What the Pod team are getting up to

A couple of months ago, the whole world changed and (like so many other organisations!) we had to rethink how we work at Pod and how we could still best support all our volunteers moving forward.

Our volunteers have been amazing, showing a huge amount of support – rescheduling their placements where they can and some have even chosen to donate all or part of their placement fee to help keep us going through these challenging times if they haven’t been able to reschedule. It is our wonderful volunteers (and our passion for supporting them!) that continues to motivate us, even when times aren’t bright and breezy.

We are also proud of how the the Pod team have pulled together and embraced the challenges of the past few weeks. We’re still here, answering any volunteer questions and helping to organise future trips!

As traditionally we’ve been an office based organisation, the transition to working from home has been interesting. From the new honorary Secretary Smudge the cat helping Lucy answer volunteer emails and crashing our zoom meetings

To Bee popping out of the room for a cup of tea (although we can’t do office ‘tea rounds’ at the moment, we’re still all drinking gallons of the stuff!) and returning to find her desk has been commandeered by a spaniel eager to have their tennis ball thrown.

As the travel industry has been hit hard by border closures and travel restrictions, we made the difficult decision to furlough some of our team. Being a small team, we all work closely together and we’ve felt the absence of having some of our number not able to work. There’s still plenty of team chatter though and we’re all keeping each other up to date with how we’re doing during lockdown.

Our lovely Ros has had the joy of training the new family member – a cockapoo puppy! – whilst she’s on furlough and trying to make sure he doesn’t get up to too much mischief.

The talented Iona has been using her time on furlough to expand her cooking and baking skills (like much of the UK!). From Thai curries that are reminiscent of her Pod Trip to Thailand last year, to this scrummy sponge with home made raspberry jam that she made with her Grandma. No banana breads just yet though!

Founder of Pod Alex, has taken on new teacher duties, home schooling his lovely girls until their year groups are able to be back in the classroom. Of course, a positive of this time is that they’ve been able to spend some quality family time together, getting out and about on bike rides.

Earlier this year, our fabulous Gemma welcomed new arrival baby Asha into the world. Gemma’s  maternity leave has not been quite what she expected, but she is loving being able to focus on her new little family and take Asha out on local adventures exploring the Cotswolds.

Our partner projects overseas are all working hard to continue their community education, conservation and animal rescue work until volunteers are able to join them again and can’t wait to welcome new volunteers back. We’re riding the storm out together and will still be here when you’re ready to start planning your next volunteer adventure.

You can find out about what we’re doing to support volunteers here too: https://www.podvolunteer.org/blog/an-update-from-pod-on-coronavirus-covid-19

In the meantime, to all our volunteers, stay safe and healthy and keep being amazing!