Call to expand healthcare ‘Volunteer To Career’ scheme to aid stretched NHS workforce

The ‘Volunteer to Career’ scheme - piloted by national charity Helpforce working with 48 NHS organisations across England - has already supported people from all walks of life to secure permanent roles including healthcare assistants, mental health support workers and assistant physiotherapists.

Among those who’ve moved into to paid employment are former members of the armed forces community, refugees, over-50s, and single parents.

Now Helpforce is urging the Government to explore ramping-up investment in the initiative as part of its upcoming NHS 10-Year Health Plan, insisting it has potential to cost-effectively fill around 23,600 frontline healthcare job vacancies and related study placements in England by the end of the current Parliament.

Currently, around 107,000 NHS secondary care roles in England are vacanti and the annual cost of using agency and bank staff - who do additional shifts at their own or a nearby hospital to earn extra money - has risen to more than £10 billionii.

The call has the backing of two influential health think-tanks - The Health Foundation and The King’s Fund - as well as NHS Providers, London’s Chief Nurse, and St John Ambulance.

Helpforce Chief Executive, Amerjit Chohan, said:

“The success of the Volunteer to Career programme to date has been significant. Together with our partners in NHS Trusts and other organisations, we’ve helped people who are interested in healthcare careers but don’t have a background in the field to gain valuable experience before applying for paid roles.

“Through expertly designed and structured pathways, volunteers can find their niche without the immediate pressure of employment, while being upskilled and given confidence to take into job interviews.

“Since we launched the pilot initiative in 2022, hundreds of people have taken part, with 55% of them successfully transitioning from volunteering roles to paid careers in healthcare or associated courses - such as in nursing and midwifery.

“Our analysis shows that with the right investment, there’s clear potential to supersize the opportunity, with conservative capacity for each of the 215 NHS trusts in England to support an average of 50 volunteers annually. We believe that over the next four years that could set over 23,650 people on a path to fulfilling healthcare careers that benefit not only them, but the whole of society. We urge the Government to consider Volunteer to Career expansion within its upcoming NHS 10-Year Health Plan, unleashing the potential of home-grown healthcare talent.”

Not only does the Volunteer to Career programme help tackle acute frontline NHS workforce shortages and burnout, it also addresses the challenge of encouraging people who aren’t in jobs - either through choice or circumstance - to re-enter the workforce, with an estimated 9.3 million people aged 16-64 in the UK deemed economically inactiveiii.

And it supports a key objective of the NHS Long-Term Workforce Plan: to train more NHS staff domestically, reducing reliance on international recruitment and agency staff - with an ambition that in 15 years’ time around10.5% of the NHS workforce will be recruited from overseas, compared to nearly a quarter nowiv.

Sarah Woolnough, chief executive of the King’s Fund, said:

At a time when the NHS is severely stretched and tackling long-standing and chronic workforce shortages, Helpforce is doing excellent, innovative work to support volunteers to explore opportunities for an NHS career. To implement Volunteer to Career on a mass scale would require strategic investment in volunteer managers across NHS Trusts, but such investment would likely be cost-effective when set against paying high fees to agencies that supply temporary staff and helping to reduce the health services’ reliance on recruiting large numbers of healthcare staff from overseas.”

Dr Jennifer Dixon DBE, Chief Executive of the Health Foundation, said:

“The results from Helpforce’s far-reaching pilot are significant. Scaling-up Volunteer to Career has to be worthy of serious consideration by a government that’s eager to get people back to work, help with long-standing NHS workforce problems and boost social capital in local communities.”

Helpforce’s analysis of Volunteer to Career suggests significant benefits for NHS budgets, existing NHS staff, patients and local communities:

• Individual trusts reported substantial cost efficiencies. For example, West London NHS Trust calculated that recruiting just three Band 4 medical staff from the Volunteer to Career programme, versus employing bank staff, resulted in a £46,800 annual saving.

• 82% of healthcare staff said volunteers improved their working lives, while 90% reported that working alongside volunteers improved the quality of service they could provide.

• Each volunteer supported an average of 190 people.

• 42% of volunteers were from ethnic minority backgrounds and 61% lived in areas ranking within the 50% most deprived – illustrating the programme’s effectiveness at drawing-in diverse talent from local communities.

Saffron Cordery, Interim Chief Executive of NHS Providers, said:

“It’s evident that a great many NHS Trusts are already reaping benefits from the Volunteer to Career programme. Addressing NHS workforce shortages requires a readiness to explore innovative solutions and bold thinking. The advantage of expanding an already proven model like this is that good practice can easily be shared to deliver results at scale.”

A key aspect of Volunteer to Career has been its success in helping people to gain places on nursing and midwifery training courses. At Shrewsbury and Telford Hospitals NHS Trust, 30 individuals transitioned to midwife training after the trust identified that many working mothers who were interested in the profession faced barriers to entry – for example, not feeling able to give up existing jobs held due to high childcare costs. Through the Helpforce designed programme, the women were offered flexible volunteering placements that gave them exposure to the role, opportunity to gain skills, and ultimately the confidence to commit to formal training.

As well as working with NHS hospital and ambulance trusts, the Volunteer to Career pilot has involved nine hospices. Funding to date has included a £900,000 grant from NHS England and £865.000 from the Burdett Trust for Nursing.

London’s Chief Nurse, Karen Bonner MBE - a Helpforce Trustee - said:

“Volunteering should be an integral part of NHS workforce planning, backed by consistent and long-term funding. Throughout my career, I’ve witnessed the immense – often overlooked – contribution that volunteers make to the health service. “

Leading charities also support Helpforce’s ambitions for Volunteer to Career.

Dr George Woods, Chief Business Officer for St John Ambulance, said:

"Every day, thousands of dedicated St John volunteers play a vital role in supporting the NHS. Whether it's through their invaluable contributions in hospitals, volunteering through youth programmes, or engaging in community-focused initiatives - our volunteers help ease the pressures faced by frontline workers.

"We are proud to support Helpforce's 'Volunteer to Career' scheme, which not only creates a pathway into frontline healthcare roles but also offers opportunities for individuals from all backgrounds to contribute to the NHS and build meaningful careers. By investing in volunteering as part of the NHS 10-year health plan, the government can further strengthen our NHS and empower those who aspire to make a difference in their communities."

Ends

For further information, please contact:

Martin McGlown, Head of Communications at Helpforce, on 07737 722643 MM@helpforce.community; or Vy Tran, Helpforce Communications and Content Manager, on 07508 772844 vt@helpforce.community

Notes to Editors:

Helpforce is the only independent UK charity focused exclusively on establishing high impact volunteering services across the health system.

Its team of experts:

• Co-create innovative solutions with health and care organisations.

• Enable organisations to maximise the potential of volunteering to improve outcomes for people and services.

• Connect the people leading volunteers to improve quality together.

Founded in 2017, the charity works with NHS trusts, hospices, local authorities, and voluntary and community organisations – directly and indirectly supporting hundreds of thousands of people.

Helpforce was recently awarded a GSK IMPACT Award, a prestigious national health award for small and medium sized charities delivered in partnership with The King’s Fund, in recognition of programmes including Volunteer to Career.

Learn more about why volunteering should be included in the NHS 10 Year Plan.

Learn more about Volunteer to Career.

Read more stories from Volunteer to Career.