NCVS provides a range of fee-based services to organisations delivering positive social, economic and environmental change where the support required falls outside of our core service areas. Our services are specifically tailored to the needs of voluntary and community groups to help them to maximise their social and economic impact.
Charity and Company registration
We know it can be daunting when faced with the prospect of registering your organisation as a legal entity. Let us take the worry out of forming your charity, company or social enterprise. Our in-depth service can take you through the entire process, working with you to develop registration documents, model your social aims and even help you decide the most appropriate legal form if you are unsure.
We can help you to register a legal structure such as a Company Limited by Guarantee, Charitable Company, Community Interest Company (CIC), or Charitable Incorporated Organisation (CIO).
Please describe your needs using our Request Support Form, making it clear that you are willing to explore a fee-based consultancy option if this turns out to be most relevant to your situation. Depending on the type of group, or where you are based, you may not encounter fees for some levels of support.
Employee volunteering
Employee volunteering is an effective and powerful way for businesses to invest in their staff and local communities. We can help employers by:
- Providing information and advice on how to start volunteering
- Assisting with volunteering leave policies and procedures
- Promoting volunteering to your workforce.
Employee volunteering can:
- Enhance the wellbeing and development of employees
- Be an alternative and complementary approach to staff development and training
- Increase publicity and reinforce organisational reputation.
Email volunteercentre@nottinghamcvs.co.uk to find out more.
Training
Our training programme is designed around your needs as a voluntary, community or social enterprise organisation. You can attend our scheduled courses (currently being held online via Zoom), starting at £10 per person per session, or we can come and deliver to your staff from £250 per half day. Details of courses already on offer can be found on our Training Courses page.
For bespoke needs, please email ncvs@nottinghamcvs.co.uk.
Research
NCVS is involved in conducting and supporting research across the sector. Our State of the Sector work has anonymously surveyed Nottingham voluntary and community organisations to try and understand how the sector is managing to deliver its services. You can see more about this in the Voice and Partnerships section.
We occasionally carry out commissioned research to support broader programmes by other organisations and to facilitate partnership approaches. Our experience and knowledge of local groups means that we can assist in identifying trends, analysing gaps in service delivery, and ensuring wider voices and communities are reached.
Some recent examples of research partnerships assisted by NCVS:
- Supporting the Nottingham and Nottinghamshire Building Health Partnerships (BHP) programme to address challenges around Delayed Transfers of Care at Nottingham University Hospitals. The BHP programme is facilitated by the Institute for Voluntary Action Research (IVAR) in partnership with Social Enterprise UK, and jointly funded by NHS England and the National Lottery.
- Providing locality co-ordinator support to Heriot-Watt University for the Nottingham part of the 2019 Destitution in the UK Survey, funded by the Joseph Rowntree Foundation.
If you think NCVS could support your research or assist with information-gathering, please email ncvs@nottinghamcvs.co.uk.
Mediation service
Mediation is when an independent and impartial third party discusses a problem with two people in dispute to try and find a solution that works for both of them. It’s often used after informal discussions between them haven’t come up with a solution.
Mediation can be very useful in employee situations but it can also be very helpful in any situation where human relationships are causing operating difficulties. This could include volunteers, trustees and clients as well as employed staff. Mediation is voluntary and the mediator will not and cannot force the parties to accept a solution. Both of them must agree on the way to solve the dispute. Mediation does however facilitate the formation of a solution, and encourages the parties to work together to resolve their issues.
Mediation shouldn’t be used to solve problems that have to be formally investigated (e.g. harassment or discrimination). Mediation helps people who don't see eye to eye to sort out their differences as quickly as possible - saving time, money and stress.
We can provide you with an ACAS-trained mediator for a very reasonable fee. Your initial consultation to find out if your issue or problem is amenable to a mediated solution is completely free of charge. We will then provide you with a fixed price for any subsequent work, and if required we can arrange the room bookings as part of the mediation service. We guarantee to be impartial and to keep your issue completely confidential.
For more information email ncvs@nottinghamcvs.co.uk.