Giving young jobseekers the same type of coaching that high-flying business execs get was the innovative idea at the heart of Resurgo (founded in 2003).
In 2003, our founders used this idea to create a coaching programme for jobless people aged 16-24 in Hammersmith, London. They called it the Spear Programme, borrowing the S and the P from St Paul’s, the church that gave them some space in the basement in which to work.
Resurgo’s coaching expertise branched out over the years into other activities. These included a social impact accelerator, an income-generating corporate coaching arm and a programme for unemployed adults that was created during Covid.
But in 2024, our leadership realised we needed to focus solely on the codified and successful Spear Programme – which by then had grown to 17 centres around the UK. It was time to address overall issues with Resurgo’s name and brand, to give us the best chance of reaching the ambitious goal of national expansion.
The problem
Resurgo means ‘I rise up again’. By this point we were managing a 20-year-old brand that lacked cut-through among the main audiences for the Spear Programme: young people, donors and delivery partners.
Part of the problem was confusion about the relationship between Resurgo and the Spear Programme.
So we surveyed staff and key partners to gather their views on any issues with the brand. Their message was loud and clear: the name was a big issue.
Instead, we needed a simple, bold name and brand that aligned with its purpose. We needed to bring the charity and the programme together.
The process
Audience representatives – young people, corporate partners, donors, delivery partners, trustees and staff – were consulted. The comms team engaged key stakeholders at four milestones in the process and feedback was iterative.
One of our founders was the chair of trustees. The team saw that he needed to go on the journey. So our CEO met with him regularly and shared insights from the audience research. Our head of comms wrote a paper outlining the insights and pros and cons of changing the name.
The team used external consultant James Rutter, chief strategy officer at frozen food brand COOK, to define our brand essence – and our charity’s place in the market. We decided we were essentially a youth employment charity. Never before had it been stated in those simple terms – which made changing our name easier.
An extraordinary board meeting around the name-change featured robust debate, but in the end, the board unanimously agreed to change the name to Spear. The rationale was that the name needed to give the plans to grow the Spear Programme the best chance of success.
This was a pragmatic recognition that Resurgo was no longer the right name. Survey feedback was key to the decision.
Once the decision was made, the team continued to work with our brand consultant and brought in a design agency, Wild People.
Working with the internal team, the brand consultant developed key messages for each audience, as well as a new vision and mission. The design consultant developed a brand book with design principles.
Leadership dedicated a day in December 2025 to sharing and discussing the brand and the new vision and mission with the entire organisation.
The comms team created a new style guide and gave practical training to the whole organisation on using the new brand assets and where to find templates, new fonts and other resources.
Challenges and solutions
Challenge one
The new brand had to work both nationally and locally for the now 18 Spear Centres across the UK. Local branding could not be an after-thought. The team embedded this in the brief for the designer.
Challenge two
New imagery was needed – but photoshoots are costly and time-consuming. The solution, suggested by the designer, was to start with a critical mass of new images and keep building them, rather than go with stock photos.
Challenge three
We have four people on our comms team, most working part-time. This made it tricky to create a new website while multiple other projects were going on, alongside a brand roll-out. So the website launch was slightly delayed until the end of January 2026.
Results
It’s still early days for Spear, but the new brand has been really well received by all of our key audiences. Our new imagery and bold palette have allowed the comms team to relaunch social channels that have increased followers by 20%. Spear have seen reach on Instagram hit 88,000 in the first month, compared to an average of 2,000 before the rebrand.
Corporate and employer partners are essential to our work as the businesses that hire Spear trainees. They’ve been so keen on the new brand that they’ve asked for details of the agencies used. And they now always tag the right organisation on LinkedIn!
We are enjoying record press coverage – and radio interviews no longer start with a presenter mispronouncing our name.
Our brand finally makes sense. It’s clear and powerful: “We’re the youth employment charity Spear. We run the Spear Programme.”
