volunteer sustainability strategy - join st. john

Mahi Aroha A summary of our Volunteer

Sustainability StrategyStrategic priorities &

key recommendations

St John New ZealandHato Hone Aotearoa

2020–2025

A WORD FROM OUR CHIEF EXECUTIVEKUPU WHAKATAKI I am proud to introduce our strategic priorities for Mahi Aroha, our volunteer sustainability strategy that outlines our commitment to volunteers over the next few years.

With approximately 8,600 volunteers collectively contributing more than three million hours every year across our operational and community programmes, it’s safe to say volunteers are our lifeblood and a crucial part of the care and support we deliver every day.

Our work in Aotearoa started in 1885, responding to a need for first aid care in the community. We were entirely a voluntary organisation back then, and while we now have a significant paid workforce working side by side with our volunteers, the need and importance of our volunteer workforce is still vital today.

As we look to the future, volunteering will continue to play an important role in the services we provide. We see volunteering being especially significant within the context of our strategic aims of Building Resilient Communities, improving the Quality and Equity of Our Services and Creating a Values-led Culture.

Put simply, we wouldn’t be able to do what we do without our volunteers, and we must keep moving forward to retain, engage and look after our people who give up their time to help communities across the country. This document outlines just how we’re going to do that.

Thank you to all our volunteers – your support is invaluable.

Ngā Mihi, Peter Bradley – Chief Executive, St John

Volunteering at St JohnTE MAHI TŪAO KI HATO HONEOur organisation is run by people who are passionate about serving their communities and caring for their fellow New Zealanders. As a charity, we have a long-established volunteer ethos, with paid and volunteer members working side by side to look after each other and value the contribution of others, embracing a diversity of views, ideas and opinions that enhance our work and culture.

We believe it’s important to develop strong communities to help people live independently, get the social connections they need and improve their wellbeing. Central to everything we achieve is the energy and generosity of our volunteers. Volunteering at St John enables our volunteers to gain new skills and experience as well as to have opportunities to give back and support their local community, work collectively, build friendships, grow social connections and gain personal fulfilment.

We deliver care to the community via a diverse range of volunteer roles throughout clinical operations and community health services. These roles require different levels of training, skills and time commitment. The volunteer journey varies across programmes, with different approaches to recruitment, induction, volunteering experience and volunteering pathways depending on the role and team. It is important we recognise the diversity of our volunteer workforce and the opportunities this diversity brings in enabling meaningful experiences and more resilient communities.

Understanding our volunteers’ unique motivations and whakahihikotanga, and continually striving to deliver an optimal volunteer experience that actively values, promotes and supports them; bringing the best out in our people and enabling us to deliver a high-quality level of community care, underpinned by our shared vision and mission.

St John Volunteer Sustainability Strategy | 2

A snapshot of our volunteers

What our volunteers say

693Health Shuttle volunteers helped thousands of Kiwis get to over 77,000 health appointments

57Community Carers provided non-clinical comfort and support to patients, residents and families in rest homes, retirement & residential villages

55Governance Volunteers provided leadership and strategic direction and oversight of the activities of St John in New Zealand

184SPCA Outreach Therapy Pets coordinators and their companions provided hours of therapeutic pleasure

798Caring Caller volunteers connected with over 1,250 clients to offer friendship and support

1,034Youth leaders coordinated New Zealand’s premier youth programme to 5,295 future leaders

2,937Operations volunteers provided essential services on the frontline

1,423Op Shop volunteers helped keep our opportunity shop doors open

819Friends of the Emergency Department and Hospital Friends provided community care and friendship in hospitals

1,666Order members constituting the Order of St John in New Zealand, helping to promote its goal for relieving sickness, distress and suffering

1,006Local Area Committee volunteers supported St John programmes and raised essential funds

*Note many volunteers carry out multiple volunteer roles. Numbers correct as at October 2020.


Volunteering gives me a sense of pride and an enormous amount of passion to help others. I love seeing how

my contribution can make such a positive impact on someone’s day whether it be small or large.

– Oli, 19, AC

Volunteering is my Step Forward in making a better tomorrow. Whether it be for an individual, community

or St John, offering my time and efforts has been worthwhile. I know I’m making a difference.

– Annie, 38, Ambulance and Events Volunteer, First Responder

It is very rewarding, being able to help members of my community who put their trust in us. As a station manager

I enjoy the teamwork, learning leadership skills, mentoring and watching new volunteers grow and seeing my station succeed.

– Carol, 46, Volunteer Station Manager, Emergency Medical Technician

It gives me a sense of purpose and satisfaction, doing something useful and helping people in the community. It also challenges me intellectually. Studying to be an EMT aged 67 gave me a sense of academic achievement,

something I hadn’t experienced in over 40 years!– Jim, 72, Ambulance and Events Volunteer,

Emergency Medical Technician

It’s a reason to get out of bed in the morning, it gives me a sense of

purpose.– Di, 63, Op Shop

Volunteering for me is about being able to give and gain knowledge from

the people around me. It allows me to give back and thank those who have created the communities I am part of.

– Caitlin, 17, Youth

Volunteering gives me the opportunity to do meaningful work in the community while in turn giving me challenges and

personal satisfaction.– Guy, 84, Archives

It’s about connecting with people and seeing how easy it is to make someone’s day a little bit better. Giving back to the community that helped raise you doesn’t have to be complicated, and it’s so fulfilling.

– Elina, 26, FED

I love the camaraderie we have as a group. It’s also a

lot of fun.– Steve, 66, Health Shuttle

Our future: How does volunteering fit in? We step forward when help is needed. For better. For Life.

> Our mission underpins everything we do, providing a framework for our six strategic aims and our priorities for the future.

> Volunteering plays a crucial role right across our organisation, and as such is woven throughout our strategic aims.

- Improve the quality and equity of services

- Build resilient communities

- Partner to do what’s right for New Zealanders

- Build capacity to innovate and adapt

- Create a values-led culture

- Unify St John

We see volunteering being especially critical when we look at the following strategic aims:

Building resilient communitiesOur volunteers play a crucial role in supporting the delivery of our programmes and services within the community. They are also key to ensuring that we can achieve the geographic reach and can be present where the need is greatest including within our Māori and other minority communities.

We’re investing even more to strengthen our existing community programmes, and we’re growing new activities that address some of today’s underlying problems affecting people’s health and wellbeing.

Improving the quality and equity of our services We believe everybody in Aotearoa deserves access to the right care at the right time, whoever they are and wherever they live, so we can all have the best possible health and wellness outcomes. We’re committed to delivering high quality, patient-focused healthcare services, and our volunteer workforce is hugely important in achieving this. As a Te Tiriti o Waitangi partner, we are committed to being authentically responsive to the healthcare needs of New Zealanders.

Creating a values-led cultureIt is our ambition to be an organisation of positive people working together. We believe we too are a community – one made up of people working and volunteering side by side to do their best for our patients, customers, supporters and communities.

What is volunteer sustainability?Volunteer Sustainability is the organisational framework to more effectively support, develop, and resource our volunteers throughout their journey at St John. It is critical that our volunteers feel appreciated and valued, and that volunteering continues to be relevant, visible and valued in local communities. It acknowledges the role that mahi aroha has in Māori culture.

Why is volunteering sustainability important to us?Our volunteers represent a vibrant spirit of generosity and sense of community, and with more than 8,600 volunteers, we are committed to ensuring and offering the most meaningful and sustainable volunteering experience.

This strategy aims to set out the way we encourage and promote a culture which recognises, enables and promotes volunteering. Supporting our volunteers is everyone’s responsibility.


Volunteers

Shared Goals

Sens

e of B

elonging Local Support Networks

1. CapacityIncrease our capacity to manage,

support, and recognise volunteers.

3. AcknowledgeAcknowledge and recognise the value of

volunteers across all levels in the organisation.

4. ResultsEstablish systems to

track, measure and report results.

2. CapabilityEnable and empower our

volunteers and their leaders to succeed.

1. Further streamline volunteer recruitment and onboarding practices.

2. Continue to enhance the volunteer experience through developing quality leadership.

3. Continue to promote an inclusive and belonging culture.

4. Collaborate with other volunteer organisations, agencies and groups across Aotearoa.

1. Further empower the Volunteer Support Group (VSG) as a strategic body.

2. Ensure recognition opportunities promote volunteer engagement and retention at a local/ārohe level.

3. Develop accessible mechanisms for compelling storytelling.

1. Develop and implement a robust, comprehensive Volunteer Measurement Framework.

1. Further empower volunteers and their managers/ poutoku through the development and promotion of training and progression opportunities.

Developing our strategy: the journey to Mahi Aroha

OUR STRATEGY IN A NUTSHELLWHAKARĀPOPOTONGA MATUAIn 2014, we launched our first “Volunteer Sustainability Strategy” (VSS). This acknowledged the need to place further emphasis on building the right mix of volunteer support initiatives to better inform, attract, support and retain our volunteers.

In 2019, a comprehensive review was undertaken to understand the current perceptions of the volunteer journey. This included a design workshop session; focus groups, interviews with paid staff, volunteers and people holding both roles; survey results of 629 volunteers; a Volunteer Support Group workshop session, a review of previous implementation plans; and feedback from over 2,600 of our volunteers through our organisational engagement survey.

This updated strategy covers the next four years and renews the focus on the volunteer, their personal experience and journey by asking the question, “What can we do to be a world class organisation and give volunteers the type of experience that they signed up for?”

Mahi Aroha is about people working together from a position of love, caring and empathy. It is at the heart of Māoritanga and recognises that our personal wellbeing relies on the wellbeing of the entire hapori whanau to move forward, we need to ensure we

do the right thing by our volunteers. Our systems must encourage and support our people to progress beyond transactional volunteering to something more transformative. This is about achieving a sustainable approach to volunteering by investing as much in the volunteers’ personal development as we hope they bring to the volunteer role.

We seek to benefit volunteers, local communities and our organisation by achieving three overarching goals over the next four years:

> Local support networks: Systems and processes are in place to provide a clear sense of direction while delivering the training and support needed to work together at a local level.

> Shared goals: Volunteer leaders who are well equipped to support the strategy over the next four years and into the future are established in all key locations or programmes across the organisation.

> Sense of belonging: We have established a volunteer model that is inclusive and offers volunteers the opportunity to connect to the identity of ‘One St John’, overcoming any feelings of division between volunteers and paid employees.

This approach ensures recommendations reflect our unique culture, and our values; it takes into consideration current programmes, volunteerism best practice approaches and key stakeholder perspectives.


Our commitment TE ŪRANGA In their work with us, volunteers make a vital and valuable contribution to Hato Hone St John and the people of Aotearoa.

Our Volunteer Sustainability Strategy reflects the mana St John holds for its volunteers and their contribution to everything we do.

In refreshing the strategy to take us through to 2025, our intention was to honour past achievements and people and to build on their work and feedback from stakeholders. We have done this by looking to new innovations as well as by adjusting and improving the support, development, processes and practices that underpin the volunteer experience within Hato Hone St John.

We have focused on activities that reflect partnership, respect and appreciation for our volunteers and their whānau under four strategic priorities that collectively integrate the organisation’s specific commitments.

Meeting these commitments will ensure our volunteers are well-equipped and validated in a culture – and by leadership, support, development and tools – that sustains their engagement, satisfaction and involvement with Hato Hone St John.

Kia ora te tangata. For the wellbeing of people.

He aha te mea nui o te ao, he tangata, he tangata, he tangata.

What is most important in the world, it is people, it is people, it is people.


volunteer sustainability strategy - join st. john

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