Insights and inspiration
Written by Sarah Tranter, Learning and Storytelling Officer
Over the past year, the Vision for Volunteering Team has been engaging with people up and down the country about the five themes of the Vision for Volunteering, what they mean and how to translate them into action.
We have been running a series of webinars sharing our ‘insights and inspiration’ from the past year: practical insights into the implementation of the five themes and inspiring stories of action people have taken.
So, what have we learned?
Awareness and Appreciation
Terminology matters – not everyone uses the word ‘volunteer’ to describe their work
Understanding impact – to feel appreciated, volunteers and others need to be able to understand and articulate the impact of their work
Passion is key – the best voluntary opportunities are a two-way process, connecting volunteers to their passions
Funding challenges are a demotivator – short-term and unstable funding creates anxiety in volunteers and can undermine other efforts to make them feel appreciated
Power
Sharing power is good for everyone – volunteers and organisations benefit from power-sharing, and can help with recruitment and retainment
Volunteers may need help to step into their power – organisations must give volunteers the opportunities and support they need
Power v leadership – co-production and consultation are good; power sharing in decision-making is better
Lived experience – giving power to the voices of lived experience helps make services resonate with those involved
Equity and Inclusion
Tried and tested methods work best – consider whether you have picked the low-hanging fruit e.g. improving access to expenses, inclusive recruitment
Identify your barriers – identify the barriers unique to your audience of volunteers and work to break these down. Don’t try to be everything for everyone
Learn from each other – share your own learning and don’t be afraid to ask others how they’ve approached something
Flexibility is key – flexibility should be built into volunteering opportunities from the ground up
Collaboration
Funding is an opportunity and hindrance – competitive funding processes can put local organisation in competition with each other when we should be working together
Collaboration takes time – it can be challenge to collaborate when so much time is focused on the day job – but it’s always worth it
Sharing volunteers – sharing volunteers, or having volunteers who work for more than one organisation, can enable the sharing of skills and connections
Collaboration is important at all levels – senior leaders need to understand the benefits of collaboration at a strategic as well as operational level
Experimentation
Resistance to change – change can be scary; experimentation needs to be collaborative, empowering and inclusive to bring volunteers along on the journey
Small change is good change – not all experimentation needs to be big and dramatic
Experimentation involved listening – learn from others and listen to a diversity of voices to source new ideas and approaches
Fear of failure – we need to reframe our relationship with failure so that we learn as much from failure as from success
You can watch a recording of the webinar (1 hour) or download the slides.