Our Chief Executive
Leslie Morphy OBE
Leslie Morphy has been our Chief Executive since November 2006. Her career before coming to Crisis was largely in the not-for-profit sector, with a strong emphasis on social exclusion and expertise in learning and skills development.
She was a Director at The Prince's Trust for nearly 10 years, latterly as UK Director of Programmes and Policy delivering programmes to 40,000 young people a year. During her time there the reach of the Trust to young people through its programmes doubled.
Before working at The Prince's Trust, Leslie was Head of Research and Development at the Basic Skills Agency, whose work formed the bedrock of government policy on literacy and numeracy. She previously ran a social enterprise, Broadcasting Support Services, which connected television and radio audiences to information and services.
Ambitious plans
Since being at Crisis Leslie has led the development of a five year strategic plan which has set up learning and activity centres in cities round the UK. New centres have opened in Newcastle and Oxford, new services are operating in Birmingham, Merseyside, Edinburgh and Bermondsey and plans are afoot for centres in Coventry & Warwickshire and South Yorkshire. Crisis is at the forefront of campaigning on behalf of homeless people and we run a private rented sector national advisory service working with partners across the UK to enhance access to the private rented sector for single homeless people.
Leslie received her OBE in the 2010 Queen's Birthday Honours List for services to homeless people.
She has degrees from the London School of Economics and Birkbeck College, London University. Until recently she was a trustee of Bliss, the special care baby charity and is a governor of Oxford Brookes University.
Leslie is married and has a son and daughter who are the apples of her eyes.