In 64% of the UK's top 100 charities, the most senior fundraiser is also responsible for marketing and communications. A year ago, that figure was 56%. Among charities raising more than £100m in voluntary income, it reaches 76%.
These figures come from AAW Group's 2026 benchmark of fundraising leadership pay, which tracks the same panel of charities year on year. Over the past 12 months, around eight more charities in the panel have moved to a combined role.
The shift raises some important questions. What does a combined role look like in practice? How does pay compare with a fundraising-only position? And what should boards consider before bringing these functions together?
The job titles have changed
Titles in the panel now include Chief Engagement Officer, Chief Marketing and Fundraising Officer and Executive Director of Marketing, Fundraising and Engagement. Each reflects a role with responsibility for both the income a charity raises and how it presents itself to the public.
The titles vary, but the underlying change is clear: fundraising leadership increasingly sits alongside responsibility for brand, communications and wider public engagement.
Size makes a difference, up to a point
Combined roles are most common among the largest charities, although the pattern is not consistent across income bands.
£100m+ voluntary income: 76% have a combined role.
£50m–£100m: 68%.
£25m–£50m: 47%.
£16m–£25m: 68%.
Under £16m: 60%.
Charities raising £25m–£50m are the only group in which most still keep fundraising as a standalone function. Two years of data are not enough to explain why, but it is a pattern worth watching as the benchmark develops.
Two sectors go the other way
Culture is the highest-paying sector in the benchmark, with an average salary of £148,230 for its most senior fundraising leaders. None of the three cultural institutions in the panel has a combined role. Conservation, where the average is £130,542, has none either.
Both groups are small, so these figures need to be treated with care. They do, however, show that combined leadership is not the only route to a senior salary. Specialist fundraising roles can command high pay in their own right.
The pay premium
Combined roles pay an average of £128,942, compared with £115,233 for fundraising-only roles. That is a premium of 11.9%, up from 9.7% last year. Pay for combined roles also rose faster over the period, increasing by 5.9% against 3.9% for fundraising-only roles.
Is that premium enough? There is no single answer. Marketing and communications can each be substantial functions, with their own teams, budgets and strategic demands. Combining them with fundraising gives one person a much broader remit. The salary needs to reflect the actual scale and complexity of the job.
The figures show a pay difference between the two types of role. They do not, on their own, tell us whether the premium fully reflects the additional responsibility.
Where it can go wrong
The benchmark also highlights the importance of reviewing roles as they change. Some salary falls this year were linked to posts being folded into wider engagement roles at a different grade.
There is a risk in the opposite direction, too. A fundraising director may gradually take on communications and brand over two or three years without any change in grade or salary. Over time, that can leave the charity with a senior role whose responsibilities have outgrown its terms, creating a potential retention risk.
When a charity changes the remit, it should review the role's grade and salary at the same time. Leaving that review until the next recruitment exercise can mean discovering a gap between the job as it stands and what the market expects to pay.
Questions for a charity redesigning its top team
Boards and chief executives considering a combined role should ask four questions:
What will the charity gain by bringing income and brand leadership together, and where might it lose specialist leadership or focus?
Is the role graded for the responsibilities it carries now, or for the job it started as?
Is there a strong enough second tier of leadership to make the combined role workable, with the right expertise and capacity across both functions?
How will the board judge success when one role is accountable for income, communications and reputation?
The bigger picture
The growth of combined roles suggests that charities are increasingly bringing fundraising, marketing and communications under one senior leader. But the benchmark shows that this is not a universal model, and the right structure will depend on each charity's size, priorities and leadership capacity.
Pay needs to keep pace with the job. Whether a charity combines these functions or keeps them separate, boards should understand the scope of the role, benchmark it against comparable positions and review the salary when responsibilities change. That gives charities a stronger basis for attracting and retaining the leadership they need.