Vision for Volunteering

More collaborative, more diverse, devolving power:

Vision for Volunteering sets challenges to all those working with volunteers

• Vision for Volunteering promotes a conversation about future of volunteering

• Contributions from more than 300 organisations have been received

Volunteering needs to embrace experimentation, actively encourage collaboration, and ensure that it is more diverse and inclusive, in order that the impact volunteers make across the country can continue to grow, according to the Vision for Volunteering.

The Vision also urges organisations to recognise the power of volunteers and communities, and to ensure that everyone is able to engage with their community and build the future they want to see. This requires power to be devolved to individuals and communities, it argues.

The Vision for Volunteering movement, led by NAVCA, NCVO, Volunteering Matters, the Association of Volunteer Managers and Sport England, today (Friday 6 May) begins the next stage of its conversation on what volunteering needs to look like, and how this will make volunteers feel about their roles, by 2032.

Over the last few months, the Vision has received feedback and input from a total of more than 350 people - from CEOs and volunteer managers to volunteers and community workers - who together represent more than 300 organisations from the charity, public and private sectors. The evidence gathering phase was supported by the Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport (DCMS).

Emma-Jane Gill, an ambassador for youth social action campaign #iwill, is speaking at the event. She says: “I’d describe myself as being in a long-term relationship with volunteering, and it’s safe to say that I would not be where I am today without it. Being able to give my time and expertise flexibly and connecting with a wide range of people through different kinds of voluntary work has been the source of great enjoyment, fulfilment, and direction - and has helped me make a start in the world of work.I hope that the Vision for Volunteering can contribute to many more people having a range of opportunities to make volunteering a part of their life.”

Ruth Leonard, chair of the Association of Volunteer Managers, who will also speak at the event, says: “Today’s publication is deliberately not the delivery of a finalised action plan - this is the start of the next chapter in a conversation about what is needed to create a diverse, innovative, ambitious and person-centred future for volunteering. I know that many are already working on the principles outlined in the Vision or are keen to take them on board - whatever stage you are at, we hope that the Vision and its insights can enable you and we’d love to hear your voice in this continuing dialogue.”

Five key themes

The five key themes for the future of the volunteering ecosystem are: awareness and appreciation; power; equity and inclusion; collaboration; and experimentation. The Vision says:

• We want a future in which volunteering is further ingrained in the collective psyche, is part of everyone’s life, and in which it’s always easy to find ways to make a difference

• We want a future where the power of volunteers and communities is recognised and supported, allowing everyone to engage within their community, identify what matters to them and build the future they want to see

• We want volunteering to be accessible and welcoming to everyone, everywhere, so that the benefits of volunteering are equally distributed

• We want a future where collaboration can be natural, fluid, flexible and spontaneous, with collaboration actively encouraged and barriers to it tackled

• We want innovation, experimentation and embracing flexibility to be a natural, constant part of volunteering, not just a temporary bolt-on in times of crisis or Covid

The Vision also argues that volunteers themselves, more than processes or outputs, must be at the heart of volunteering in order to make the most of peoples’ motivations and skills. 

It goes on to say that putting volunteers at the centre of volunteering does not mean ignoring or being less responsive to the needs of society, noting that the Covid-19 pandemic made it clear that individual motivations are strongly linked to those needs.