CHSF Chair of Trustees Kieran Brady

I’ve been a trustee of Children’s Heart Surgery Fund (CHSF) for many years, and recently I’ve just become Chair of CHSF Board of Trustees. I wanted to share with you all why I’m involved with CHSF and why I’m so passionate about this charity.

A few years ago, I really wanted to “give back” to local communities. I’m very fortunate to have a long commercial career where I focus on creating solutions to benefit corporate organisations, and so I felt like I also wanted to get involved with a charity that really helped people at their time of need.

After being moved by a good friend’s story and experiences with children’s Heart Surgery Fund after their son was born with a congenital heart disease, I reached out to CHSF to understand more about the work they do and how I could help.

One of the first things that surprised me was to hear that 1 in 125 babies are born with heart disease. These babies in our region and their families rely heavily on the life-saving medical equipment at Leeds Congenital Heart Unit and the comprehensive family support that CHSF give to all those affected.

After witnessing the great work the CHSF team do to support these local families, I began helping the (CHSF) corporate team in their fundraising activities, which was the closest discipline to my day job of IT sales.

Over the years I’ve been involved in some amazing events which include walking the Yorkshire Three Peaks, dressing up as an elf during the children’s Christmas party – and who can forget the time I donned a wig to do my best Donald Trump impression!

Throughout my fundraising the support of my colleagues, contacts, family and friends has been vital to CHSF, who don’t receive any statutory funding. It’s meant that life-saving activities can continue to help and support a patient’s heart, mind, family, and future.

As the charity is so important to me, I volunteered to become Chair of Trustees to help shape the strategy of CHSF, and to provide as much support as possible to our CEO Heidi and the rest of the team members.

Getting involved with CHSF has, and will continue to be, an incredible experience for me and I would like anyone who is in a similar position to where I was to consider if/how you can give back to your communities, as sometimes business consumes us more than perhaps it should. There are so many people and causes that could do with our talent and effort, so I would encourage anyone to spend time on helping others.

If you would like to get started, then you can always reach out to CHSF to discover how you could become an individual supporter or a corporate sponsor. The team are always full of great ideas on how individuals and corporates can help. I guarantee that when you start to see the difference that you make, you will continue to support a good cause, whatever it is.

Please make a difference to your local communities, they need you so much in these challenging times.

Kieran Brady
CHSF Chair of Trustees

Kieran is works for IT service provider Redcentric as their Group Sales and Marketing Director.