Report transcript in: Karen's Story

Please Report the Errrors?

So we're recording.

Hi, Karen. Um, thank you for your time this morning.

Just wondered if you could start by introducing yourself, please.

Hi, I'm Karen Watson, and I work at Volunteer Centre Newcastle.

And for my sins, I've been doing it for 18 years.

It's a long time.

It is. And it's been many a change over the years.

Yeah, I bet. I bet.

Um,

so if you could tell me just a little bit about

how you've been involved in vision for volunteering so far.

OK, so

I'm employed by volunteering matters

so very early on in the vision conception.

Volunteering matters has been a partner around the table

and the designated person in volunteering matters I linked up

with as soon as I started reading about the vision.

And

so I've been getting information about developments

from the named person at volunteer matters,

and I've been using my networks

to keep the groups registered at the volunteer centre informed What is the vision?

How can we look at the vision as a community?

And from that we've developed information sessions,

um, and run some training sessions to coordinators about what the vision is and

how it can support them

to look at good practise in their everyday

work small steps. But the first step is what is the vision and and

making them aware that there is a vision?

Yeah,

yeah, which is the It's the first step, isn't it?

Because, you know,

volunteer coordinators aren't signed up for every newsletter

or they're not signed up for national news.

And so our role is to make sure

if something's happening that involves volunteers or volunteering

that we make sure that the sector is informed.

Yeah,

yeah.

Um,

you were also kind enough to support

our

workshop in Newcastle as well over the summer.

And

it was fantastic.

Yeah, I think it's really important that

the vision has a local face,

someone that people can continue the conversation with,

and it's not seen just as a theory.

It's an actual.

It's an actual thing we have to put into practise in our everyday stuff. So we've

supported the vision staff as much as possible in

terms of always informing people when there's an event,

um, always making sure that we can attend, if possible, not to do anything other than

be there for the groups that we work with

and taking names of people who might be interested in more in depth. And

that's why when we did our big Volunteering Network event,

which is the biggest we've ever had,

we asked you to come along and talk about it.

And

in our recent training needs analysis,

we asked people what they wanted to know about in 2024

and the vision was in the top four.

That's great.

So that's

something that I'm hoping that

rather than me do it. I'm not an expert. What I'll do is I'll contact

Well, I'll contact you or the team and say, Look, this is a request.

When you're doing the Newcastle dates,

I'll start to advertise them as early as possible

so people can clear space in their diary.

And if not, is there possible for the team to come and do a dedicated session?

Yeah,

so for me, that's how I can use my networks most effectively

to keep the

groups informed about all the changes. So the new animation,

which is fantastic,

I know Well, I watched it and I sent it to a few people yesterday,

and, um,

I'm going to be putting it on social media today,

and I'm gonna be sending it in the next newsletter as the latest update.

It is a nice animation,

and it hopefully just kind of brings things to life a little bit.

is. It is a really, really nice animation, and

I think it explains things really

clearly. But very at a very gentle level.

Yeah,

it's wide open for interpretation, isn't it? So

no, I was just saying It's really good as a refresher for

people who have heard about it, but forgotten about it because you do.

But it's also a really good introduction

to the vision with the hope. So it's a cover all for everybody.

It doesn't matter whether you know about it or not. I enjoyed it.

Yeah,

that's good to hear.

So thinking about next year,

um, and beyond potentially. But next year, what would you like to see?

So when you think about the coordinators that you've chatted with,

or perhaps on a personal level, what what would you like to see come next?

Um,

provision for volunteering,

I think the events having the events in Newcastle,

trying to do some dedicated sessions for people who

can't get to the events whether that be as,

uh,

coordinators forum that we open up and do across

all the volunteer centres in the town and we region

because we're all getting funded by the North

of town Combined authority on the UK Prosperity Fund

to, um,

look at

how we give power to communities.

And I think for me, that's the biggest challenge for coordinators to understand

because we're funded to deliver in communities.

But that doesn't necessarily mean that the communities

have been consulted about what we're delivering.

Yeah,

it's Yeah, it's a really important conversation, isn't it?

And I think people get their heads around a lot of the other concepts. But power

and giving power is always a big challenge.

Yeah,

it's a good one, isn't it?

You know, you know a lot of the engagement work we've done this year.

That's definitely top of the list when it comes to just

response. And,

you know, um, thinking about what that means to people because it is.

It's a challenging topic, isn't it? But it's a really important one.

for me,

you know, Newcastle City Council are very clear that they want an asset based

community development Focus.

Which again is us as connectors, asking the community what they want.

Yeah, but the big challenge is having the capacity to respond to that.

OK,

because there's no point in doing a consultation

if you're not then supporting the change.

we have to be able to say to people

in power in the voluntary sector will this group want

to change their local environment by doing a litter pick?

Because the park has got broken glass in it.

Where do they get the equipment now?

Newcastle City Council is great because they'll lend

you litter pickers and arrange for rubbish pickups.

But what about ideas about people wanting to do planting? Or they want to take over

an abandoned community centre because they really miss it as a hub,

having the capacity to do that

level of governance support,

Having

us having the knowledge of how to do that is a challenge.

So for me, power is the thing that

I always get stuck on myself

about how we best yeah,

release power

and support empowerment.

Yeah,

it's really interesting stuff. Um,

yeah, really, really helpful.

We could have a whole of that conversation about that I think exactly,

and I think that that's for me.

Sometimes that's what we almost need to do is break down the components.

So you've got the vision. But sometimes the vision

is overwhelming for people's brains about how they might have to change.

So it's almost like having an

have an introduction to the vision, but then follow that through.

But let's look at what this means

and have those intense focus groups because the focus groups,

when you stand in the rooms and watch the events

and you see people you've never met before really getting into conversations,

there's not sometimes enough time to really bite into what that means.

Mhm.

Yeah,

a bit more depth, A bit more

time

to actually say right out of today, one action

that everybody wants to agree that they're going to try,

whether it be a discussion with your manager, whether it be changing something

and send yourself a letter.

So in three months, when you come back to the next session,

you know if you've done it,

yeah, I

like that idea.

Yeah,

you know, I mean, I know it's old school, but for me, sometimes

it's that networking that actually is what you get out of the event.

And if you do

hear

that,

yeah, and if you can find a group in the area, the same as you,

that you could perhaps work on something together with

the community and join forces because for me,

that's what the vision is about.

It's not working in silo. It's saying, like we are all in this area.

We're all in the West end of Newcastle. How can we come together

to better help

our communities understand that they can take the lead?

Yeah,

it's really, really important.

And again, I think we hear a lot, and I think we know that,

you know, wherever we move with the vision, that place is just so important.

Um, thank you, Karen.

We could talk all day about this. So maybe we need another.

Maybe maybe we need another chat in.

Is there anything else you would like to

reflect on or request or kind of mention around vision for volunteering?

No, I think it's really important to keep up the momentum.

Yeah, for me, it's having that

because there's different people at every event.

Hm.

So having regular events having that

capacity to do regular sessions.

Whether that be,

you know, you have

a training thing that we can use or

slides that we can use when we're delivering training

and talking about the vision, that's OK with you. I. I did a training session,

I think, before your team was recruited, when the vision was still a vision,

not with staff.

Um, and people really liked it. They really enjoyed it. But I was a bit like

I've written this of what I've read. What if the discussions are going the wrong way?

So just

even if it was the volunteer

centre coordinators being empowered?

And that's why I like your community champions role?

Mhm.

Because I think if people actually felt empowered and trained

to know that what they were saying about the vision is, OK,

then you would have more faces popping it into conversations.

Yeah,

and so maybe people feeling a bit more sort of well equipped to have those

I think

it's

It's

for me. It's like, Oh, am I saying the right thing about the you know that what I mean.

It's like

any volunteer good practise training.

I always if I design something I always run past

someone else

and take on board what they've said or if they've asked me a

question about what I mean so that I'm on the right track.

I like the champions. I like that you're recruiting across the sector

and it'd be good if you had a champion in

each area that that was connected to the volunteer centre. So they could.

When they're out there and they're meeting a group, they can say, Oh,

the volunteer centre can help you with this

and then they can Do you know what I mean? So that

the champions know who we are, and we know who the champions are.

That's a really good point, OK

noted.

Thank you, Karen.

That's OK.

You know me,

I. I like to talk about things that are gonna make an impact.

And I think the vision is the biggest thing

that we've

had

both on the horizon to start with. But now it's got a body.

It's not just a third, there's a body, there's a team behind it.

And I think

that

what's been achieved

is amazing. And it's

looking forward to how that develops over the coming years.

Yeah,

Brilliant. Thank you, Karen. I'm gonna stop recording now. Thank you.

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sarahtranter

Post date

29/01/2024