Encouraging volunteers to continue on their learning journey
Five tips for Team Leaders and Lead Volunteers when having a conversation about overdue learning
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At Scouts, we want to encourage a culture of ongoing learning, where both our young people and our volunteers have the opportunity to grow and develop skills for life. Aiming to achieve this goal, and to provide our volunteers with the skills and knowledge to keep everyone safe, we offer them learning opportunities to our volunteers.
Following-up on the volunteers’ learning progress is one of the Team Leaders' and Lead Volunteers' responsibilities. That happens through checking if the volunteer is confident when performing their tasks, and also by making sure they complete the required learning.
Here you find support for Team Leaders and Lead Volunteers when talking about uncompleted learning with their teams and some tips on what to consider when preparing for the conversation.
1. Choose the right moment and approach for the conversation
Thinking of how the volunteer would best respond to the conversation is the starting point when planning for it. As their leader, you might already know if they prefer to have a chat before or after the next Scout meeting, or a video/phone call at another time, but there is no harm in asking them for their preference.
As you know, the time and place you choose, and the approach and tone of voice you use will influence on how the volunteer receives and responds to the conversation. Creating an environment of understanding, where both you and the volunteer feel comfortable, is really important.
2. Check if they understand why learning is important
You can take this opportunity to explain why we take learning seriously at Scouts and remind them of its benefits, both for the volunteers themselves and the people they volunteer with.
As a general rule, people are more likely to do something when they truly understand its purpose and they see value on it. We know that completing learning might not be as fun as running a Scout activity, but we have a collective responsibility to make sure we're all equipped with the right skills to keep everyone safe.
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Keeps people safe.
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Provides a shared understanding of best practices.
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Communicates our values, standards, policies and expectations.
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Improves the quality of the programme we deliver.
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Gives volunteers opportunities to develop existing and new skills.
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Empowers the volunteers to perform their tasks and responsibilities.
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Helps to accomplish our duty to look after the young people in our care.
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Improves knowledge.
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Provides new skills.
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Develops existing skills further.
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Prepares for responsibilities.
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Improves self-confidence.
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Shows we care about our young people.
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Recognises competencies and knowledge.
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Celebrates achievements.
3. Ask what is stopping them from completing their learning
Each volunteer might have a different reason why they haven’t completed their learning. It’s important to allow them to share their reasons with you, and not presume them. This is particularly important as an individual could have additional support or learning needs that you are unaware of.
They might be really busy at work, going through a difficult moment in their personal lives, or just not understand what learning they're required to do. Some volunteers might be worried about not having the right skills or equipment to complete their learning, or they might have had negative training experiences in the past.
4. Explore what support they need
Once you have an understanding of what is stopping the volunteer from completing their learning, you can start exploring what you, your wider team and anyone else can do to best support them.
You can also take this opportunity to check if they understand the learning they're required to do.
Below you find some suggested actions you can propose to help volunteers complete their learning.
While we don’t want the experience of our young people to be affected by our learning commitments, offering the volunteer the option to use the time they already dedicate to Scouts to complete their learning might be a last resource when other alternatives have failed.
- Use the time of the Scout meeting to complete the learning. You can support them by finding a leader to cover the volunteer’s absence that week.
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For e-learning courses, you can suggest they bring a laptop or tablet to the Scout meeting, and sit aside while another leader is running an activity.
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If there's a group of leaders from the same session who need to complete learning, you can suggest they cancel one Scout meeting and use the time of the Scout meeting to complete the learning at home, all together at their regular meeting place, or to attend a face-to-face learning course.
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Some work places encourage their employees to volunteer by allowing them to use some working hours towards their volunteering. You can check with the volunteer if this is a possibility where they work.
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Double check what is the delivery method available for the course they're required to do: face-to-face, e-learning, or a combination of both. The volunteer might not be aware that many courses are currently done online, and therefore can be completed at any day and time.
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For face-to-face learning courses, you can help the volunteer check the offer available in your County/Area/Region, as they might not know where or how to book them. If there is not enough offer, you might consider contacting the Volunteering Development Team and enquiry about the learning offer in the near future.
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Some work places encourage their employees to volunteer by allowing them to use some working hours towards their volunteering. You can check with the volunteer if this is a possibility where they work.
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Temporary exceptions can be made to exclude a member from receiving learning reminder emails if the volunteer is going through a difficult moment, such as bereavement or being ill. You can check if the volunteer could be considered to be included in the exemptions list by emailing training.compliance@scouts.org.uk.
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Consider using the time of the Scout meeting to complete the learning at home. You can support them by finding a leader to cover the volunteer’s absence that week. If suggesting this option, take into consideration that being part of a Scout meeting might be an important part of their support network and mental wellbeing.
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Check with the team if there's a device with internet they can bring to the Scout meeting, and suggest the volunteer sits aside while another leader is running an activity.
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Check with the team if they have a device they could borrow for this purpose.
- Suggest the volunteer has a conversation about alternatives with the Volunteering Development Team.
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Check if there're free internet access points around the volunteer’s home, e.g. libraries.
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Check if there're funds that could be used to support the volunteer to access e-learning, e.g. purchasing a sim card with mobile data and a device for training purposes, or using an internet Café.
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If the volunteer is not sure where to find the learning they need to complete at scouts.org.uk, share the Learning digital tool guide with them.
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Ask another leader or member of team to act as a buddy/mentor, and show the volunteer how to access and complete these e-learning modules. You can suggest the buddy/mentor guides the volunteer through the website, or sits next to them while they are doing the training.
- Contact the Volunteering Development Team and ask for support. They can help you find a suitable alternative.
- If the volunteer has a disability, health or medical condition, the accessibility tools for independent learning might be helpful for volunteers with vision or hearing problems, and in some cases, those with physical or motor issues.
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Ask the volunteer if there is any additional support you or others could offer. You could suggest a couple of ways to support them, for example, they partially complete the course (eg the theory part of First Aid training), or check if another leader or team member could act as a buddy/mentor to support them.
- For e-learning, the accessibility tools for independent learning might help volunteers with vision or hearing problems, and in some cases, those with physical or motor issues.
Explain that renewing learning is a common practice across many organisations, and the main reasons for it are:
- The guidelines and procedures can change over the years
- To continually refresh skills and knowledge
- To provide confidence when applying them
Our young people and volunteers having a safe and great experience is very important and should be for all volunteers. Learning supports this.
5. Agree on action plan
You can finish the conversation with a clear action plan. Both the volunteer and you should agree on the next steps each of you are expected to take, the timeframe to complete them, and the consequences of not doing it.
Consider if you might need to put mutually agreed restrictions in place, or to suspend the volunteer until they complete their learning.