Billy
Communications Officer
You are amazing. Without you as a part of our Shift.ms community, we wouldn’t be such a vibrant, connected community and we are grateful for every single member of The Energy for being so committed to Shift.ms.
So, where did we find this information?
We asked you how volunteering has helped (or hindered) you. You told us that we’ve either maintained or improved on all of the impact measures against last year. You can read more about how we achieved this further on.
We’ve removed two questions that were either too vague or not what you were looking for in your volunteer experience.
In order to get a sense of our improvements in areas you highlighted last year, we have added two statements. The first has helped us to understand the discrepancy between information you wanted, compared to the resources you received.
After our first Diversity and Inclusion Focus Group highlighted the fact that it’s not clear that Shift.ms volunteers are nearly all MSers, we’ve also asked if it is clear that Shift.ms is by MSers, for MSers.
“Volunteering is rewarding, gives me focus & belonging.”- MSer
Micro volunteering is short tasks that don't necessarily require any ongoing commitment, such as our Weekend Takeovers. Read more about micro volunteering here. Our Instagram and Twitter Takeovers have been more popular than ever. This year, 100% of micro-volunteers were MSers, compared to 93% last year, ensuring Shift.ms is truly MSer led.
All of the health outcomes we measured for those taking part in micro-volunteering were either maintained or improved based on last year's responses.
We had lots of feedback telling us you simply “love it”. (Hint: Check out some of the wonderful quotes on this page).
Our Ambassador roles have been given a fresh lick of paint, so watch this space for more opportunities later this year.
You told us that you wanted to see “behind the scenes of Shift.ms”. We’ve welcomed you into the Shift.ms fold with a programme of Focus Groups and two mid-week “Ask Me Anything” takeovers.
“I love the variety of being able to join ad hoc sessions, and find behind the scenes way of contributing that mean I can help and feel useful in a way that's comfortable for me. - Member of The Energy
Our Blog programme is booming with 45 contributors, compared to 15 bloggers last year.
We produced and launched the Lightning Talks Series 2, which increased in total views from 8,721 in Series 1 to a huge 31,492 in Series 2. That’s a massive 261% increase. These short talks covered a range of topics from toxic positivity to self-injection tips.
We developed and shared Day One, a growing video collection that explores the fears, frustrations, successes and solutions MSers have shortly after being diagnosed.
We produced two new series, ‘MSers React’ and ‘Do all MSers think the same?’ where a handful of MSers share their thoughts on memes and videos, with some of those statements that make you eyeroll. These were our first film projects that used active recruitment to gain a wider representation of the MS community. This rebrand led to a 107% increase in YouTube video views.
Our channels amassed over 32,000 views on social media covering a range of topics from toxic positivity to self-injection tips.
Our Instagram page hit the milestone of 10,000 followers, which is down to the wonderful work of our engaging Instagram volunteer team.
We welcomed new Instagram and Twitter Takeover Managers who have given the Weekend Takeovers a huge boost, with more respondents getting back to our Volunteer Lite Survey for micro-volunteering than ever before.
Thanks to our wonderful TikTok volunteers, our page is thriving. Since January, we’ve enjoyed 37,000 video views and increased our audience size by 225%.
We have had yet another astounding year, with a record number of 314 requests for support (an increase of 5% on last year's hugely successful year).
We have retained over 76% of our Buddies, and with a steady year of recruitment welcomed 18 new MSers to our team.
Our Buddies are now based in 17 countries, reaching more MSers across the globe than ever before.
To date, we have received requests for support from MSers in 33 countries.
We’ve started an external evaluation to look at how our Buddy Network is really doing, with plans to improve and grow our offering.
We listened to issues around the word “equality”, and removed the word from our programme. We now refer to our work as Diversity and Inclusion, and have completed a number of actions to hold ourselves accountable and ensure we’re representative including:
Virtual fundraisers have continued this year, with a return to some in-person events which included:
Our upcoming plans include:
This year, the number of active volunteers reduced, but you’ve all shared more time per-person so we’ve maintained the hours donated year-on-year.
We’ve had some mixed feedback about our ongoing communications and connections. Some of you aren’t getting the connections you need, especially during weekend takeovers. We need to address this.
Buddies in particular wanted to connect with each other with your MS-type in mind.
We need to find new ways to ensure our service is visibly diverse and welcoming to people from all walks of life.
We’ve received so many wonderful quotes and stories on how every person finds and uses their MS Energy, from attending rugby games to time spent after release from quarantine hotels and taking part in a whole heap of sports. One particularly poignant message came from one of our volunteers based in Ukraine, Anna. Anna said:
“My motto after I was diagnosed with multiple sclerosis was: “This is not the end, this is the beginning of a new life!” My remission lasted a year. Unfortunately, this year a war broke out in Ukraine. I had to fight not only with MS. On the 28th day of the war, due to constant stress, my body failed, the right side of the body was partially weakened. Thanks to the support of people in the MS community, I feel the strength and desire to continue to fight and not give up.”