Joining NAVCA and the VCSEP
Like many, I entered into 2020 with a #NewYearNewMe attitude, having just confirmed a brand-new job role, with a move from Sheffield to Manchester to boot.
After fifteen years in Sheffield, I’d packed up my life and found tenants to rent my house. Putting the majority of my possessions into storage, I embarked on a new life in a new city.
2020 was going to be my year!
Cut to 31 March and I’m typing into Google ‘What is furlough?’ having been placed on the Government’s coronavirus job retention scheme by my employer. Two weeks later and furlough turned to redundancy and my job became one of the many lost through Covid-19.
The implications of the pandemic have been significant and life-changing for many people. Many have lost family, friends or colleagues to the virus, and many more will continue to be affected by what’s coming to be known as Long Covid.
I am appreciative my experience of Covid-19 has been limited to the loss of my job, but the situation had turned my bright-eyed anticipation on its head. Job hunting is hard, job hunting in a global pandemic is something else entirely. Spending hours tailoring every application to hear nothing back is tough. Luckily, experiences in my dating life have given me the ability to cope with rejection!
Then, along came NAVCA and the role of Partnerships Manager. With its specific focus on the work of the VCS Emergencies Partnership and the Health & Wellbeing Alliance, I knew my redirections had landed me exactly where I should be.
My background is in the voluntary and charity sector, working with local and national organisations focusing on community and healthcare. This first month in post has been a huge learning curve, developing an understanding of the complexities of local Infrastructure.
Coming into the Emergencies Partnership, I’m really proud of what we are setting out to achieve. Through the many conversations I’m starting to have with local infrastructure organisations, I’m hopeful that this is a real opportunity to not only strengthen the work of voluntary and community sector organisations but to absolutely showcase and celebrate it.
Already, I’m hearing about the incredible work that is happening in response to Covid-19 at a community level, from the delivery of 80,000 meals to vulnerable people in the south west, to the acquisition of fifty smartphones and data plans for a small organisation in West Yorkshire working with RAS families.
Through these conversations with NAVCA members, I’m also learning about the incredible work Infrastructure organisations do outside of the response to Covid-19. Working with their local community to create and develop ways to meet the needs and aspirations of people in their area, connecting voluntary and community groups, sharing expertise and supporting each other. How they provide the local voluntary and community sector with tools, information, and practical expertise, so they can be the best they can be.
My place at the table is to represent the voice of around 200 local infrastructure organisations, including almost all our NAVCA members, who are part of the programme. We’re working hard to ensure that processes designed to capture insight and intelligence at the top are practical and deliverable on the ground. I’m also keen to ensure that assumptions drawn from top-down data are correct and in line with what is actually happening in local communities. After all, the Emergencies Partnership was born out of a recognition that it’s those on the ground who can really tell us what is going on and that during and after emergencies, those local voices have to be empowered to help shape the response.
Whilst Covid-19 has absorbed the focus of the Emergencies Partnership work this year, we know VCS organisations’ work existed before this and extends well beyond it. We are working to establish channels which will last long into the future, to support a long-term collaboration in times of emergency.
