Joe O’Brien, TD, Minister of State with responsibility for Community Development and Charities today highlighted the importance of volunteers and volunteer managers throughout the country particularly in the context of the Covid pandemic and the immense volunteer efforts that have been evident in communities across Ireland over the past year.
Minister O’Brien opened the Volunteer Ireland - National Volunteer Management Conference 2021 – by referencing the long tradition of volunteering in Ireland and acknowledging the immense contribution of volunteering to our society during the response to Covid-19 over the last number of months.
Volunteer Ireland have been running this conference for the past 10 years and this is the first year that it has been held virtually. It provides an opportunity for those that manage volunteers in charities and community groups across Ireland to learn about best practice in volunteer management and to be encouraged, supported and inspired when they return to their day-to-day work and management of volunteers.
Minister O’Brien opened and closed his address by sharing his personal experiences of volunteering and his appreciation for the importance of good volunteer managements and supports.
Minister O’Brien said:
“The exceptional community response that we have witnessed this past year to such extreme adversity and upheaval to all our normal lives – the type of which we could never have imagined - could not have happened without selfless volunteers coming forward to help and, crucially, volunteer managers and volunteer organisations, helping to coordinate and maximise these efforts. The extraordinary events of the past year have certainly shown us the value of good volunteer management in important areas such as screening and selecting the right volunteer for the right roles, training and inductions, support and supervision, and knowing how to deal with conflict.”
The Conference this year has a strong focus on the National Volunteering Strategy, which was launched in December 2020, and many of the events over the course of the two days look at how the strategy can be implemented to the benefit of the volunteering community.
In addressing the Conference, the Minister said:
“This strategy is an acknowledgement by Government of how important volunteering is to the well-being of the nation and to steer the delivery of an agreed and ambitious vision. As Ireland starts to recover, we know that there will be changing needs and priorities within individual communities, and I know that volunteers will play a hugely important role in that recovery. I am pleased to be able to say that Government will continue to support the volunteering community in developing volunteering for the benefit of our society.”
ENDS
Contact:
The Department of Rural and Community Development Press Office
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Notes to Editor
What is the National Volunteer Management Conference?
The National Volunteer Management Conference is an opportunity for those that manage volunteers in charities and community groups across Ireland to: learn about best practice in volunteer management; to network, share and learn from their peers; hear about trends and research in the field of volunteering and volunteer management; and finally to be encouraged, supported and inspired when they return to their day-to-day work and management of volunteers. The conference has been running for over 10 years now and is one of Volunteer Ireland’s signature annual events. We are excited to host our first virtual conference particularly due to the cancellation of last year’s conference which was due to take place shortly after the start of the pandemic.
Who attends the conference?
The conference is open to all who manage volunteers in Ireland’s many registered charities and community groups. While conference delegates are largely made up of full or part time paid volunteer managers other attendees include: corporates managing employee volunteer programmes; and individuals who are volunteers themselves who have taken on responsibility of managing and supporting volunteers within their community group or organisation.
Organisations of all sizes attend the conference, national, regional and local with usually about a 50-50 mix of organisations from Dublin and outside Dublin. Some of the national organisations registered to attend this year’s conference include: Age Action, Swim Ireland, Irish Cancer Society, Irish Wheelchair Association, Barnardos, RNLI and Special Olympics. Some regional, local, overseas and corporate organisations include: COPE Galway, Maynooth University, Queen’s University, Carlow Pride Festival, Cork Simon, Midlands Polish community.