In late 2019, Liam and his wife decided to relocate from sunny Yorkshire to the South Coast of England. The move was sparked by the pair entering retirement. They found a spot that took their fancy in West Sussex, so they packed up their lives and settled into their new home.
Liam had spent his 40-year-long career working in IT and he told us that it was always his intention to put his experience to good use through volunteering. Covid, unfortunately, postponed the start date of those aspirations, however, in 2021 Liam started to reach out to organisations and charities through Mid Sussex Voluntary Action.
Liam came across Carers Support West Sussex and decided to utilise his extensive IT experience and enrolled to be a Digital Champion volunteer. Liam’s digital champion role is to support unpaid carers with a variety of digital tasks which can be anything from help with a phone, tablet, laptop, printer, Alexa or just generally helping someone navigate through the complexities of getting online for the first time.
As a tech guy himself, the Volunteero app works perfectly for managing his volunteering activity. Liam tends to check the app at least once a day and picks up at least one mission per week. A mission can last just one call, usually no less than an hour, or it can last for two, three or even more calls. Carers will also contact the service for ongoing digital support.
Liam shared a couple of success stories with us including one where he had supported a carer to get set up with Google Calendar. This carer juggled caring for multiple family members and struggled to keep on top of all the appointments needed. Thanks to Liam’s support, she can now add events, appointments and reminders into her busy schedule at the click of a button. This may sound simple to many, but for an unpaid carer, tools that can ease the pressure of daily life can be immensely helpful. She is now able to keep track of essential appointments.
So far this year, Liam has dedicated over 83 hours of his time to connecting carers with digital devices which we think is just absolutely extraordinary. Speaking of his time with Carers Support, Liam told us “I enjoy volunteering immensely, it’s very satisfying to know that you have helped someone”.
And he doesn’t stop there! Liam also volunteers for a number of other digital projects in his local area including IT help drop-in sessions, a repair cafe, assisting charities with their digital support needs, acting as a digital ambassador by helping to keep people safe online and finally being the go-to guy for all his friends and family’s technical issues!
Given his experience in IT and development, we of course had to ask Liam what he thought of our app to which he told us “Volunteero works really well for us, particularly when we have several missions on the go at once.“
And because we’re always keen to develop and improve at Volunteero, we had a good chat with Liam about how we can improve the app and our planned features, but you’ll have to watch this space for more info!
