Department For Culture Media Sport
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This research was conducted by a consortium led by Basis Social alongside London Economics and New Philanthropy Capital, as part of the Volunteering Research Managed Service.
The research explores how digital tools are currently supporting volunteering in England, and how their role in sustaining and promoting volunteering in the future could be improved, focused on four key research questions:
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To what extent do digital tools currently support VIOs and volunteers at different stages in the volunteering journey (i.e. recruitment, onboarding, management and gathering feedback)?
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Where digital tools arent supporting VIOs in the volunteering user journey, for what reasons are they not?
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What kind of digital infrastructure can help to harness digital tools to support volunteering?
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What, if any, are the opportunities for government and/or voluntary sector intervention to enhance the role of digital tools to support volunteering?
Key findings include:
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There is wide-ranging consensus among experts, digital tool providers, volunteer-involving organisations (VIOs) and volunteers that digital tools benefit volunteering. Yet there remain barriers to the access to and use of digital tools for many.
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The digital marketplace is fragmented, with limited interoperability between tools. This could be acting as one of the barriers to the use of digital tools.
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Experts, digital tool providers and VIOs called for digital tools and a digital tools marketplace that is: strategic; financially sustainable; open to new market entrants, innovations and technologies; easily navigable and better sign-posted; and, interoperable and integrated with local volunteering infrastructure organisations such as Volunteer Centres (VCs) and Councils for Voluntary Services (CVSs).