This resource covers the overall things to think about before starting to pay people to do the work of your organisation. We also have a checklist of your legal responsibilities and information on how to meet them – find it here
Why change from volunteer-only?
The reason should always be to enable your organisation to deliver more impact – do more, do better, be a more reliable service.
Managing the change
Starting to use paid support is a change that many VCSE organisations go through as they grow. Our experience at Voscur shows that it can be an unexpectedly difficult time, particularly for the people whose energy and commitment has kept the organisation going since it started.
- Manage change or it will manage you
Think carefully about the implications of this change for how you work. If there are possible issues think about ways to make sure they don’t become serious. Talk to each other, listen and communicate well.
- Mourning for “the early days”
It can be difficult for the founders of an organisation to let go – to let someone else be in charge of things that they have been running themselves. It’s important to recognize this and value the past, whilst still moving forwards. It might be useful to discuss some of the possible underlying issues before you appoint any staff, so that you can make sure they are treated properly and everyone’s roles are recognized and valued.
- Uncertainty about roles and responsibilities – as a trustee or director am I still useful and valued?
- What is a reasonable and sensible level of control – feeling confident that things will be done properly without micromanaging or disrespecting the autonomy of staff members.
- Will new skills and attitudes be needed? When you are free of some or all operational responsibilities you will need to spend most of your meeting time on oversight and strategy, not on sorting out operational detail. This is a big change and it’s important to support individual board members to think about this carefully. They may actually prefer to leave and find another hands-on role and that’s much better than staying on when the new way of working isn’t right for you.
Planning for the new way of doing things
- As soon as you can, set a timetable so that you can report back to fellow board members on how things are going.
- Fundraising; you may need to research new funders, or approach current funders about making an additional application.
- Trustee/Director recruitment may be needed to make sure you have the skills on the board you need to be employers.
Developing a structure
As a volunteer-only organisation you may already have some sort of structure – volunteer team-leaders for example – but you will need to adjust this to make sure new roles and responsibilities will fit together.
Your structure should be based on;
- What will be most effective to get the work done to the highest possible standards for clients?
- What will be most effective to provide the appropriate level of risk-management and control?
….not on your personal views on the type of structure you prefer
Key questions for your structure
- Who will tell who to do what – the chain of command?
- Who provides the day-to-day support and supervision? To avoid confusion this needs to be one person, not the whole committee.
- How will information move through – reports, updates etc?
- How do we balance trust and accountability?
Delegation
- What will a paid person be asked to do that is a delegated Board responsibility? Authorise payments up to a set amount, prepare eternal reports for example.
- This needs to be clearly defined, agreed and regularly reviewed.
Employee or self-employed?
Having someone on the payroll and having someone who is self-employed each provide very different benefits and drawbacks in terms of consistency and flexibility. You may find that you have to employ someone as otherwise you’ll be breaking the law – you’ll find more detail on this here
You can mix and match – for example having an employed manager and a self-employed bookkeeper.
Job descriptions
- Don’t load people with too much to do
- Don’t squeeze incompatible jobs together
- Think about what can reasonably be achieved within the hours you can afford to pay for
- Think about competencies more than experience and qualifications
- Working hours and working from home – how open to this can you be?
- Do you have any flexibility – could you offer the job in a different format for a really good candidate?
What pay should we offer?
If the role you want to fill doesn’t have a nationally-recognised professional pay system it can be difficult to work out what to pay people to get the right candidate. The best thing to do is to do some research on what other organisations are advertising similar jobs at. You may find it useful to check out Voscur’s jobs page to see what other Bristol organisations are offering.
Useful links
Disclaimer
We make every effort to ensure that our information is correct at the time of publication.
This is only intended as a brief summary of relevant issues and information. Legal advice should be sought where appropriate. The inclusion of other organisations in this information does not imply any endorsement of independent bodies, they are just for signposting purposes.
Voscur is unable to accept liability for any loss or damage or inconvenience arising as a consequence of the use of this information.
