Uniti is a new digital volunteering platform that puts volunteers in touch with charities and community groups seeking support across the Channel Islands. Uniti is also a well-being platform that recognises social connections, relationships and allows people to share acts of kindness. We were delighted to be involved with Uniti from the very early stages of development, as the team was awarded funding after wining the Covid-19 Community Challenge in 2020.
The idea for Uniti was developed by Channel Islanders Ed Prow and RJ Allen in 2019, who identified that society’s three foundational blocks – the community, third-sector and the private-sector – sit isolated from one another, with minimal interaction between them. They developed Uniti as a solution that changes this dynamic, uniting each group through one platform in order to collaboratively solve the unique issues that each faces.
“We believe that by centralising the needs of a community and uniting the third-sector, private-sector and community under one platform we can improve and modernise the way volunteering operates. The third-sector represents the best of society, and is a foundational block in any community – yet smaller organisations in this sector have too often been left behind in terms of digital improvement, primarily due to a lack of monetary incentive from exterior investment,” said Uniti’s Ed Prow.
“With overall volunteer demographics getting older, innovative ways of engaging younger audiences are needed to ensure the voluntary sector continues to thrive – especially in the new Covid world. The Uniti model flips the table, by utilising private-sector subscription packages to subsidise a free volunteer management and engagement platform for the third-sector. This allows charities and voluntary organisations access to a wealth of resource, skilled helpers and technology that would otherwise be unavailable and provides businesses an easy way to facilitate their employees’ volunteering time. Simultaneously this ecosystem provides an overdue free application for the general public – to find, understand and sign up to local voluntary opportunities in their community,” concluded Ed.
The Uniti team was recognised with a Highly Commended Honour at The Creative Conscience International Design Awards (www.creative-conscience.org.uk) in 2019. In March 2021 the team secured seed funding from two investors, Shufl Captial and Vitruvius, which enabled the platform development to complete in February 2022.
Watch our video below to find out more about Uniti.
