At the end of August, we sent out a short survey to all of our lovely volunteers and beneficiaries. We’re always trying to find ways that we can improve our projects and the way they’re run - which is why any feedback is really important to us.
Here, we wanted to take the chance to share the results to update you all on what everyone thinks about their experiences working with SVC. Also, we wanted to go through any specific suggestions left by our volunteers and where possible, explain any changes we’re going to put in place based upon the feedback that you gave.
The survey results - some quick numbers
Volunteers
Of our volunteers who responded:
100% enjoyed volunteering with SVC
100% felt they had enough support whilst volunteering with SVC
100% felt prepared for volunteering with SVC
Average score of 4/5 - Improved Confidence
Average score of 4/5 - Improved Communication Skills
Average score of 4/5 - Improved Time Management Skills
Average score of 4/5 - Improved Team-Working Skills
Average score of 4/5 - Improved Organisational Skills
Beneficiaries
Of our beneficiaries who responded:
Average score of 5/5 - Improved Digital Skills
Average score of 4/5 - Improved Confidence
Average score of 4/5 - Improved Communication Skills
Specifically, beneficiaries mentioned they liked that the projects reduced loneliness, allows them to meet new people, the fun activities and the fact that projects were run in small groups. So some fabulous feedback from our beneficiaries as well as from volunteers!
Your suggestions, and our response
“Use of icebreakers” (Huggard)
From now on, we’re going to introduce icebreakers and/ or new activities across all our projects within inductions and training sessions, so that hopefully all our volunteers can get to know one another better and feel more comfortable in volunteering together.
"More frequent updates” (Police Volunteering Scheme)
There are many ways we’re going to keep you updated with what’s going on at SVC. Recently we’ve started sending out a newsletter every quarter with updates about what we’ve been doing and what opportunities are available. We also update our Facebook, Twitter and Instagram pages regularly, and are currently setting up an SVC Moodle. When we interview our new volunteers, we’ll be encouraging you all to follow us to stay updated.
“Help with employment and other volunteering opportunities” (NHS)
SVC has a strategic aim to always expand our opportunities every year to provide our volunteers with a wide range of opportunities. We also are more than happy to help out with your employment prospects in any way that we can. We’re happy to provide references for job applications and we also provide volunteers with training certificates and end of year certificates as a record of hours volunteered. We’re also looking into providing these certificates through LinkedIn for those volunteers who want to log their volunteering on there, and we’re also organising a careers event for later this year so keep an eye out for that!
"More experience with communications and marketing” (Club Night)
If you’d like to develop specific skills while volunteering with us, we’re always happy to see where we can help! Contact us and we can discuss if this would be possible, and how we can help you.
"Use digital logbooks" (Digital Befriending)
We’re currently using digital logbooks for our Digital Befriending project and our Digital Be Friends project, for you to use if you prefer. We’re also looking into using digital logbooks for some of our other projects in the near future.
“Digital social events for volunteers” (Digital Befriending)
We’re planning a social event for volunteers that will take place over Zoom for later this year. If this goes down well then we’d be more than happy to plan some more. We’re also organising a digital drop-in space for volunteers to come along to if they want a casual chat with staff and other volunteers.
“Volunteer case studies” (Pen Pal Project)
We will be featuring more examples of case studies, both from volunteers and beneficiaries on our social media and within our blog in the future!
“Promote other volunteering opportunities” (Pen Pal Project)
We’re going to promote any volunteering opportunities we’re recruiting for within our newsletter each quarter as well as on our social media. Also, as with the above point, we’re planning to share volunteer and beneficiary case studies which we hope will help in highlighting some of the different opportunities we have available. As well as our own projects, we also promote external opportunities with charities like Tŷ Hafan, Bobath, Headway and Bluebirds. We develop new partnerships across South Wales each year, so make sure to take a look at our list of projects for both internal and external projects that we support.
“Information to be sent from one member of staff” (Police Volunteering Scheme, RCT)
This project has been running for two years up to now, and SVC and South Wales Police are still in the process of structuring the most effective way of communicating with volunteers, making sure no volunteer gets left behind if they don’t have access to certain communication channels (e.g. email, Duty Sheet software, instant messaging). This may have led to some doubling-up of messages to volunteers who had access to all of these channels in the past. Going forward, although SVC and South Wales Police will still use similar channels, South Wales Police will be taking the lead on communicating most Police-related business, while SVC will be focusing on communications related to university students, placements, and volunteer support. This should mean less doubling-up in communications from SVC and South Wales Police compared to last year.
We’re so grateful to anybody that filled in our survey and made a suggestion of how we can improve. Without these suggestions we wouldn’t be able to continue developing and improving the projects for future volunteers to come, so a huge thank you!
If you missed out on the survey but have any suggestions or feedback for us, then feel free to email us any time at info@svcymru.org
