Reflecting on 2025: Delivery, Learning and Momentum at S3

As we come to the close of 2025, we are taking a moment to reflect on what has been a year defined by strong delivery for clients, continued organisational growth, and important learning across our services and products.

Funding Success and Client Impact

Our FundReady team once again delivered outstanding results. Combined with our wider bid-writing consultancy, we supported clients to secure in excess of £75 million in funding over the year. These successes underpin real, tangible change in communities across Ireland and the UK and remain central to our purpose as an organisation.

Consulting Delivery Across Ireland

Our consulting team worked the breadth and width of Ireland, delivering a diverse portfolio of local sports plans, outdoor recreation strategies, and business cases. Notable projects progressed this year include:

• Cavan Regional Sports Complex

• St Jarlath’s Project, Tuam

• Oak Healthy Living Centre (PEACE PLUS)

These projects reflect our continued focus on high-quality, place-based planning that is grounded in community need and long-term sustainability.

Football Investment and Major Programmes

We are particularly proud of our role in delivering the Northern Ireland Football Fund, where three of the four highest-scoring bids across the entire programme were supported by our team. This outcome is a strong endorsement of our technical rigour, partnership approach, and understanding of funder expectations.

ImpactReady and Evaluation Learning

2025 was a testing and learning year for ImpactReady. With more than 35 active users, we gained invaluable insight into how organisations use the platform in practice. This learning now informs our preparation for ImpactReady Version 2, launching in 2026.

Key milestones included:

• Achieving Cyber Essentials certification

• Securing our first Social Value customer, creating a strong foundation to build on in 2026

Alongside this, our impact and evaluation work continued to scale. Major programmes progressed, including ACN Way (UK-wide) and Sport Ireland’s Sport 4 Empowerment Programme, and we completed over 30 individual evaluation assignments during the year.

Looking Ahead

S3 continues to grow, and we look forward to welcoming new team members in 2026, alongside further investment in:

• The ImpactReady product

• High-quality consulting services

• And, as always, delivering major funding successes for our clients

With Thanks

A sincere thank you to our team, whose commitment and professionalism make this work possible, and to our clients, for their continued trust and confidence in S3.

We wish everyone a peaceful and healthy Christmas, and a prosperous New Year.