Kicking off a new partnership with The Street Soccer Foundation

Thank you so much for joining me today Keith, We had such an inspiring conversation about The Big Goal and the Street Soccer Foundation and the incredible work you’re doing. What surprised me the most is how closely the values of your foundation align with those of the ITP. Both of us are focused on making a real difference and changing lives through the power of something - yours being football, of course. Can you tell our members a little more about The Big Goal campaign?

The Big Goal is a national campaign formed to help eradicate youth homelessness across the country. We want to unite as many businesses as we can nationwide to come together in support of disadvantaged and homeless young people, and to sponsor these young lives through the nationally acclaimed ‘Street Soccer Academy’ programme, to help youngsters move into work, education, or further training - and out of homelessness. As part of the campaign initiative, we have also created the first, biggest national five-a-side football tournament with the support of Sky Sports, that allows all members of The Big Goal to enter a 5-a-side team and to take part in the national competition each year, with the chance to play at St George’s Park, England’s official training camp!

The principle behind The Big Goal campaign is incredibly inspiring. Can you share with us how the Foundation came about and what motivated you to start The Big Goal initiative?

When I formed the Street Soccer Foundation back in 2015, I did so having learned by accident of the statistics around youth homelessness. I sketched out the idea for the Foundation knowing how powerful football as a sport is, in helping to bring people together and improve their health and well-being. After taking the Academy concept to the PFA and gaining their support and encouragement, I initiated a first partnership with West Ham United Foundation in East London to launch the charity endeavour of using football to help homeless young people off the streets. Then back in 2023 last year, I conceived the idea for The Big Goal as a national campaign, playing on the strength of the work of the Foundation where we operate through true partnerships and collaboration to affect positive social change all over the country. I was adamant that we could create a campaign that could become a true movement, in helping to tackle the biggest social issue in our country in youth homelessness. My motivation lies in the fact that through the power of the global number one sport, and a true coming together of people in businesses across the country, I am certain, working together, we can genuinely help end youth homelessness in this country, which is a must.

That’s a beautiful story and one that resonates with the ITP’s mission to use skill development and community-building to create lasting impact. It also aligns perfectly with our Challenge Perceptions campaign, which aims to break down barriers to employment and ensure equal opportunities for everyone, regardless of their background or circumstances.

Now, I understand the Street Soccer Foundation has received a lot of support from various companies across the ICT sector. Can you tell us a little more about the companies involved and what their roles are?

When forming the idea for The Big Goal, I was fortunate to have been introduced to Nigel Sergent, the Editor at Large of Comms Dealer, who loved the idea and instantly agreed to be our media partner. We then together approached Terry O’Brien, the CEO of Giacom, and Terry agreed for Giacom to be the Headline Sponsors of the campaign. Since then, the companies that are already involved are all across the ICT sector, where we’ve initially seeded the campaign. After formally launching in January this year, we successfully bought together 34 companies across the ICT sector who we fondly refer to now as our ‘Founding Members’. These organisations have collectively sponsored a total of 44 Street Soccer Academies in this first year of the campaign, allowing us to support 462 young people through the programme and out of homelessness. Companies that are a part of The Big Goal have the opportunity to meet their sponsored Academy groups of young people, tell them all about their business, and even make new hires from their Academy group. We have some amazing young talent that come through the Academy who have simply just fallen on hard times, but have a real desire to prove themselves and an ambition that we have within the campaign is to unlock new work opportunities for many of these young people where we can provide wonderful entry-level talent for businesses all over the UK.

That’s amazing, and beyond the corporate support, what does it mean to the young people who go through the programme? How does their participation in the Street Soccer Foundation change their lives?

The young people that give the Academy programme a chance to become a positive influence in their lives really are amazing. Many of them have been through very traumatic circumstances and often join the National Academy very low in confidence, self-belief, resilience, and even outlook on life. Over the three months that we work with each Academy group of young people, we take them on a journey of self-development, providing a fusion of classroom-based workshops along with weekly football coaching, building their soft skills and enabling them to become much more confident and resilient, improving their general physical well-being and mental health, and linking them into new opportunities in their local community through the partnerships that we forge nationwide. Many of the young people comment on the fact the Street Soccer Academy programme becomes a Street Soccer ‘family’ for them, and often several young people say it’s not just helped change their life – but also saved their life. The programme and the work of the Foundation is incredibly humbling and rewarding, hence why I am so passionate about The Big Goal and the given opportunity for companies to join us in our mission to help end youth homelessness through the power of the beautiful game.

It really is incredible and exactly the kind of impact we strive for in our own initiatives. We’ve already discussed the various ways we’re going to work together, and I’m personally really excited for what’s ahead. Without a doubt, our partnership is going to make a significant and lasting impact. What are your hopes for this partnership between the ITP and The Big Goal campaign?

 Understanding the ITP to be all about supporting the telecoms sector by addressing the skills gap and empowering people at all career stages and the fact that as an organisation you are committed on talent development and helping to create a diverse and sustainable workforce, it so aligns with the ambition of the Street Soccer Foundation. We exist to enable others to build better prospects and better futures and at the same time, we want to empower young people as well as our partners and sponsors to come together and help each other, and work together to enrich our communities all across the country. I am a massive believer in partnerships and collaboration to accelerate positive social change, and I truly believe our partnership with The ITP and its members can bring about several new supporters of The Big Goal campaign, to allow us to collectively achieve incredible further impact for the benefit of the lives of hundreds if not thousands of young people in the coming years, in communities nationwide – and at the same time, see us together, help eradicate youth homelessness in the UK.

It's an exciting time, and I really do believe we will change a lot of people’s lives and set a new standard for social impact. Thank you so much for your time today and for the incredible work you do with the Street Soccer Foundation. I’m looking forward to all the amazing things we’ll accomplish together.

Join The Big Goal, and lend your support to this inspiring organisation!