Jan’s career at Royal Mencap Society spans 22 years during which she established Golden Lane Housing, was the director responsible for Mencap’s personal support division for 11 years, and has been Chief Executive since 2013.
Explaining her decision, Jan said:
‘Finding the right time to hand over the baton is always difficult particularly so when it involves an
organisation
An organisation are a group of people who work together.
and team as inspiring as Royal Mencap. But we are approaching the end of the first five-year phase of the Big Plan which we published in early 2015. It therefore feels the right time to hand over to the person who will lead the development and implementation of its
strategy
A strategy is a plan to show what an organisation, or a person, wants to do and how they are going to do it.
for the coming five years. Leading Mencap has been a great privilege and I am proud of what we have achieved in recent years.’
Derek Lewis, Chair of Mencap’s trustees said:
‘Jan has been inspirational in her leadership and in her dedication to the interests of people with a
learning disability
A learning disability is to do with the way someone's brain works. It makes it harder for someone to learn, understand or do things.
over more than two decades. Golden Lane Housing, which she created, has enabled 3,500 people with learning disabilities to occupy accommodation of a high standard, often specially adapted, within the
community
A community is the people and places in an area.
– offering the same living standards and life opportunities that are available to others. During her 11 years leading personal support services she grew the number of people we support from 3187 to 5216 and ensured that Mencap was among the leaders in the quality of its services. And as Chief Executive she has been the driving force behind Mencap’s ambitious Big Plan to reduce
discrimination
Discrimination is when someone is treated differently (usually in a bad way) because of things like their disability or their
religion
Religion is to do with the things you believe about the world. For example you may believe there is a god or something else. Examples of religions are Christianity, Hinduism, Islam and Judaism.
.
and ensure people with learning disabilities have the same opportunity as others.
She will be greatly missed, and trustees are determined to find a worthy successor. I am very grateful to her for agreeing to remain in post until later this year to ensure that we have a smooth
transition
Transition means changing from one thing to another. Transition sometimes means things like when you change from having children's social care to adult social care.
.’
-ENDS-
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