The ACEVO Pay and Equalities Survey is the most comprehensive source of data on charity CEO pay, benefits and leadership development. For more than 20 years, it has provided a crucial resource for sector leaders seeking insight into trends and challenges in governance, remuneration, and representation.
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- A glimpse into ACEVO’s Pay and Equalities Survey (2022–2024): gender pay gap and representation by charity size
- A glimpse into ACEVO’s Pay and Equalities Survey (2022–2024): socioeconomic background
Each year, the survey reflects the views of charity chief executives who respond to it across England and Wales and through our partners Charity Leadership Scotland and CO3, across Scotland and Northern Ireland. It highlights key patterns relating to gender, race, disability and organisational structures, helping leaders to benchmark their organisations and make informed, equitable decisions.
This short briefing focuses on just one aspect of the findings from the 2023, 2024 and 2025 surveys: the working benefits available to charity CEOs, their holiday entitlement and take-up, and their satisfaction with wellbeing and work-life balance. For the full data set and analysis of these trends, plus so much more, the Pay and Equalities Survey reports are available for purchase.
Working benefits
Flexible working
| Year | % of CEO respondents who have access to this benefit |
| 2023 | 74% |
| 2024 | 71% |
| 2025 | 71% |
Flexible working has long been cited as the top benefit amongst those who responded to the survey. It shows that work-from-home flexibility, compressed hour options and hybrid work patterns remain strong within the voluntary sector. The availability of substantial working culture shifts such as flexible hours rise from 73% among small charities and 74% among medium organisations to 83% of larger organisations.
Mental health support/employee assistance programme/wellness programmes
Note: in 2023 mental health support was reported as an employee assistance programme. From 2024 it was captured as mental health support.
Mental health support
| Year | % of CEO respondents who have access to this benefit |
| 2023 | 45% |
| 2024 | 44% |
| 2025 | 38% |
Wellness programmes
| Year | % of CEO respondents who have access to this benefit |
| 2024 | 32% |
| 2025 | 25% |
Mental health support and wellness programmes are available to just 28% and 15% of small charity CEOs, respectively, but increase to 73% and 48% of those running large charities.
Caring leave
| Year | % of CEO respondents who have access to this benefit |
| 2023 | 22% |
| 2024 | 25% |
| 2025 | 23% |
Enhanced maternity/paternity pay
| Year | % of CEO respondents who have access to this benefit |
| 2023 | 23% – 39% |
| 2024 | 23% |
| 2025 | 22% |
Note: 2023 asked separately for ‘enhanced maternity pay’ (23%) and ‘enhanced paternity pay’ (16%). Combining the two figures totals 39%. However, these benefits likely overlap as organisations offering paternity pay almost certainly also offer maternity pay, so the true unique coverage is somewhere between 23% and 39%.
No benefits available
| Year | % of CEO respondents who have access to this benefit |
| 2023 | 8% overall, 12% at small charities |
| 2024 | 15% overall, 18% at small charities |
| 2025 | 15% overall, 15% at small charities |
Across all three years, the data consistently shows that CEOs at the smallest charities (those with an income under £1m) have significantly less access to working benefits than peers at larger organisations. In 2025, mental health support was available to just 28% of small charity CEOs compared with 73% of those at large (£5m-<£15m) charities. Wellness programmes were available to just 15% of small charity leaders, rising to 48% at large organisations. This pattern is replicated across virtually every benefit tracked in the survey and shows little sign of improving over time.
While scarcer resources and gaps in provision may be unsurprising at smaller organisations, this continues to raise concern around career support and retention at small charities, as well as ensuring basic statutory benefits are in place.
Holidays and unpaid hours
Despite being entitled to similar amounts of holiday, charity CEOs take less than their full allowance, and work a significant number of additional unpaid hours on top of their contracted time.
Median holiday entitlement
| Year | Median entitlement | Median take-up |
| 2023 | 28 days | 25 days |
| 2024 | 28 days | 25 days |
| 2025 | 29 days | 25 days |
Median unpaid hours worked per week
| Year | Median unpaid hours per week | |
| 2023 | 8 hours | |
| 2024 | 7.5 hours | |
| 2025 | 6 hours | |
The gap between holiday entitlement and actual take-up has remained stubbornly fixed at three to four days across all three years. While the median number of unpaid hours worked each week has gradually reduced, it remains a significant burden. In 2025, a new question also found that whilst 84% of CEOs had taken no wellbeing or stress-related days off in the past year, more that one in 10 (12%) had taken between one and five days, 2% had taken 6-15 days and an additional 2% had taken more than 16 days. Those at small charities were the likeliest to have taken wellbeing or stress-related days off at 18%, compared with 14% at medium charities and just 10% at large charities.
Wellbeing and work-life balance
Note: in 2023 this section was titled ‘Overall wellbeing and satisfaction’ and used different question wording.
Satisfaction with the degree to which the board ensures CEO wellbeing
| Year | % of CEO respondents who are satisfied |
| 2023 | 59% (agreed wellbeing was prioritised) |
| 2024 | 50% |
| 2025 | 49% |
Satisfaction with work-life balance
| Year | % of CEO respondents who are satisfied |
| 2024 | 56% |
| 2025 | 53% |
The picture here is one of persistent and, in some respects, worsening concern. Satisfaction with the degree to which boards prioritise CEO wellbeing dropped notably between 2023 and 2024, and has barely recovered since. In 2025, just under half of all CEO respondents felt satisfied with how their board supported their wellbeing, and only just over half were satisfied with their work-life balance. In 2025, satisfaction with board wellbeing support stood at 47% among leaders of small charities, compared with 42% among those at large organisations.
Reflections
Taking the data together, flexible working remains the strongest benefit, but it’s not universal. Larger organisations are notably more likely to offer it than smaller ones. Still, nearly a third of CEOs lack access to this now-standard workplace expectation. Mental health support has fallen over the past three years and wellness programmes dropped considerably in one year. Most strikingly, small charity CEOs are nearly three times less likely to have mental health support than their larger charity counterparts and this is a significant structural gap.
The share of CEOs with zero benefits nearly doubled from 2023 to 2024-25 and among small charities, it reached 18% in 2024. This is a warning sign about the basic employment offer within parts of the sector. CEOs consistently work 6-8 unpaid hours per week and leave 3-4 holiday days untaken every year. This pattern hasn’t meaningfully shifted across three years. The gradual reduction in unpaid hours is a rare positive signal but the baseline remains high.
Board support for CEO wellbeing fell between 2023 and 2025 and work-life balance satisfaction decreased between 2024 and 2025. Notably, smaller charities CEOs don’t consistently fare worst here: large charity leaders report even lower satisfaction with board wellbeing support, pointing to a possible governance and culture problem, not just a resourcing one.
The small charity penalty is widespread and constant. Across almost every metric, small charity CEOs are at a disadvantage. There’s little sign this is narrowing over time, raising serious questions about sustainability, retention and duty of care in the smallest parts of the sector.
The overarching concern is that the people leading organisations dedicated to social good are themselves working in conditions that risk burnout, without adequate support structures and this is becoming more, not less, evident.
We encourage charity leaders to:
- Take your leave. The persistent gap between entitlement and take-up is a signal, not a badge of honour. Taking your leave would help model healthy behaviours for your teams.
- Advocate for your own benefits. If mental health support or wellness programmes aren’t in place, make the case. Your retention and resilience depend on it.
We encourage trustees and boards to:
- Make CEO wellbeing a standing governance item.
- Review the benefits offer. Particularly at small charities, check that basic statutory entitlements are in place and that the organisation is not inadvertently operating below acceptable standards.
The full reports from 2023, 2024 and 2025 offer detailed breakdowns by gender, race, disability, region, board satisfaction and much more. Visit acevo.org.uk to purchase the latest Pay and Equalities Survey reports.
ACEVO offers a variety of resources to support wellbeing, which may be beneficial for members seeking additional guidance or assistance. There is also a wide range of wellbeing blogs available to all.