How did you become involved in St Margaret’s?
My daughter, Jade, was diagnosed with breast cancer during the middle of the Covid pandemic and when it came for her to get her oncology treatment, she came to St Margaret’s Hospice.
I was aware of St Margaret’s as I’d been in their shops but when I looked up online for a bit more information about where I’d be taking her, I saw an advert for volunteers and thought it would be a wonderful to pay the hospice back for everything they were doing for her and other patients. The hospice has created an environment for the NHS to use for its most needy patients, like my daughter, that was isolated and much easier for infection control, and I think that’s amazing.
I followed the links on the hospice website for volunteers and low and behold, I discovered they were looking for a trustee that had similar skills and experience to me. I was coming to a point where I was looking to retire and all the stars aligned and fortunately for me, all of the skills I had were skills that the trustees’ thought would be useful to the hospice and well, here I am!
How long have you been a trustee for?
I haven’t even hit my first anniversary yet, so I am a newbie and I started in around March 2021. It’s been a really interesting journey for me as I’ve never done anything like this before. It’s been great.
There are so many charities out there, what attracted you to St Margaret’s?
I wanted to do something for St Margaret’s find a way to give back to them for what they were doing for Jade. We were just so grateful that Jade could have her chemotherapy despite everything that was going on with Covid and that this wonderful organisation had made that happen.
Also, as I started looking through the website, I became more aware of St Margaret’s and found out more about the work it does. I read stories from some of the trustees, and they really resonated with me and it was just a great way for me to transition out of my normal world of work, take the skills and experience I had and do some real good with it.
The values of the organisation and putting up capacity for patients they didn’t need to pay attention to really struck me. It made me so grateful for all that they were doing and I knew I wanted to do something to help.
What do you do when you haven’t got your ‘trustee hat’ on?
I’m a parish councillor and enjoy being involved in local politics, it’s not that glamourous but its very practical and there are lots of small things that need looking after. I help to run my local village website that I live in which I enjoy. I used to work in IT and worked for IBM for 22 years before I retired.
In my spare time, I like to go walking and playing a bit of football and I really enjoy going to the gym.
How much time do you commit to the hospice in your role as a trustee?
When I first spoke to some of the other trustees, they spoke to me about a minimum level of commitment that would be required which is around 8-10 hours every quarter. This is so I can read up on the things I need to be familiar with, read meeting papers and contribute at the committee meetings I’m a part of.
Initially, I was on the main board and then I was on one of the sub-committees, but I have since joined another two sub-committees as I felt that my skills would be useful there and it would be something I’d enjoy. So, the time commitment for me is a little bit more but I’m happy with it.
We are also thinking about the future of the organisation now and how to adapt to current circumstances and make it really robust for the future. I’ve been involved in some of that work as well so the 8 hours a quarter has turned into 8 hours a week for me! I have the time to do this, and I give it willingly because it’s a great cause to give it to and I get a lot out of it too as it means I can apply the skills I’ve learned to something new which is challenging for me. It engages me in all sorts of ways which I am really enjoying so I find that a lot of the time I am not really measuring the time commitment.
The trustee role can be as big or as small as you want it to be. You can do a minimum time commitment or invest more time into it, it’s up to you.
What do you most enjoy about being a trustee?
The cliché is ‘everyday is a school day’ and as a trustee that is definitely the case. Learning about the organisation, what it does, the capabilities it has and the people we have as well as what we’ve done in the past is wonderful.
We talked about some cases recently involving the clinical teams and they do some amazing things for patients. I just love the way we do things and the people here; I can’t enthuse about it too much. The things that our people do and the way they think about how to make the days of our patients lives better just blows me away completely.
Working with the people is absolutely phenomenal and we have such a diversity of people as trustees and executives within the organisation which is brilliant. I am learning so much from each and every one of them not just about how we do what we do as a hospice but from their experiences. It’s making me more well-rounded as a trustee just by working alongside them.
What advice would you give to a prospective trustee of any charity?
Go and do it, throw yourself into it. Find a niche that you can bring some value in and choose your charity or your role around your own experience and the skills that you have. It will enable you to bring as much value as you can. Learn from the people around you, it’s a fantastic thing to do, is a great way to broaden your horizons and open and expand your mind. You can do it at any age. The one regret I have is that I didn’t do this sooner, I was trying to balance the idea of having enough experience and gravitas to bring enough to the table and actually youth and fresh perspectives are as valuable as age, seniority and gravitas. Every charity needs a balance of both and you can’t put a place in for the future if you don’t have a mixture of these. I’d encourage anyone at any age who wants to do something really good and get the satisfaction of making a difference to bring their talents to their favourite charity.