Employer Supported Volunteering

We encourage organisations to talk to their staff members about volunteering, their involvement in organisations already, those that they would like to support and what they would like the impact to be. Often this can be very different to the reality of ESV and can influence the success of a programme. Often companies will give their time, resources and energies into charities that have a personal resonance with team members and therefore making the ask is an important way of ensuring that engagement is meaningful.

Does your organisation have a policy that embeds, supports and encourages employer supported volunteering? Has that policy been communicated with all employees and managers and do you proactively support and encourage involvement.

Do you think about the safeguarding requirements involved in employer supported volunteering? Does your organisation have and communicate a safeguarding policy that covers your staff members when they are both within and outside the office?

Volunteer Now can support the development of both policies.  Prices can be sought from Alice O’Boyle: alice.oboyle@volunteernow.co.uk (Business Development Officer) as prices will be dependent on the size of your company and the requirements.

All of the organisations that we work with have insurance that cover their volunteer involvement. We recommend however that your company also ensure that they have insurance coverage for their staff team.

Organisations will also undertake their own risk assessments and many of these roles are repetitive therefore the organisations are used to delivering and supporting them for corporates. Some of the smaller organisations may need support particularly if you have certain requirements that need to be filled. It is important that you share with them any additional needs that your staff team might have, this could be mobility, allergies, etc so that they are aware and can ensure inclusion.

Organisations should provide you with a brief before you attend and this will cover what you need to wear or bring. Some organisations may ask you to bring some equipment with you, e.g. gardening gloves.

Thinking about your policy and the pressures on staff think about how many staff are able to attend at one time and how much time are you enabling them to take. Some opportunities are suitable for half days whilst others would be a full day depending on the distance needed to travel.

Sometimes we forget that the activity isn’t the end result. We need to ensure that staff members understand the impact of what they have done, not only the positive difference on the organisation but also on themselves and the company. Being able to share the social, personal and corporate impact is vital in maintaining and developing this culture within the organisation.