Beyond Social Services
Breaking the chains of poverty and lending a helping hand in times of need
Summary
By now, you have probably heard of and are familiar with the term ‘VUCA’. VUCA, short for Volatile, Uncertain, Complex and Ambiguous, seems to be the most appropriate term to describe the chaotic world we were plunged into when COVID-19 hit. With the circuit breaker put in place, less-privileged families became more susceptible to encountering troubles paying for their daily expenses.
At a Glance
As we look back, we realised that 2020 was a harrowing year for many families. While anxious Singaporeans were busy panic-buying, wiping the shelves out at the nearest supermarkets, and stocking up on necessities as we entered a nation-wide lock-down, less-privileged families were left struggling and wondering if they had enough to pay for tomorrow’s expenses.
For the latter, staying safe comfortably, eating regularly and healthily, working from home (while getting paid) are marks of privilege, and out of reach.
Why the need to improve customer service standards and their experience?
The pandemic added 4.7 million more people to Southeast Asia's most extreme poor in 2021.
More than half of households earning less than $1,000, and nearly half of those earning between $1,000 and $2,900 reported
disruptions to their incomes.
Households earning less than $3,000 a month were
most impacted by the COVID-19 lockdown in 2020.
With a vision to ensure that every child and youth with a disadvantaged background will have an opportunity to refuse a lifestyle of delinquency and welfare dependency before 2025 approaches, Beyond Social Services (Beyond) set out on a workplace transformation journey to seek ways it can foster greater engagement of volunteers in its communities.
Diagnosing the problem
With the COVID-19 outbreak, Beyond saw a huge decline in external volunteers as schools and workplaces shut down, and people were advised to isolate themselves in their homes and not head outside unnecessarily. Furthermore, with stringent safety restrictions put in place, it was no longer possible to organise nor partake in any events. This further lessened volunteering opportunities.
Thus, the organisation had to source for ways to continue with their efforts in reaching out to families that needed help, while making do with their existing volunteer and staff count.
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Being a member of the Learning Enterprise Alliance strengthens and keeps us abreast of good practices across different industries that can be transferred to improve our efficiency. Most importantly, the project creates a more positive work experience for our volunteers.
Mr. Gerard EeExecutive Director
It was a pleasure working with our Workplace Learning Consultant. We shared our objectives with her, and she was able to work on it with minimal supervision. We would like to continue building more e-learning contents by extending it to other programmes.
Ms. Chiu Ying YikManager, Volunteer Development
I am grateful to be involved in this project and be able to contribute my experience working with volunteers.
I believe the results will be helpful to reduce the workload of our colleagues in having to brief volunteers. Also, the videos can bring together like-minded people who will be able to achieve a more meaningful volunteering experience.
Ms. Grace TohCommunity Worker, Community Relations & Fundraising
Solutions
An eLearning training course was vital in briefing and training volunteers who signed up for door-to-door distribution prior to the event. Volunteers were allowed to prepare themselves and take ownership of their learning by completing the course at their own pace.
Moving on to the co-creation phase of the project, Beyond worked hand-in-hand together with IAL’s Workplace Learning Consultant to deploy the following interventions:
- Worked with the consultant to create a set of e-learning content to support In-kind donation, food rations and voucher distribution. This gave every volunteer the flexibility to view the videos at their own time and convenience. It further reduced the need for a physical briefing at the start of the event.
- Updated current SOPs to enhance the volunteering experience by incorporating the newly developed eLearning content and information i.e., distribution process and FAQs that were also shared with volunteers ahead of the event.
Challenges
For the project team at Beyond, it was important to bear in mind that the content had to be concise enough for volunteers to look through in their free time. This meant that determining what to include in the eLearning content proved to be a challenge.
Secondly, as faced by many organisations during the circuit breaker, the COVID-19 restrictions were a huge barrier to the operations of Beyond, as there were limited distribution events available for the team to determine the results of the newly developed eLearning content.
When asked about the critical areas that led to the success of the project, Beyond shared that support and participation of the project team members were extremely vital, given that they have the most experience on the ground in terms of managing door-to-door distribution events and providing detailed information in the storyboarding process.
In addition, it would have been impossible to create an effective yet authentic eLearning video without photos and images taken from actual past distribution events, which the team members contributed. Most importantly, the willingness of the members to spend time reviewing the videos and providing their feedback to improve eLearning content was what made the project a tremendous success.
Achievements
At the end of the workplace transformation project with NACE@IAL, Beyond achieved the following:
Successful creation of an eLearning video to better prepare volunteers prior to the actual event.
Reduction in manpower workload of staffs prior to and during volunteering events.