behind DiNN's outcomes, tracking how confidence, partnerships, and funding shift for participants in the months after they complete a programme.
-
Why The Journey Does Not End When a Programme Finishes
Support rarely arrives as one clean intervention. It's a Health Check here, a grant there, a mentoring session somewhere else. Meet Carib Eats, MEM Academy, and Youth League UK, three founders whose journeys show what happens when support becomes a connected pathway instead.
-
Partnering to Build Better Pathways to Black and Global Majority-Led Change
Funders like City Bridge Foundation, Wellcome Trust, and Esmee Fairbairn Foundation partner with DiNN because reaching Black and Global Majority-led organisations well takes more than money, it takes lived experience, care, and evidence-based design.
-
How We Are Solving the Gaps That Stop Black and Global Majority-Led Organisations from Growing
Black and Global Majority-led organisations aren't short on talent or community trust. What's missing is infrastructure: the funding pathways, investment readiness, and civic support that turn good work into lasting impact. Here's where those gaps are, and how DiNN is built to close them.
-
List of Grantees
From grassroots youth groups to climate initiatives, arts collectives to health-focused CICs, see the full list of Black and Global Majority-led organisations we've supported since 2023, a snapshot of the ecosystem we're helping to build.
Join DiNN Community
DiNN Community is a safe and intentional online platform available to all Black individuals and leaders wanting to access resources, network, and share research and lived experiences.
Get in touch with Ozias for more
information
Want to get more involved, ask a question, or share some ideas? Feel free to get in touch.