As part of Volunteers’ Week, we’re celebrating Volunteering Your Way by showcasing organisations that are making volunteering more flexible and accessible.
We spoke to the Moira Anderson Foundation about why they started offering flexible volunteering opportunities, the barriers they hoped to remove, and what they’ve learned along the way.
What prompted you to start offering flexible volunteering opportunities?
A big part of it came from recognising that a lot of people genuinely wanted to support the Foundation, but traditional volunteering models didn’t always fit around their lives. We were seeing people with passion, lived experience, skills and enthusiasm feeling like they couldn’t commit because they thought volunteering had to mean fixed shifts every single week.
At the same time, demand for our services and community presence continues to grow, so there was also an opportunity for us to rethink how we engage people in a more modern and accessible way.
We wanted volunteering at MAF to feel welcoming rather than intimidating from the very first conversation.
What barriers to volunteering were you hoping flexibility might help remove?
Mainly time and confidence.
A lot of people juggle work, caring responsibilities, university, health conditions, childcare or unpredictable schedules. For some, committing to the same day every week just isn’t realistic, even though they still want to contribute meaningfully.
Confidence was another huge one. Because of the nature of MAF’s work, some people worried they needed to be experts, counsellors or have loads of experience before volunteering. Flexible roles allow people to start smaller, build confidence gradually and engage in ways that suit them personally.
We also recognised that some volunteers may have their own personal connection to the cause, so creating opportunities that felt supportive and low-pressure was really important.
How did you approach designing these flexible roles?
We started by stripping things back and asking ourselves what volunteers actually need in order to contribute well.
Rather than building everything around fixed hours and rigid structures, we focused more on outcomes, support and accessibility. Some roles are completely flexible and can be done in small pockets of time, including online awareness activity or helping share campaigns from home.
We also redesigned the training structure around flexibility. Volunteers receive a Welcome Pack before training so they can understand the background, values and story of the Foundation in advance. That means the in-person sessions can focus more on discussion, safeguarding, confidence-building and practical scenarios rather than information overload.
Another thing we changed was moving towards role-specific follow-up conversations rather than a one-size-fits-all approach. Depending on the role, volunteers can have a shorter one-to-one or small group conversation tailored to what they’ll actually be doing.
That makes the process feel much more personal and supportive.
What do you hope flexible volunteering will make possible that wasn’t working before?
Hopefully it opens the door to people who may never have seen themselves as “traditional volunteers”.
We want to reach younger people, working parents, students, retirees, people returning to confidence after difficult periods in life, and people who maybe only have a few hours every month but still want to make a difference.
Flexible volunteering also allows people to build their involvement gradually. Someone might begin by sharing awareness posts online or helping at a single event, then later grow into outreach, fundraising or community engagement roles.
At the heart of it, we want volunteering to feel more human. Less about “fitting into a system” and more about finding where someone’s strengths, time and confidence fit naturally into the organisation.
And lastly, what would you say to another organisation thinking about trying flexible volunteering but unsure whether it’s worth it?
I’d probably say flexible volunteering isn’t about lowering standards, it’s about lowering unnecessary barriers.
People still want to contribute. They still want purpose, connection and community. But the reality is that life looks different for people now, and organisations need to adapt around that rather than expecting everyone to adapt around us.
Even small changes can make a huge difference. Giving people options, allowing gradual involvement, offering different levels of commitment and building roles around real people rather than rigid structures can completely change who feels able to step forward.
For us, it’s already helping volunteering feel more accessible, more welcoming and more reflective of the community we actually serve.
Find out more
You can find out more about their current volunteer opportunity and how to get involved here: https://vanl.teamkinetic.co.uk/volunteers/opportunity/10270011
Visit the Moira Anderson Foundation website here to find out more about their organisation and the incredible work they do!
https://moiraanderson.org/
