Volunteer to Career in General Practice
As featured in previous episodes, Volunteer to Career is a fantastic enhanced volunteering experience. Volunteers have the chance to gain first hand experience in a health and care setting, receive career mentoring and make a difference at the same time.
In this episode we hear first hand from two people what it was like to get involved with Volunteer to Career. Ginette took part as a volunteer, and shares why she signed up and the value it offered. And we meet Laura Holder, the Practice Manager at Ludham and Stalham Green Surgeries who set up the programme that Ginette participated in.
To get in touch: nwicb.volunteering@nhs.net
To find out more about Volunteer to Career visit: https://improvinglivesnw.org.uk/volunteering-volunteer-to-career/
Volunteering Discovery is produced by Hospital Radio Norwich for Norfolk and Waveney Integrated Care System.
Hosted by Sarah Briggs
Producer: Jules Alderson.
Transcript
In earlier episodes of Volunteering Discovery, we
Sarah:introduced Volunteer to Career.
Sarah:This was a new volunteering initiative within primary care, aiming to support
Sarah:people to take their first steps in a health and care career, by giving them
Sarah:first hand experience and extra support.
Sarah:In today's episode, we're meeting two members of the team at Ludham
Sarah:and Stalham Green Practice, who took part in Volunteer to Career.
Sarah:Ginette, one of the first people to sign up with the scheme as a volunteer, will
Sarah:share her story of what it was like and how it helped her on her career journey.
Sarah:And we'll be hearing from Laura Holder about why she was keen for the
Sarah:scheme to take place in the practice, how she set it up and the benefits
Sarah:she saw from involving volunteers.
Sarah:First, we'll meet Ginette.
Ginette:My name is Ginette and I have been volunteering at the
Ginette:Ludham and Stalham GP surgery.
Ginette:I had hit a wall really in my job search.
Ginette:I wanted to be a phlebotomist.
Ginette:I just like the idea of being in the healthcare service and
Ginette:doing something like that.
Ginette:When I read up about it, you don't actually need to have any qualifications
Ginette:to do it, apart from the skills.
Ginette:I'd embarked on two courses of my own that I'd found and did those, but couldn't
Ginette:actually, as I said at the start, couldn't actually get a job because a lot of the
Ginette:jobs were asking for people with six months work experience, and it's hard
Ginette:to get started in something like that.
Ginette:So that's Why I really wanted to do it.
Ginette:I had been down quite a few avenues and Found that I couldn't actually get
Ginette:a job without having any experience so I had been looking at different
Ginette:ways to Try and find some experience i. e. work experience, which I did do.
Ginette:I went around with the East Coast community nurses and shadowed their
Ginette:phlebotomist, which was enjoyable.
Ginette:So then I started to apply for jobs again, but then, as I said, I hit a wall.
Ginette:And one day I was sitting, I had actually I had enrolled on a care course.
Ginette:At the time and I was sitting in a a clinic waiting for my
Ginette:reflexology appointment and picked up a little leaflet and in that was
Ginette:the advert for volunteer career.
Ginette:So I did no more and went home and emailed and got a response straight
Ginette:away, which was perfect actually.
Ginette:I thought about the volunteering aspect of it and thought that it'd be a really good
Ginette:idea to try and find some volunteering that would be in the healthcare sector
Ginette:and volunteer to career actually was.
Ginette:So that met all my requirements and I just followed on through with that.
Sarah:The practice that Ginette applied to was Ludham and Stalham Green surgeries.
Sarah:As volunteering within primary care is not taking place on the same scale as
Sarah:within other health settings such as hospitals, we were keen to understand why
Sarah:the surgeries had decided to get involved.
Sarah:Their practice manager, who led the involvement with the work, filled us in.
Laura:I'm Laura Holder.
Laura:I'm the practice manager at Ludham and Stalham Green Surgeries.
Laura:We are a two site rural GP practice in North Norfolk.
Laura:We serve just under 6, 000 patients in our local community.
Laura:We have quite an elderly demographic.
Laura:And we also have some areas of deprivation that we serve,
Laura:particularly around the coast.
Laura:We have four GP partners.
Laura:We're a training practice, so we train GP registrars, practice
Laura:nurses, and we do lots of different apprenticeships here as well.
Laura:I think Volunteer to Career really matches with the ethos of the practice.
Laura:So we're all about being a training practice with the GPs, nurses
Laura:and apprentices that we train.
Laura:We also really believe in supporting our local community.
Laura:So the thought that we could help somebody in Norfolk and Waveney, who's looking
Laura:to start a career in healthcare or just get back on the career ladder for a wide
Laura:variety of reasons really spoke to us.
Laura:We can really see the value in volunteering.
Laura:I think.
Laura:We have experience of volunteering in a couple of different ways.
Laura:We have a really active patient participation group.
Laura:who volunteer for us with things like when we have our flu clinics, they come
Laura:and help people take off their coats, and help people parking, and things
Laura:like that when we're particularly busy, so that's been fantastic.
Laura:And also, during COVID, when we had the COVID vaccine centres, we did a
Laura:lot of work with volunteers helping there, and it was so positive, that
Laura:it's something that we wanted to continue in a really positive vein.
Laura:I personally also think if you have people that volunteer to
Laura:work in healthcare, you're getting amazing people who genuinely care.
Laura:For us on a practical level as well, recruiting in rural North
Laura:Norfolk can be really challenging.
Laura:So the thought that we might be able to have a volunteer that may really
Laura:thrive here and may gel really well with us and might end up with us
Laura:recruiting them into a role is just the
Sarah:Having signed up to take part in Volunteer to Career, there were
Sarah:several areas for Laura to consider and prepare, ready to welcome volunteers.
Laura:Anything connected to primary care or healthcare, the first thing that pops
Laura:into your head is always confidentiality.
Laura:People's health records and what they're coming to the doctor for, it's
Laura:incredibly private and personal, so we have to be really compliant with GDPR.
Laura:We worked really closely with the ICB and we also worked really closely with our
Laura:HR provider, so our employment lawyers, to make sure that we had a really good
Laura:volunteer handbook, so that we had a really clear role description with what
Laura:skills and qualities we were looking for, and that we had a handbook that spoke
Laura:to them all about mandatory training.
Laura:Policies that are applicable to them procedures that were applicable to
Laura:them, so that they knew what was expected of them, and they knew what
Laura:was expected of us as an employer.
Laura:Think expectations is something that you have to manage really well
Laura:all the way round the organisation when you think about volunteering.
Laura:I think that We needed to set out to the volunteers some things to think
Laura:about when you work in primary care, like the fact that most patients that
Laura:come to the GP, it's not for good news.
Laura:They're not feeling very well.
Laura:You're not seeing them on their best day.
Laura:So sometimes they can be agitated, upset, or just not.
Laura:Very chatty and you have to appreciate that.
Laura:It's very rare you go to the doctors for good news.
Laura:And they needed to know the practical things, so they needed a full induction
Laura:when they came, just like a member of staff would, because they need to know
Laura:where the toilets are, where the coffee is, where the fire escapes are, what to
Laura:do when an alarm goes off, what to do if a patient collapses in front of you.
Laura:So actually, some of the induction was very similar.
Laura:to an employed member of staff, because from a health and safety
Laura:perspective, an infection control perspective all those things could still
Laura:happen with a volunteer in the room.
Laura:And in terms of the team, we wanted to make sure that the team were on board,
Laura:that they were going to make that volunteer feel welcome, feel very much
Laura:part of the team but that they weren't going to Expect too much of them either.
Laura:It's not free labour.
Laura:It's not another member of the team that we're just not paying for.
Laura:It's somebody that is on a journey to get to a career they want.
Laura:And we're hopefully going to help them on that by giving them
Laura:experiences and opportunities.
Laura:Yes, they're here to help us, but we're also here to help them.
Laura:I think that was something that we tried to instil in the team really early on.
Laura:And I think.
Laura:The fact that the way we went about recruiting was doing a really informal
Laura:interview, because of course they're not interviewing for a job, it's not the same.
Laura:We wanted to make sure they'd be a good fit, wanted to understand what their
Laura:motivations were for doing it wanted to, them to understand what our motivations
Laura:were for doing it and to be able to shape the role around the individual.
Laura:That was really important to me.
Laura:I wanted to be able to see what that individual, where they were coming from,
Laura:what skills they had, what their hopes and dreams were, and then mould it around
Laura:them rather than trying to fit them into a structure that I had in my head.
Laura:So for example, If we'd had an interview with somebody that was hugely gregarious
Laura:and really confident, I might have said, you'll be amazing, front of house, getting
Laura:people to fill in their patient surveys.
Laura:You would be great at that.
Laura:Whereas if we had somebody that was much quieter or more introverted,
Laura:it might not suit their personality.
Laura:They might not enjoy it.
Laura:We might not get the best out of them.
Laura:Or if we'd had someone who was incredibly IT savvy.
Laura:Maybe we would have used that aspect of them.
Laura:So I really wanted to make sure that it worked for them and it
Laura:worked for us and that our team knew what our expectations were.
Sarah:As Laura says, confidentiality in health and care settings is essential.
Sarah:We asked if there were any extra considerations given due to the nature of
Sarah:being a relatively small rural practice.
Laura:We didn't want to say no to anybody that applied, but I was mindful
Laura:that it's not ideal to have one of your own patients because of confidentiality.
Laura:The the The volunteer that we had doesn't live in our catchment area,
Laura:lives quite a long distance away.
Laura:We weren't concerned that she would know our patients or that her family lived
Laura:here or anything like that, because that can be a bit of a conflict of interest.
Laura:So that was the first point.
Laura:In terms of confidentiality, there is mandatory online training that the
Laura:volunteer has to do before they can even step foot in the door, that talks all
Laura:about GDPR, duty of candor, and Caldicott Guardian, Caldicott Rules so they have
Laura:to do all of that before they even come.
Laura:Then it also forms part of their induction.
Laura:And they also don't have an NHS smart card, so they can't access anything.
Laura:They can't access any patient identifiable information, they can't access any
Laura:patient records or anything like that, so they simply don't have the access.
Sarah:With the vision of creating a tailored volunteering experience for
Sarah:the right volunteer, we asked Laura how the practice went about organizing the
Sarah:activities after they'd met Ginette.
Sarah:You'll hear Laura refer to a HCA, this stands for a health care assistant.
Laura:When I did the informal interview with Ginette, she was very interested in
Laura:the healthcare assistant phlebotomy type role, which initially I thought this might
Laura:be a bit of an issue because actually one of the core things about volunteering
Laura:is they can't do anything clinical.
Laura:They're not covered by insurance, they haven't had the required training, so you
Laura:can't get them to do anything clinical.
Laura:That's really clear from the outset.
Laura:But actually When I discussed it with her and we started talking about what
Laura:type of things she could do Actually when you really sit down and think about
Laura:it, there's lots of things that she could do that helped the nursing team
Laura:Because we've got healthcare assistants.
Laura:We've got practice nurses.
Laura:We've got a registered nurse associate.
Laura:We've got an ANP So we looked at what things could she do that would help the
Laura:whole team and help her with learning.
Laura:So we spoke to our whole nursing team and said, we've got this opportunity.
Laura:We found this amazing lady who just radiates smiles and we just
Laura:think the patients will love her.
Laura:She's really interested in this role.
Laura:So we'd like to create a volunteering opportunity for her where she gets the
Laura:opportunity to see what you do, to see really in real life what does an HCA do
Laura:on a day to day basis, but we want to make sure she's helping you, she's helping
Laura:the patient, she's helping the surgery.
Laura:So as a team, we came up with a list of things that we
Laura:thought she could safely do.
Laura:So that's things like physically being an extra pair of hands.
Laura:So if an elderly couple with mobility issues.
Laura:Come in to have their blood tests.
Laura:She can get them from reception She can be an extra pair of hands to literally
Laura:physically help them come through to the room Get them an appropriate chair,
Laura:help them sit down, help them to take their coat off, roll their sleeve up,
Laura:get them some water If they're a bit dehydrated, their veins aren't coming up.
Laura:So practical things like that She can do and it just helps the flow of the day
Laura:because healthcare assistants when they're doing a phlebotomy clinic is quick.
Laura:It's fast It's five minute appointments back to back So just to help with the
Laura:flow of the day of getting patients in is helping the whole practice On
Laura:a really practical level as well.
Laura:She was doing things like restocking so making sure that we had blood
Laura:bottles on the blood trolley making sure we had cotton wool and Plasters
Laura:and everything like that so she could restock for everybody She could, once
Laura:the blood's taken, take them through and put them in the blood bag ready
Laura:for the courier to take to the lab.
Laura:She could help with printing forms so if a healthcare assistant needs a lot of ice
Laura:forms printed, which is the forms that get sent with the blood samples to the lab.
Laura:If she could physically print them all out on a printer, so that they're in
Laura:the room ready, that's really helpful.
Laura:And even small morale boosts of things, like making a cup of tea for
Laura:that particular member of staff who hasn't stopped all morning, and making
Laura:sure that they've got what they need.
Laura:all really helped.
Laura:And of course, at the same time, what she's doing is she's shadowing
Laura:and she's learning and she's seeing what it's really like to be
Laura:work as part of the nursing team.
Sarah:For Ginette, the first part of her volunteering journey
Sarah:started with contacting the team to find out more and to see if it
Sarah:was the right opportunity for her.
Sarah:Ben Chandler and Laura Jones, who led the project for the Primary
Sarah:Care Workforce team at the Norfolk and Waverley Integrated Care Board,
Sarah:were on hand to talk to Ginette about the role and what to expect.
Ginette:After having a chat with both Ben and Laura They actually both
Ginette:put me at ease during the process.
Ginette:I felt that I could ask all the questions that I needed to ask,
Ginette:and they were really professional and very friendly and supportive.
Ginette:That kind of gave me the confidence to go on and enroll to be a volunteer.
Ginette:I went on a course in Norwich and that covered all sorts of things
Ginette:like fire safety, health and safety.
Ginette:Basic first aid data protection and lots of other things like moving and handling
Ginette:and infection control and safeguarding.
Ginette:That was really good and it helped when I came into volunteering that I'd
Ginette:covered some of that in the courses.
Sarah:Once Ginette had completed the training, she was ready to get started.
Sarah:Ginette talked us through what she could expect to be doing
Sarah:in her volunteering sessions.
Ginette:I'd always arrive on time and maybe make drinks for myself
Ginette:and the person that I'm shadowing.
Ginette:And that was always prearranged, who I was going to be with,
Ginette:so that was really helpful.
Ginette:There's two surgeries, this surgery and Stalham, so I would flip between
Ginette:both of them after a few weeks here.
Ginette:It would depend who I was with really.
Ginette:Sometimes I was with the phlebotomist.
Ginette:Which was really good because obviously that's what I was
Ginette:interested in to start with.
Ginette:We would go through what she was going to do that day, and after I'd been there
Ginette:for a few sessions, I was able to get all the stuff ready, like the blood
Ginette:bottles, the cotton wool refill, all of that, and make sure everything that she
Ginette:needed was to hand during the session.
Ginette:And then I would help her to enter information onto the system.
Ginette:And that would be really good.
Ginette:And then, moving into the healthcare assistant role, I would help her to
Ginette:weigh the patients, do their height, and waist measurements, and enter all
Ginette:that, all of that information onto the screen while she did the talking
Ginette:and the patient was always happy for me to do that, which was really nice.
Ginette:Everyone was really friendly, and, after, being introduced as a volunteer.
Ginette:It was really nice because sometimes I'd see the same patient another time
Ginette:and it was nice to see them again.
Ginette:And they were happy for me to be there which was really nice.
Ginette:Yeah so I suppose as the volunteer role went on, Being with the
Ginette:phlebotomist a few times I was then able to do the ice forms for her.
Ginette:So I felt like I was really helping and being part of the team
Ginette:really, which was really nice.
Ginette:An ice form is a blood form, basically.
Ginette:It's what the doctors request the bloods and then that has to be put through onto
Ginette:a form, which is called an ice form.
Ginette:And that, Prints out.
Ginette:So you have the sticky labels to stick on the blood bottles and that's sent off to
Ginette:the hospital or the pathology department so they can um, look at the samples.
Ginette:Thank you.
Ginette:Yeah, so that's all on there.
Ginette:. Other times I would sit in and shadow the nurses.
Ginette:That would be very interesting.
Ginette:I would watch what they did actually and, just sit quietly most of the time
Ginette:in the nurse sessions because there wasn't really anything I could do.
Ginette:I'd make drinks for us all and Maybe enter some information on to the computer
Ginette:if it was appropriate to do and clean up after the patient had left, wipe
Ginette:down the chairs and things like that.
Ginette:So I felt again, I was having a little bit of hands on experience as well.
Sarah:To enable Ginette to observe and support healthcare professionals during
Sarah:appointments with patients, the practice team followed a procedure each session.
Laura:The way that we worked it was Ginette would be with a health care
Laura:assistant or a nurse for a session So for example for a morning and we have
Laura:it on our computer system where you see they see 20 patients that morning For
Laura:example and at the top of that ledger we was right that we had a volunteer
Laura:in there And so when a patient came to reception As we were checking them in,
Laura:we were asking for their individual verbal consent to say, is it okay that
Laura:a volunteer is in there shadowing?
Laura:If they said yes, marvellous, she'd come out, she'd introduce herself.
Laura:If they were still comfortable, that's fine.
Laura:If they said no, she'd simply step out.
Laura:They're quite used to it here because we're a training practice,
Laura:so they're used to registrars, student nurses, apprentices, so it's
Laura:rare that people say no, we find.
Laura:If it's something incredibly personal or very private or very intimate, . They
Laura:might say actually on this occasion.
Laura:No, and that will be completely respected But on the whole I think people were
Laura:really interested in what she's doing and really keen That the practice was
Laura:doing this when I discussed it with our patient participation group Because
Laura:whenever we take on a pilot for something or a research project or anything that
Laura:we take on I always run it past our PPG patient participation group first because
Laura:I want a patient's perspective on it If I think it's a good idea the partners think
Laura:it's a good idea I want to get a patient perspective before I say yes to anything.
Laura:When I discussed it with them, they thought it was a wonderful idea and
Laura:were really pro and really supportive.
Sarah:The chance to see first hand what volunteering in health and care is
Sarah:really like and gain the chance to see different roles in action proved to be
Sarah:a highlight of Ginette's volunteering.
Ginette:It was interesting shadowing the nurse because You don't ever see what
Ginette:they do unless you're the patient, really.
Ginette:But seeing and asking them sometimes if it was appropriate.
Ginette:I would ask questions, about the different kinds of infection
Ginette:and things like that and what dressings they were using to put on.
Ginette:So it was very knowledgeable as well and helpful to see that there
Ginette:are so many different dressings to put on an infected leg, dependent
Ginette:on what sort of infection it is.
Ginette:With a phlebotomist, it is something that I was very interested in and,
Ginette:is my end goal anyway to become a fully fledged phlebotomist.
Ginette:I'm halfway there, just need to have my sign off for my competency
Ginette:now, so I'm happy about that.
Ginette:But at the start seeing how much preparation she needed to do and
Ginette:also how much information that's entered onto the system as well.
Ginette:It's not just sit down, I'll take your blood and out you go.
Ginette:There is a lot that goes on behind the scenes as well for that one.
Ginette:Yeah, so it is interesting.
Ginette:And also each patient is different.
Ginette:That was interesting to see all different sorts of people that come
Ginette:in gender, Weight age, all of that does affect the certain blood draws,
Ginette:and your veins, so yeah, all that was very interesting at the start.
Ginette:And now I'm used to it.
Ginette:That was really good.
Ginette:That was yeah, that kind of cemented my fact in the way that
Ginette:I would have when the job came up.
Ginette:I was.
Ginette:At first I was quite nervous of applying for it, but after speaking to people
Ginette:and the phlebotomists and the nurses and everything, they gave me the confidence
Ginette:to feel that I could actually do it.
Ginette:The part I found most enjoyable was the hands on experience of actually being able
Ginette:to get involved and, put things onto the system and print the ice forms because I
Ginette:really did feel like then I was helping and volunteering to me to a lot of other
Ginette:people it means helping it does mean that you're helping out so at the start when
Ginette:I wasn't really able to help I suppose I felt a little bit restricted because I
Ginette:couldn't do anything and but once I was actually able to do things like enter this
Ginette:information onto a system, print the ice forms, get the stuff ready for the clinic.
Ginette:And yeah, so that was the bit that was most enjoyable, being able to do things
Ginette:and feeling that I was helping out.
Ginette:At first, it was a bit of a minefield.
Ginette:Just getting the there's so much information on the actual systems
Ginette:that using that at the start was a bit difficult and I was very lucky to
Ginette:have very patient people to teach me.
Sarah:Although Ginettete knew she was interested in phlebotomy, Laura
Sarah:knew that a varied experience in the practice would be valuable.
Sarah:To help Ginette to feel a part of the team and give her a better understanding
Sarah:of the different elements of life in a GP practice, the shadowing opportunities
Sarah:weren't limited to clinical interactions.
Laura:She was also invited to our team meetings and things like that,
Laura:because I think it's really important that she knows what's going on in the
Laura:surgery, because she has signed the same confidentiality form as all of
Laura:our staff have, so she's just as bound by confidentiality as everybody else.
Laura:I think in terms of training and support, the shadowing is what really
Laura:opened her eyes to what it's really like, because I think a lot of people
Laura:think a GP surgery is one person on reception on the phone and a doctor.
Laura:. Actually, there's so many more roles than that.
Laura:It's so busy, it's so varied.
Laura:No two days are the same.
Laura:So I think the shadowing aspect of what all the different roles were.
Laura:And we made sure that she sat with, I think, everybody in the practice with
Laura:every different role at some point.
Laura:So she saw what the medical secretary is, how they do the
Laura:referrals to secondary care.
Laura:She sat with reception and saw what a Monday morning on reception could
Laura:be like when the phones go wild.
Laura:She sat in with the care coordinators who are working out who's going to
Laura:see the duty doctor that day and who's going to get a home visit that day.
Laura:And she sat in with myself and my deputy really to talk about her well being
Laura:and making sure that she was alright.
Laura:Because you can see very upset patients who've just had really bad
Laura:news, patients who are aggressive.
Laura:It can be distressing and it can be stressful and busy and urgent.
Laura:So we talked a lot about what support is out there for her in terms of well being
Laura:via the NHS and via local charities and just a whole chat about if anything ever
Laura:worries you, if you see anything you don't like, if you see anything that's
Laura:worrying you or you don't feel comfortable with, open door policy, come and find us.
Laura:Here's our mobile numbers.
Laura:Just contact us any time.
Laura:Don't feel afraid to speak up.
Sarah:Alongside the practice activities with Volunteer to
Sarah:Career, Ginette was given access to one to one mentoring sessions.
Sarah:These sessions are designed to help someone think through their next steps
Sarah:to help reach a career related goal.
Sarah:As the sessions are all tailored to the individual, each one will be different,
Sarah:with some people looking to improve their interview skills, and others not even
Sarah:sure where to find out about different roles in health and care settings.
Ginette:The mentoring sessions, they're very helpful, and I
Ginette:had a long chat with my mentor.
Ginette:She was lovely her name was Charlotte, and she was very easy to talk to, and
Ginette:she was also in the healthcare sector, so she knew exactly what I was talking
Ginette:about when I asked her advice, and she gave brilliant advice, and loads of,
Ginette:information to me and she was there.
Ginette:She said any time you need to contact me just email me and we can set up a meeting.
Ginette:And it was done over Zoom, so it was very convenient.
Ginette:And she was lovely.
Sarah:The aim of Volunteer to Career is to support people to
Sarah:take their next steps into a health and care career or education.
Sarah:In Ginette's case it did just that before she'd even finished the programme.
Ginette:Whilst I was volunteering a vacancy came up for a healthcare
Ginette:assistant role and with phlebotomy.
Ginette:So I decided that I would go for it and I was lucky enough to get it.
Ginette:And I felt extra prepared because of the training I had
Ginette:at the start, that was all good.
Ginette:And Obviously, when, once I took the role on, there was more training to do.
Ginette:So that kind of broke me in a little bit, and helped.
Ginette:So it, everything just slotted into place.
Ginette:And Laura Jones, she had already set me up on a course.
Ginette:to do a phlebotomy course, like a refresher, and to get my competency
Ginette:in Norfolk and Norwich Hospital.
Ginette:And that was really good, so I felt like that was all going in the right direction.
Ginette:And that prepared me.
Ginette:I think that opened the door for me in the sense that once I'd done my course and I
Ginette:got my forms to complete my competency, I was already on the way to having a job
Ginette:that I could complete my competency in.
Ginette:So that really did help.
Sarah:And from Laura's point of view, it wasn't just Ginette who
Sarah:benefited from the programme.
Laura:One of the first things I noticed with Ginette is her
Laura:happy, smiley, positive persona.
Laura:I think when you get somebody new in the mix that's just got that ethos that
Laura:just comes out of them, I think it's a massive morale boost for the whole team.
Laura:And I think it's lovely because a volunteer By nature of what
Laura:they're doing, they want to be here.
Laura:They're not here for the money.
Laura:They're not here because they've got to be.
Laura:They want to be here.
Laura:And that exudes from Ginette.
Laura:And she was grateful to be here.
Laura:She was happy to be here.
Laura:She looked forward to her shifts here.
Laura:And actually, that's a great morale boost for the whole team.
Laura:It really lifts the whole place.
Laura:When I asked the nurses what impact that She'd had.
Laura:They were like, it's the workload, it's the restocking the wiping down of things,
Laura:the printing forms, the helping with patients, the practical things said,
Laura:they said it really impacted positively on their workload, and if it impacted
Laura:positively on their workload, it impacted positively on their stress levels.
Laura:Because it is the little things like that, where you're going full pelt all
Laura:morning, and all of a sudden you reach for a blood bottle, and it's run out
Laura:because no one's restocked your trolley.
Laura:That you then spend five minutes going to find the blood bottles and the patient's
Laura:waiting and then you're running behind Whereas if we've got Ginette going in
Laura:and making sure that all your stock is there on a really practical level.
Laura:That's incredibly helpful
Laura:I think also the fact that Ginette was so keen to learn.
Laura:She was really genuinely interested in what everybody was doing.
Laura:And I think no matter what your job role is, if somebody new comes in and says,
Laura:wow, your job's really interesting.
Laura:Tell me more about it.
Laura:Gives you quite a good sense of self worth yourself.
Laura:Oh, I can teach you.
Laura:I do know.
Laura:So I think the staff found it quite empowering, actually having a
Laura:volunteer here and telling her about.
Laura:The practice, the patience, their role, why things work the way they work and
Laura:giving her sort of a behind the scenes.
Laura:I think it was really good for the whole team.
Sarah:Thanks to the positive impact that Ginette made during her time
Sarah:as a volunteer, the understanding of what volunteers can do within
Sarah:general practice really improved.
Sarah:Laura also gained a greater appreciation for how to make volunteering in general
Sarah:practice successful for everyone involved.
Sarah:Before Ginette got started there had been a few concerns amongst the staff team.
Sarah:You'll hear Laura refer to a PCN, this means a primary care network.
Laura:I think there was some confusion about what could somebody do.
Laura:I think also it could be slightly threatening to those that do have
Laura:a job, that somebody could come in and we might find that we could do
Laura:something without paying somebody.
Laura:I think that might be a concern of employees.
Laura:It's not at all what we were going to do, but I can see why that might be a concern.
Laura:If somebody could volunteer and do their job, why would I need
Laura:to pay them to do that job?
Laura:And I think In Ginette's case, because of the way it worked out, in that at
Laura:the end of her actually in fact not even at the end, during her time with
Laura:us unexpectedly an HCA role came up.
Laura:We suggested that she apply for it.
Laura:She applied just like all the other applicants.
Laura:We interviewed her alongside all the other applicants.
Laura:And actually, she went, she got it.
Laura:She got her dream job.
Laura:She is now a registered, qualified, working HCA.
Laura:I think that good story is so empowering for her.
Laura:And I think it can really show the staff that she came in with
Laura:something she really wanted to do.
Laura:She volunteered her own time, put a lot of effort in and actually she came
Laura:out of it with what she really wanted.
Laura:I think it's actually really quite inspiring and quite motivating for me.
Laura:The biggest importance is the value of the scheme to the volunteer and to the
Laura:practice, and making sure both parties are getting what they need out of it.
Laura:And the only way to do that, in my opinion, is really great communication.
Laura:You need to be really clear what your expectations are and what you're
Laura:prepared to give them as an employer, how much support and how much access
Laura:they're going to get, how much how many different opportunities, how
Laura:many different experiences you're able to comfortably give them, and what
Laura:their level of skills are, what their personality is, what their attributes are.
Laura:And I do think that, that making sure that it's of value to the practice
Laura:and of value to the volunteer, because if it's only one or the other, I
Laura:don't think it's going to work out.
Laura:Because They've got to show some commitment to you, and you've got to
Laura:show a lot of commitment back to them.
Laura:Otherwise, potentially, if you don't get the right volunteer in the right
Laura:role, it could be a drain on your resources, it could be the opposite
Laura:of what you're trying to achieve.
Laura:They're then not happy, they're not feeling fulfilled.
Laura:And the last thing you want is for it to create work in the practice.
Laura:So I think that communication both ways and being really open and transparent
Laura:about what you can and can't do right from day one is really important.
Laura:Setting clear expectations and really structured limits, like the fact that
Laura:you can't do anything clinical at all.
Laura:I know you've seen a thousand urine samples dipped.
Laura:But you can't do the dipping, much as I'm sure you could, you can't,
Laura:and just making sure that the things are really clear expectations.
Laura:And then I think that kind of informal interview process, it's really important
Laura:to spend some time doing that and time chatting to them about their life outside
Laura:of work, what life skills they're bringing in, what their expectations are, what
Laura:their hopes and dreams for the future are.
Laura:Because I think, I hope that we'll very much be able to do this again,
Laura:but I'm not trying to replicate what I've done with Ginette.
Laura:I want to see whoever the next person is and make a role
Laura:that's just right for them.
Laura:I don't imagine we'd probably get another one that's interested
Laura:in being a healthcare assistant.
Laura:We might be, get someone who's interested in clinical coding, or we might get
Laura:somebody that's just really wants.
Laura:Or somebody that actually wants to go down the clinical pathway one day and is
Laura:really interested in that, or somebody that's really interested in dispensary.
Laura:All of those have limitations on them, because of course there's
Laura:controlled drugs in the building.
Laura:Everything I would say to anybody looking at volunteering is making
Laura:sure you make the role fit the person.
Laura:Not the other way round.
Laura:And whilst there are lots of restrictions of things they can't do because of
Laura:insurance and health and safety and infection control and everything else.
Laura:If you think outside the box a bit and involve the team in the decision of
Laura:what could they help you with it can be a really rewarding experience for
Laura:them and a genuinely really useful in a kind of pragmatic way for the surgery.
Laura:We've now got a really engaged, mem new member of the team who is a real asset
Laura:to the team and a pleasure to work with.
Laura:I also really hope that the really positive experience we've had here.
Laura:I can now go to my PCN and say, could we look at doing this as a PCN level?
Laura:Here's my really positive experience.
Laura:Here's how it ended.
Laura:It's ended in the best possible way.
Laura:I can genuinely go out and say, this is something I would
Laura:personally recommend surgeries do.
Sarah:Now that the practice has first hand experience of volunteer to
Sarah:career and setting up activities for a specific volunteer, we wanted to find
Sarah:out how Laura viewed the potential role of volunteers within primary care.
Laura:I think in a primary care setting it will depend on the
Laura:volunteer and it will depend because each practice is so different.
Laura:Each practice works quite differently, has different personalities that work
Laura:there, has different needs but I think it's genuinely help support the workforce.
Laura:I think here, certainly it really boosted morale.
Laura:Having someone that wanted to be here so badly that they were going to volunteer
Laura:their own time to do it and they enjoyed it so much that they kept coming back is
Laura:a really good morale booster for the team.
Laura:For us, it was an incredible pathway because we got somebody that was Just
Laura:the right fit for us, because people can look amazing on paper, people
Laura:can do an amazing interview and then you employ them and you're like, Oh,
Laura:they're just not quite the right fit.
Laura:They don't quite fit with our ethos or they're not quite
Laura:getting what our priorities are.
Laura:Actually we knew who she was as a person.
Laura:She knew who we were.
Laura:So we knew that the recruitment would work out and we, she knew what she
Laura:was getting herself in for And so I think in terms of recruitment, it was a
Laura:really brilliant way for us to recruit unexpected, because like I said, we
Laura:didn't have a vacancy when we took her on.
Laura:But wonderful that's the way it worked out.
Laura:I also think it brings a sense of community, which I think is
Laura:really important in primary care.
Laura:Because even though the changing landscape of the NHS is forever changing and
Laura:fluxing, ultimately, a GP surgery is still often at the heart of the community.
Laura:We look after our local community.
Laura:We want to support them.
Laura:So if we can offer a volunteering opportunity in Norfolk and
Laura:Waverley for Norfolk and Waverley people, it fits with our ethos.
Laura:It's helping our community in a different way.
Laura:So that felt really good to us.
Laura:Also really genuinely feel like it helped us give an even better service to our
Laura:patients because little things like helping someone up from a chair, helping
Laura:someone take their coat off, offering them a glass of water, things like that.
Laura:Helped that person feel cared for and feel valued and then ultimately it
Laura:helped the clinic run to time Which meant patients weren't sitting around
Laura:in the waiting room waiting So I think it helped in an individual level with
Laura:helping people feel cared for and seen But also it helped us at a practice level
Laura:run to time not keep people waiting in waiting rooms and So anything that can
Laura:help with workload is much appreciated.
Sarah:As we come to the end of the episode, we leave you with Ginette
Sarah:and Laura's final thoughts about their involvement with Volunteer2Career.
Ginette:I'm glad I made it, yeah.
Ginette:I'm glad I'm on the first day.
Ginette:Wrong of the ladder, I feel now.
Ginette:I'm climbing it now, and I'm really happy that I made that
Ginette:decision to do the volunteering and to apply for the job, I think.
Ginette:And I think doing the volunteering did give me the confidence as well
Ginette:because it put me in the right surroundings for me to learn.
Ginette:And I think if it hadn't have been for that, I'm not quite
Ginette:sure where I would be now.
Ginette:I would say, if you've got the spare time to become a volunteer,
Ginette:I'd definitely recommend it.
Ginette:It's a lovely way to see what goes on in different settings,
Ginette:and then you can decide whether it's the right choice for you.
Ginette:With the support of Volunteer Career behind you, it does make
Ginette:it a very enjoyable experience.
Ginette:And if you just want an experience of volunteering this is a great way to do it.
Laura:I think really just to say how proud we are of Ginette and just well
Laura:done to her for keeping going for the role that she wanted, putting herself
Laura:forward, going out of her way to volunteer, to travel here, to do this.
Laura:To be committed, to turn up on time, to turn up every week, no matter what,
Laura:has led to her getting the job that she wanted, but that is down to her
Laura:work ethic, her sense of loyalty to the practice so I really genuinely believe
Laura:that she deserves a lot of praise for what she's done in this whole process.
Laura:I think for us it exceeded what we hoped it would do, because it actually,
Laura:we recruited and retained somebody that's now doing the their dream job.
Laura:We've managed to get her fully funded training to do it.
Laura:We've got an engaged, happy, motivated member of staff who's keen to learn
Laura:and is really grateful for the opportunity and is so happy to be here.
Laura:I feel like it couldn't have gone better.
Laura:You couldn't have dreamt that it would go better.
Laura:And she's just such a lovely addition to our team.
Laura:We're really lucky to have her.
Sarah:We hope you enjoyed today's episode and hearing about the
Sarah:success of Volunteer to Career.
Sarah:Thank you so much to Laura and Ginette for taking the time to
Sarah:speak to us and share their stories.
Sarah:To hear more about Volunteer to Career and the opportunities currently
Sarah:available in Norfolk and Waveney, please see the link in our show notes and
Sarah:listen to our special bonus episode.
