Helping Others Help... in the NHS

Introduction

Happy International Volunteer Managers Day (IVMD) to all who are working in volunteer involvement either in a paid or in a voluntary position. This year’s IVMD theme is “Helping Others Help ” and in this month’s “pancake” I’d like to explore how this is done within the NHS context.

There are many traditional ideas of what volunteering at the NHS means, however there is a lot of innovation to be celebrated. The NHS volunteering offer is developing in line with current trends and pioneer leaders of NHS volunteering are embracing the changes in this ever-changing landscape, especially post-pandemic.

I spoke with two colleagues who are holding the leading position in their respective voluntary services at their NHS Trusts about how they are “helping others help” within the public health sector in the UK. From developing volunteer strategies and policies, designing volunteer roles and recruiting to them, training volunteers (and others to manage volunteers) to celebrating and advocating the benefits of volunteering involvement, their role is more important than ever.

Interviews

Catherine Jowitt is the Head of Charity and Volunteering at Bradford District Care NHS Foundation Trust and kindly spoke to us about her experiences in this role.

Catherine, what does a volunteer manager do at the NHS and how is it different from other sectors?

“When you see the pressure the NHS is under and pressure of my clinical colleagues, I know that in doing this job that involves both volunteering and charity I make a difference; I support therapeutic activity, the recovery process, inspiring future workforce, we get to make a difference across the whole organisation by helping people to stay well and feel valued. We are very lucky in our profession, because we can bring a happy pill to staff and genuinely ask staff what we can do to help them resolve any challenges.”

Can you share a story within this career that has been inspiring to you, that’s close to your heart?

“When we first started volunteer involvement with inpatients sites, the first thing we did was bringing volunteers to the café where we brought people who used services. This young lady came and wanted to volunteer, she was an ex-service-user and didn’t have the self-belief she could volunteer even though she was interested in a role, and, through her volunteering involvement, she has absolutely flown. Her confidence has grown, she’s been to university, she speaks about her volunteering journey, and she is currently employed by a volunteering organisation. She is just a different person, she is unrecognisable. She spans volunteering for recovery and volunteering to career. She never thought she could become a volunteer, but she’s done it and has had a career, a voice, she’s grown in such an amazing way.”

What do you think the future holds for the profession of volunteer managers in the NHS?

“I feel like there has definitely been a shift post-Covid with far more recognition and opportunity for volunteering in the NHS. In terms of future challenges, there seems to be repetition and a lot of duplication around the volunteering world, and we will need to explore how we can move volunteers around the system, open up more opportunities such as volunteers to careers, improve attitudes at certain sites towards volunteers and think differently. Volunteering is one of those areas where we genuinely can work better together. If we want to create the culture shift where volunteering is seen as the solution for so many issues, then we got to get that dialogue so that our organisations understand that. In a lot of NHS organisations, you don’t have someone working at my level (Head of Service) and that needs to change too, there needs to be recognition for the profession and a clarity on what volunteering is and what it is not. We need to advocate for volunteering and communicate that it is not free, it requires expertise, resource, and capacity. An additional challenge is to ensure that we are maintaining our volunteers’ own good health and wellbeing.”

When I was job hunting in 2022, I chose this position partly because I wanted to work with my Trust’s Volunteer Services Manager, Rashpal Saini. It was clear from our first couple of chats that he definitely “knows his stuff”, while remaining curious, and is genuinely passionate about volunteer involvement. He kindly agreed to share his thoughts in this article.

Rashpal, what inspired you to “help others, help others” by becoming a volunteer manager?

“When I finished university, I wasn’t sure what I wanted to do. I saw an advert for VSO volunteering overseas and I thought it sounded great, so I went into fulltime volunteering overseas. That was an amazing, diverse, and inclusive experience, which was also impactful and meaningful. Through this experience, I fell in love with the power of volunteering and wanted to do something about this. I found out there was a career in volunteer management and then I became an intern and then a paid member of staff at VSO. Since then, I used every opportunity to grow myself as a leader of volunteers and to create impactful volunteering in the way that I’ve experienced it, for creating volunteering movements and delivering these types of experiences for others and other causes. I previously worked at roles where I was leading volunteer involvement in the third sector and membership bodies. This is my first NHS job.”

Why do you do this job in the NHS? How is it different from other employers/sectors?

“I joined the NHS during the pandemic and at that time the cause of public health was at the front of everyone’s mind. This was a very local opportunity to me as I am a local resident. I thought it was a timely move, but I was also always passionate around health causes. So, the job fitted in a cause that I cared about and it came in an incredible time during the pandemic where I could see there was longer term work that needed to be done too for NHS volunteering, and it was serving my local community at the same time. In terms of the NHS, I felt that I’ve been in the charity sector, but I knew that volunteering wasn’t restricted to that sector, so I wanted a new challenge in a new sector. I found very interesting the unique ways in which you work within service pressures in the NHS, the idea you can get things done in a linear way doesn’t always work as the goal posts always move so you need a different type of leadership style for volunteering where you work with teams who respond to all sorts of pressures at the same time and you need to be a catalyst around this. So, I see myself as a shepherd in emerging situations and I find this approach very helpful in a complex environment. I think this is a useful skill especially in the context of how volunteers operate today – they want more flexibility, their voice to be heard, for volunteering to come from within the community and not necessarily directed by an organisation.”

What do you think are the opportunities and challenges for the next period for our profession within the NHS?

“I think we’ve grown as an organisation to be part of an integrated or collaborative approach to health care with people starting to think together and with the Integrated Care Board (ICB) set up and I think the future is the person and everything that they can bring and how to catalyse that rather than always directing how we do things as an organisation. I think the future is that we truly put people first as an NHS but as a people profession I think we have to role model this – we’re not only about processes, we are about people and a people centred approach – how we value volunteers in existing systems and processes but also how we give greater power by helping people designing services and not just delivering them. It’s about letting go of power and letting people deliver services with a very clear mission and aim outlined. I think that will come with a more people centred attitude and approach and living those people centred values. People have power, and do not necessarily need a formal organisation to organise volunteering and support a cause, as we have seen in the pandemic with the popularity of the mutual aid groups.”

A special mention – Together Better project

A project I hold dear in my hard which is in partnership with NHS local ICS in East London with deliveries via GP surgeries, is the Together Better project at my previous workplace, Volunteer Centre Hackney, which highlights how NHS settings can become more than just the place you go for your appointments, they can be transformed into community hubs, overcoming barriers of participation and creating volunteer roles that come directly from the needs of the local residents and communities – directly benefitting them by developing a range of offers of wellbeing and healthy living activities. I’d love to see projects like this expanded and embraced in more settings.

Thank you!

And finally, thank you, to all colleagues who work in volunteer involvement in a paid or unpaid role, to Catherine and Rashpal for their contributions in this article, and to my volunteer supervisor colleagues at West London NHS Trust.

Some of our volunteer supervisors, have already won awards in teams where staff and volunteers are working in partnership, and some have also supported volunteers to develop and progress in education or employment.

Having spoken to some of our volunteers, it was inspiring to hear that our welcoming staff are admired for their professionalism and compassion and thought of as role models for the future careers of these young people. You are all superstars!

Thank you for reading and as always, I would love to hear your thoughts!

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