This year’s theme was ‘Moving Forward’ and looked at new strategies, ways of using marketing to recruit and the legal side of volunteer management. All three events were well received.
The three-day event aimed to bring ideas, thoughts and even more good practice to Cambridgeshire, giving those working with volunteers the confidence to face the challenges following the pandemic.
Vision for Volunteering
Tuesday 14th June // 10:00 – 11:30 am // Zoom
This event centred around the England strategy ‘Vision for Volunteering’, which several partner national volunteer infrastructure bodies have co-written. The vision is intended to influence national policy on volunteering for the next 10 years. An accompanying website launched on 6th May. Gethyn Williams from Sport England discusses how this national strategy affects community charities and groups in Cambridgeshire—followed by questions from the floor.
Slides from the event can be seen here : Vision for Volunteering 14 06 22
Some of the pledges from the event are below:
- Making the most of our partnerships with other charities and sharing volunteers
- I am developing a peer mentoring volunteering programme for young people – I will be looking at the vision and also other work going on to better inform this work
- Building on the concept of sharing volunteers
- Expanding the definition of what volunteering is and what I can look like- creating an individualised volunteering experience where each volunteer knows they matter, they have a voice in the organisation and that they are creating tangible change
- I am already making smaller changes and in discussion with our leadership team about fluid volunteering and collaboration with other third sector partners. I will use this discussion to move this forward!
- Visit more community groups to promote volunteering
- More volunteer involvement in developing their own roles and how the scheme develops. Decreasing the time recruitment takes. Decreasing the paperwork.
- Link this to the development of the county disability physical activity strategy, the workforce is a challenge and the representation of disabled people is an area the partners are interested in developing and embedding as good practice
- Succession planning!
- Explore the ‘power’ element and how the volunteers can hold more ownership of the organisation
Attracting Supporters and Followers
Wednesday 15th June // Face to Face
On Wednesday, we ran two training sessions in person in two separate places across the county. Attracting Supporters and Followers was delivered by Christine and Sally from CCVS and Kathryn and Keith from Hunts Forums. It brought the good practice with practical skills, helping organisations identify and recruit the right people for their organisation.
Volunteering and the Law
Thursday 16th June // 10:00- 11:30 pm // Zoom
Finally, we ended the conference on Thursday with Jasmine from Bates Wells LLP, presenting on the legal aspects of volunteer recruitment and retainment. The talk covered key issues, including avoiding contracts, equality law and how to deal with perks and expenses.
This presentation was be followed by a VCSE Q&A session made up of questions submitted prior to the event.
The slides from this event : Volunteers and the Law – Slides – 16 June 2022
