We need some voluntary help

The Sharks has grown, and continues to grow, we need a few volunteers to help co-ordinate some of our activities and other tasks. If we can grow these ideas, we may even be able to pay. Interested email: canoeing@thesharks.org.uk or call/text 07951 770241.

What do we need?

Well that sort of depends on what you can offer, there may well be things and skills people have that we have not yet realised we could do with, so if you have ideas and want to help, we are sure we can utilise your offer. However, we have identified some areas we definitely need help with:

Organising

Bit of an open ended description, but there are lots of things we could do with help organising, so we can take pressure off of coaches and enable us as a club to do more; things that would help:

• Planning for events – help us to identify events to go to, and generally support coaches in getting us there, maybe co-ordinating entries; car-sharing; lifts, accommodation, and that we get the right kit there! Not asking someone to do all of this but some help at some events will increase the number of events we can support.
• Events – we have often run many events in the past (at one time we were the Countries largest provider of entry level events), we need to do more events, often local fun races to get our paddlers active and learning to race. – You will not be asked to do everything but if you could start to help, we can re-grow this side of the Club.
• Social Activities – It would be good if we did more as club, bringing people together socially, the advantages of this is it would improve the spirit of belonging, which in-turn will build the Club up, which will improve what we do, enable us to do more, and do it even better.
• Admin tasks – There is a surprising amount of administration in running the Club, The Sharks are different to most Kayak Clubs, we operate at a number of sites and we provide services to a number of organisations; including Schools, Scouts, Holiday Clubs, other organisations. We work with a wide range of bodies, developers, local authorities, ectara, Just being a bit more efficient at sending out invoices would help, co-ordinating staff at sites, paying people, anyone good at finances?

Fundraising

There are a number of things that constitute fundraising and it is something we need to do if we are to continue to grow and have good kit (some of it is beginning to look a bit tired). We do earn quite a bit from our “more commercial” activities, but these take up time and need supporting, some of this comes back to admin tasks above. We have in teh past received grants and sponsorship, so what can you help with?

• Grants Officer – somebody to trawl through the World and find suitable grants for us to apply for. Even in the years of austerity, there are a lot of grants out there which we would be eligible for. We also need somebody to then fill in the applications, this does not have to be the same person, if we just get one extra grant a year, that makes a huge difference.
• Sponsorship Officer – we do get some sponsorship, if we can increase this then, we can do more – at present we have one of our programmes in Harlesden sponsored by GLi Urban Life, a few more of these would be brilliant. We also have some sponsorship in kind from Greenford at some locations, which we could build up.
• Fundraising events and actives – this links in with social activities above, but no reason why we should not raise a bit of money from what we do.

Communication

Communication is an important part of what we do, it is how we raise our profile, that attracts sponsors, shows granting bodies what we do. It is what recruits new members, gets new organisations involved. Some of it we do very well, some we could improve on. Our face to face meetings usually go well, but we need the right approach to get through the door, or to get people through our door.

• Social Media – we could do a lot better on lots of platforms, basically The Sharks has become too big for one person to maintain our communications. There is a lot we would like to do, but do need help, just an hour a week would make a huge difference. As well as our website, we have a presence on Facebook, Twitter (now called X), Instagram and YouTube, all our accounts are …/thesharkscc.
• Branding – there are other ways we communicate, posters, banners, and specifically face to face, if we can get in through the door to talk to people, we can be more active, raise more funds. Banners need to be positioned. We need to ensure all our kit is clearly branded, so people know exactly who we are and how to contact us.

• Merchandising – Seems a bit of an over the top word for selling kit and things, but there is demand for Shark kit and it looks smart, it shows people who we are and helps to build a club atmosphere. There is of course some potential in raising funds from this, depending what we want to sell. There are a number of options.

Maintenance

We have a lot of kit spread over 5 sites, which is due to expand to more sites with more kit in 2024, we need to maintain our existing kit as well as look after the infrastructure at the sites.

• Boats get damaged and we can extend their life by a bit of TLC, anybody a bit handy with resin and fibreglass?
• As we take on more sites, we need them to be managed, and occasionally a bit of maintenance, most of our sites do not need much at all but as we improve them, they do need a bit of loving care.
• Our slalom site at Harefield could do with some upgrading, so that we can improve what we do and what we offer.

We have a lot happening in 2024, and we need to get plans in place now, we need to ensure we can meet the challenges of the new year and deliver for you, our members and supporters.

Please contact us on 07951 770241 or email: canoeing@thesharks.org.uk.

Published 14th September 2023

Updated 20th September 2023