Evaluation of the Volunteers Managers’ Network in Fife

One of the roles of Volunteer Centre Fife is to enhance the capacity of volunteer-engaging organisations. Support can be provided in different ways:

• facilitating a Managers’ network is one way of doing this.
• support for member organisations has also taken the form of training on issues related to managing volunteers – a programme has been offered throughout Fife for the last 6 years.
• An additional feature has been our ability to tailor training to the needs of the group.

We recognise that every organisation is at a different stage of development in their support for volunteers. With this in mind, we felt the time was right to seek feedback from organisations about the effectiveness of the Network since its inception some 6 years ago, and how support could be further developed.

At the recent National Conference for Volunteer Centres, a workshop on Managers’ Networks was held, with 13 centres attending.

Feedback suggests that Network development in Fife is well ahead and copies of the Noticeboard attracted much attention. It is our intention to see if there if enough interest to develop a national network.

A summary of your overall responses is listed plus suggestions for the way forward .

1Responses

42 including questionnaires and 3 focus groups

The Network was found to be effective for a variety of reasons

2 Positives

Building the Capacity

• joint recruitment
• attracting new and diverse volunteers
• getting ideas on recruitment
• distributing ABE to a wider audience
• VC Fife is effective first stage in filtering process
• Helpful to have input from the volunteer Centre as the referral agency

Staff development

• guidance on policies
• having discussion topics as a focus
• communication and education
• sharing expertise
• an opportunity to gather intelligence
• identifying and offering specific training
• sharing info and resources

Networking

• ability to network as lone worker with other Managers
• having meetings in the local area
• meeting new workers
• listing contacts in the network
• raising the profile of the network

3 Your proposals as to how we can offer further support

Staff Development

• facilitate a Mentoring Scheme
• promote links with groups with similar focus eg heritage/conservation/ mental health
• more days for volunteers/managers to attend meetings
• offer more training packages to suit needs of the organisation
• brainstorm session on how we manage complaints/insurance/funding/vols business; how to deal with conflict
• provide support to the VM when training own volunteers
• consultancy service

Building the capacity

• support with recruitment not just in Volunteers’ Week
• be informed about local events
• access to other premises for training/meetings
• continue to offer info on ABE to all organisations and potential volunteers
• funding and information for specific training eg Health and Safety; Basic Catering
• encourage people who receive service that they could also be volunteers eg ABE learners/ESOL clients/service users at home

Network

• increase the network
• lone worker meeting client on VC Fife premises when VC staff in building

4 Suggestions for improvement