At Good Neighbour HQ, the Good Neighbour Team (GNT) work hard to make matches and support conversations and connections between local people. To do this successfully we need to have boundaries and guidance in place to ensure that no one is harmed when they are part of the project. Explore the sections below to see the different elements we would like you to think about.
Not intentionally creating risk.
We want Good Neighbour to be a positive and empowering experience for everyone involved and to achieve this we all need to work together to create a safe and supportive culture.
When you volunteer in a scheme like this, you often get messages about making sure you recognise harm and/or abuse in the people you are supporting and put them first. We want to ensure you are safe too and ask that you put yourself in the same position of safety as you would one of the beneficiaries. This can sometimes be challenging as you may want to put you all into making sure they are safe, but think of this, if you aren’t safe how are you going to be able to support them?
Please be always mindful of everyone’s safety and comfort when you are volunteering. Be conscious of the mission of the project and the reputation of the scheme by always presenting yourself in an appropriate manner.
Emotions make experiences.
What makes an experience positive or negative? What makes something nice or nasty? Generally, it’s how we feel about the experience. So much of our memory, associations and processing for many people is based on emotion and connections. Great times with friends, colleagues, or family. Shared times when we were part of a crowd at a concert or a group of people at an event. Many of us hold the emotions we felt at the time close or connect to the shared experience.
Part of reducing harm is about creating positive experiences over negative ones, which can be achieved by considering the emotional impact of your actions. Work to remove confusion, fear, and uncertainty that can all create negative or challenging feelings. We are trying to avoid creating traumatic experiences or re-traumatising people by repeating the harmful behaviour from other agencies of projects.
This also applies to you and your role, if something is challenging or uncomfortable, it isn’t something you should be doing for your own wellbeing. Put yourself alongside the person you are supporting, don’t put them first and ensure that both sides are comfortable. You can’t support someone if you are not in a positive position yourself. It is OK to say ‘no’ or ‘not today’.
Involve – an appropriate level of relationship for the service
Because of the work we do, we must draw some sort of boundary in order to protect everyone involved and give the scheme some structure. Our basic model is to offer 12 weeks of chat to build or rebuild a person’s self-worth and confidence to be empowered to go to a group or activity nearby. Sometimes our volunteers and beneficiaries become friends which means the boundaries of neutrality are broken and they share deeper information and experiences together. This means that it stops being a service arrangement and becomes a friendship. There is no problem with this, and we just stop monitoring and supporting the relationship as a positive result has been achieved. Never feel guilty for this.
If the 12 weeks have finished and you are ready to move on to someone else, that works too, the GNT will check in with you and see what you want to do.
We say all of this because we would like to just draw some boundaries which are about keeping everything safe and appropriate. See the lists below to get a feel of how we differentiate the relationships.
Good Neighbour Volunteer:
- Not sharing personal contact information / details / phone number
- No physical contact / respectful distance
- Light conversations, swapping memories, sharing interests and likes
- No involvement in ‘life admin’ (finances, housing or other issues)
- Sticking with agreed timeframes such a hour visit limit
Friend (not supported by the GNT)
- Swapping numbers and personal details (your address, family’s names etc)
- Sharing of worries, issues, health challenges, previous experiences
- Giving life advice or supporting through challenging situations
- Exchanging gifts
- Supporting with life admin (finances etc)
Physical contact (e.g hugging) Once your relationship reaches the point of friendship regardless of when it is in the 12-week cycle, let the GNT know, and we will make the suitable arrangements to hand it over to you.
Gossip
The very nature of what we do means that we hear many stories. Talking to people who lead lives full of challenges and issues can change your perspective on your situation. These stories and situations have a big impact on us, and we can feel compelled to talk about what we are doing and what we have heard (also so we’re not carrying the burden of it around). We then end up in the tricky situation of needing to offload what we know but with the consideration of sharing information about someone’s life that isn’t yours to share.
We do this in our own lives all the time and it can be hard to separate why it isn’t acceptable when we are part of a service. The people we support have been referred or are part of our service because they are vulnerable, and we want to support them with respect and dignity. If you need to offload what you have heard or how you are feeling because of your visit, talk to your contact in the Good Neighbour team.
Ask yourself, would you be happy to be the subject of someone’s dinner table or ‘out for coffee’ conversation? Let’s maintain the beneficiary’s dignity and privacy and don’t discuss anything you do with them or know about them with anyone but your Good Neighbour contact.
It’s important to know whom to tell if you are worried about something or think someone might be doing something that harms themselves or is being harmed by others. It means we can get them the right support from the right people, do not try and intervene or provide this help yourself.
Contact the GNT with all the information you have including all the details you can. The team member will guide you through the conversation and take it from there.
Home - their territory, their space.
Going into someone's home can be unnerving as you are in an unfamiliar space and it can make the experience of meeting a stranger more tense. Every person we connect to a volunteer has had a pre-meet and risk assessment by the GNT and referred from another professional this acts as a buffer to keep you safe but this shouldn't mean you stop being vigilant. Whilst you are in the position of volunteer (see the Involve section) try and reduce or prevent the time you are parts of their home on your own or from handling anything, this is about not creating distress or mistrust between you and person.
Please don't feel obliged to accept any refreshment from your person, you don't have to explain anything to them. There are lot of reasons why you might want to avoid food or drink from someone's elses' house, these are your own. Always try and think what the accepting of refreshment feels like to the person and what obligations they may start to feel or what they may be sacrificing to fulfill this obligation. Use your gut to do what feels right to you
Barrier free – accessible and without uniforms or perceived fear
Through previous experience, fear and uncertainty some people are hesitant to work with services that wear uniforms or work out of specific spaces (hospitals or formal offices for example). In the voluntary sector we don’t have many of those barriers and this puts in a prime position to be trusted and help people relax and truly be themselves. It is part of the magic we bring as services.
Whilst on one side this is a good thing for the people we are working with, it adds a level of vulnerability on our part as it can be easier to see us as friends rather than a person providing them with a service. Be aware of your behaviour and think about how you are going to still be approachable and welcoming without giving off the wrong signals that you want your connection to become a more serious friendship or relationship.
Try and retain some formality to the situation, wear your badge, keep a respectful distance and avoid physical contact.
Overwhelming events.
You may or may not know from your own life that fears, subjects, names, music, food, smell, appearances can bring back joyous but also traumatic memories and feelings within people which can have profound effects on how they feel about themselves and the world.
Without upsetting yourself, briefly think if you have any or what could be off the list for mentioning. We don’t want you to be upset by anything you do through your volunteering so mention it to the GNT and they can discuss it with the person. We don’t control our triggers and please don’t ever think it’s silly that you are upset by everything things. It could be a hairbrush, a Bakewell Tart, the song ‘You’ll Never Walk Alone’. If you don’t want to cover something, you can simply say ‘I’d rather not talk about that, thank you.’ You don’t owe anyone an explanation; this is your business.
Equally, we ask you to extend this kindness to the people you connect to and if something upsets them, make a mental note, change the subject or let them have their moment (if it feels like you can handle it, and they aren’t too distressed). After your session, mention it to the GNT
If you upset or challenge the person you are supporting, apologise and ask any questions you feel are appropriate to not do it again. For example:
‘I’m sorry that what I have said has upset you, without giving me any details to make it worse, are there any subjects or things I should avoid to stop this happening again’.
Trauma can manifest in many forms but use your intuition and read the situation. If it happens again, think about the person, are there memory issues or other challenges that mean they forget? If it’s going to keep coming up either by accident or on purpose, let the GNT know and we can work to find a solution, don’t be continually upset or affected by your volunteering.
Upsetting the status quo – creating positive disruptions
Taking the last point a stage further, there are times when an existing fear or trauma can create feelings that more traumas could be caused if they take a risk or try something new. If it feels safe and they are willing to try (that bit is super important) then you can help break that cycle doing what we call a ‘positive disruption’, this means offering support in whatever makes sense to change the habits or feelings for the better.
We talk about this in safeguarding as a tactic to grow the person’s self-worth and that they can move on from the situation that may be harmful to them. Encouraging a bit of a walk, putting on some music and boogying along, playing a game, showing photos of their past, preforming a hobby they may have given up and all ways that can bring back a sparkle or find new drive to engage mind body and spirit.
As you can imagine though, only do this if your person feels receptive and play by ear what is happening e.g. someone may get teary showing you photos of their relatives who are no longer around, but is this a reliving of the grief and likely to cause harm or a fond moment of memory that can be cathartic to get the emotions out. Please use your own senses to manage this, you will know what feels right at the time. Remember, you can always cut a session short and check in with them at another time. Never tell someone that their feelings are silly or that someone ‘wouldn’t want them to cry’.
Reflection – their behaviour is their past not your present…
As a last point to remember, it is very easy to feel like how they are behaving or feeling is entirely a direct result of your presence and intervention. There are so many factors involved that are influencing their behaviour, you will truly never know. One thing however to be certain of however, how you behave and approach this might affect how they behave in the future because this might be final chance they are giving being social or a big leap of faith in a stranger. Don’t take it personally, but take your time, be patient and make sure you are both OK. It might take 4 weeks of 10-minute visits to break the ice or build trust, that is absolutely fine, there is no expectation on timing, it’s what works best for you both.