Monthly group coaching – Youth Volunteering

What challenge inspired this recipe?

This best practice came out from the evaluation of previous ESC projects and we came up with the system in 2022 while planning the new project. During the evaluation it came out that volunteers who live under the same roof and work together as well encounter difficulties on problem solving and conflict management on the group level. It covers a wide range of topics: giving feedback on someone’s behavior, how to keep the common rules, avoiding conflicts etc.

Since our individual mentoring targets highly the learning path of the volunteers we needed another asset to support the wellbeing of the volunteers on the group level. We noticed that in the groups where monthly group coaching was introduced, volunteers had less difficulties with the time spent in the project, worked together more effectively and were able to overcome their difficulties more easily.

✍️Egysek

Ingredients :

The session can be led without any materials but some materials are nice to have to make it more interactive : Dixit, or other cards, papers, pen, rope, clips etc In the house of the volunteers all the materials are all available for delivering such sessions.

Step by step guide

The group coaching happens once a month on a selected day and all the long term volunteers should be present. It is led by one of our colleagues who is experienced with mentoring, coaching, mediation. The length of the session is 3 hours with small breaks.

The session contains these 3 parts:

energizer/ focus activity
action learning – the volunteers have the opportunity to present a challenge, consult about it and define next steps
closing with symbolic feedback to each other

Apart from the above mentioned outline the volunteers can also ask for topics and methods to learn about, youth workers can also propose ideas on what to work on during the session.

Important to highlight!

We consider group coaching as a good practice because:

we notice that the group of volunteers who are having this opportunity are better equipped to deal with difficult situation while living together and with time have less and less issues
According to the feedback of the volunteers their wellbeing and self development are supported on a different level and define it as needed.

Before you start cooking, keep in mind…

This format works the best if you have more long term volunteers who live under the same roof and work together regularly or on a daily basis. We did not try this practice in another setting but based on the situation of the project this practice can be accordingly adjusted: frequency, covered topics ( only work-related topics) etc.

For this activity the organization also needs to find a person who is qualified and committed leading these types of sessions and not so closely attached to the daily life and work of the volunteers. This can also create more cost for the organization.