In this article, we're going to outline some of our recommended settings when creating and managing ongoing missions in Volunteero.

We also have similar articles for events and one-off missions.

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Please note that this article is based on what we've seen to be successful from organisations that use Volunteero. However, we always encourage you to use the features and the platform in a way that is most beneficial to you and your volunteers.

So, what might constitute an ongoing mission on Volunteero?

When creating your Mission template for your ongoing mission, first decide on your general options for location, phone calling etc.

Option A: Shifts OFF

Typically with this sort of mission, we see the shifts functionality to be switched OFF.

It's good practice to make sure that you communicate with your volunteers what the expectations of the role entail (Mission descriptions are perfect for this!). For example; if you're using this type of mission to manage an on-going befriending match, you may advise your volunteers to let you know via chat when they are visiting and submit a volunteero report after every visit/ interaction with their beneficiary.

Keeping an ongoing mission open can empower your volunteers to take control of their volunteering time whilst still providing a safe framework.

Option B: Shifts ON

You may choose to have regular shifts set up for an on-going mission if there is a set time/ place for the activity to happen. If this is the case then you may also wish to enable our Check-in check-out feature to confirm attendance.

This approach may be beneficial if you or your volunteers prefer a little more structure to their role.

Make use of regular report reminders for on-going missions which can gently nudge your volunteers to submit a report within a specified time period. The frequency of these will really depend on the type of activity you are creating; eg if a volunteer does ad-hoc admin for you every couple of months then the 3 month reminder might be a suitable time period.

Start time: You can enable start time

End of mission report reminder: Keep this one off if it's an ongoing mission without an end-date.

Create your mission as normal, keeping the archive mission when completed option set to off. We want to make sure this mission stays on active missions.

If you do choose to use this option, then firstly we recommend doing so when there is only one volunteer assigned to the mission. Secondly they are aware to only select that the mission is completed once they are no longer going to be doing this task.

Visibility

Keep visibility as open-ended as you can leave end date blank and keep the mission as 'always visible'. You can always archive the mission if required at any stage.

Because these on-going missions tend to be more ad-hoc, we always recommend encouraging your volunteers to log the following in their reports:

As always, if you get stuck or would like to discuss your individual circumstances please don't hesitate to reach out to our team on support@volunteero.org

With ongoing missions, we have often seen that organisations would like to monitor where missions are not being engaged with, for example with befriending, where reports are not being submitted and therefor it is likely that calls or meetings are not taking place.

There are two helpful ways in which this can be monitored.

1. Mission Activeness - This chart allows you to see when the last report was submitted across a type of mission.

Open the Home section on the top left then press the gear icon on the top right.

Press the eye icon to the left of "Mission Activeness" to reveal this chart.

The chart will now show in the selection of charts on the home page and looks like the below. You will notice you can filter by the mission template just to show the types of ongoing missions you would like to review.

This chart shows the date the last report was submitted on each mission.

So the way you can use this chart is essentially to look for any missions where a report has not been submitted within say the past 30 days.

It may indicate that the volunteer is no longer able to continue the mission and it should be rematched with another volunteer or it may simply indicate that a volunteer has been failing to submit reports. Either way this is a helpful tool to monitor for this.

2. Last report date - This field in the missions table allows you to see when the last report was submitted for each mission.

To view this, open the missions section.

Then ensure that the field is revealed by pressing the three dots on the top right, then pressing the eye icon next to "Last Report Date"

Then filter the mission list by group if required e.g. if you want to view all befriending missions you should have a top level group that encompasses all these.

Then you can see when the last report date for each mission was and sort by that column.