Support and resilience
We provide funding information and encourage consideration of different funding streams including social investment. We also work to increase understanding of the sector's needs amongst funders.
We facilitate programmes of support, training and events for the sector and provide enhanced recruitment support, salary benchmarking, a Trustee Finder and job advertising through VONNE's Job Finder. We assist VCSE organisations to find appropriate workspaces and to generate potential income for underused space through our new Workspace Finder.
Together, our community of more than 1,600 members gives us a collective voice and enables us to represent the VCSE community regionally and nationally. As part of this, our Membership+ supporters, who make up around 20 per cent of our membership, receive a range of enhanced benefits according to their chosen membership grade, such as peer learning, promotion and networking opportunities, and this income underpins our work to strengthen the region's VCSE sector.
We're providing support to the sector around safeguarding issues, working in partnership with local infrastructure organisations.
Thanks to funding from The Connect Fund, we've facilitated VCSEs and stakeholders in the North East to develop a strategy for social investment, which has seen new approaches to engagement and more enterprising models of operation.
VONNE also facilitates the LARCH partnership (Local Access Redcar & Cleveland and Hartlepool), through which charities and social enterprises in the area benefit from a share of a £33 million investment programme to grow the social economy and tackle community issues.
Through the North East and Cumbria Funders Network we enable funders to be better networked and informed and work together more effectively to improve and maximise their support to North East communities.
We provide funding information to organisations through our Funding Information North East and online Funding Directory.
Working with leaders in their field as part of the Innovation SuperNetwork, we're part-funded by ERDF as part of the Catalysing Innovation in North East Clusters 2021-2023 project to deliver a programme of innovation support to the North East voluntary, community and social enterprise sector.
VONNE supports digital adoption by VCSEs, bringing digital specialists together with the sector to understand the possibilities digital presents and develop workforce skills.
We work with partners inside and outside the sector to understand barriers to digital adoption for both organisations and individuals.
As part of this, we're among 15 national Code Champions for The Charity Digital Code of Practice, which provides charities with practical advice on how to use digital to increase impact, sustainability and skills.
We're also working with Digital Catapult North East Tees Valley, Generator, and Steam Digital to deliver a free programme of support for charities, social enterprises and small businesses across Newcastle, North Tyneside and Northumberland, helping them become more successful and resilient by adopting digital technology.
Tailored to your organisational challenges, whether you have limited resources, are confused by the jargon around digital technology, or simply don't know where to start with adopting digital, Digital Pathfinders has been made possible by funding from the North of Tyne Combined Authority and Digital Catapult.
We carried out research to assess the immediate and anticipated impacts of Covid-19 on VCSE organisations in the first few months of the pandemic, as well as subsequent research into the ongoing impact, published in early 2021. We use insight like this to influence and lobby funders, commissioners and other stakeholders, and shape a collective response to supporting the sector for the short, medium and longer term. We were also a partner in the Covid-19 Health Inequalities Impact Assessment work carried out for the North East Qualitative Workstream.
VONNE represents the VCSE sector on the North East & North Cumbria Health Co-ordination Group and the North East and Cleveland & Darlington Covid Recovery Coordination Groups (RCG). We are members of the North East RCG workstreams on health, economic recovery and community resilience.
VONNE is also the regional Liaison Lead for the VCS Emergencies Partnership project to identify and escalate unmet needs identified by the VCSE sector to the north tactical cell, and influence national policy decisions.