I’m Ayaz, a consultant with thirteen years of experience working in policy, public affairs, and campaigns roles for Mind, Stonewall, Trussell and the Women & Equalities Select Committee.

I focus on the nuts and bolts of influencing, how charities can build creative and confident influencing teams, and the concrete steps that help make a policy ask travel.

If you’ve got an influencing challenge that you’d like to talk through, you can book a consultation call here.

Background in social change

I started out working in social change in 2013, joining Stonewall’s parliamentary team to campaign on the complex regulations needed to make equal marriage a reality. 

Since then I’ve worked in policy and campaigns roles for Mind, Trussell, and Liberty. I’ve also spent time as an adviser to the Women and Equalities Select Committee in the House of Commons. In those roles I led campaigns that have helped change legislation, acted as a spokesperson in national media and select committee evidence sessions, shaped a successful Supreme Court intervention, and spent a lot of time thinking about how to best influence Ministers, advisers and others in power.

In 2021, I changed tack and started volunteering as a welfare rights adviser in a small law centre in London. That led to three years working in the advice world, representing clients in benefits appeals and leading a team dedicated to helping people with mental health problems get the right financial support. The power of advice work and the need to build a better social security system are two causes which continue to animate my work.

How I can help

Increasing impact

I help organisations think through influencing strategy and take on complex challenges. One previous project involved supporting a research team who had been focused on evaluating the direct impact of services, but who wanted to move towards producing work that could influence policymakers. Another meant helping a small charity refine their policy priorities and design proportionate ways to measure their progress.

Building skills

I offer coaching for people in their first few years of doing policy, public affairs and campaigns work. Sessions give people a space to reflect on everything from ‘What should I be doing when I go to a roundtable?’ to ‘How do I navigate this tricky relationship with a coalition partner?’ I  also run training courses on writing an effective policy paper, and influencing select committees.

Getting things done

I’m an experienced policy writer and researcher and can both take on projects from scratch and step in to help get a piece of work over the line. A previous project involved cowriting and copyediting a sensitive and politically contentious piece of guidance for a large membership organisation. Another involved producing a deep dive into the evidence on 15 different policy interventions to help a charity scope a new programme of influencing work.