The first of Jubilee Sailing Trust’s (JST) new series of quarterly webinars to branch members took place on Wednesday 19^th May – and it was a great success!

Our amazing branch members are the heart and community of the charity. They vary in size from 2-3 people per branch, to over 40 – and as such, each one is treated individually and the JST work hard to offer a support framework specifically for each branch.

Branch members are part of the JST team. It is vital we support our volunteers in helping them develop new skills to enable them to support new members and connect with their local communities.  The charity was only too pleased to set up the webinar series as a first step.

The JST is all about inclusivity, whether that is offshore on board our amazing tall ship SV Tenacious, or at our (brand new!) HQ. As we are working remotely from our new office at Ocean Village, it is more important than ever that we stay in close contact.

This goes beyond answering the phones or responding to emails – it is a core mission for the charity that everyone is accessible, whether they are on the (executive) board, or onboard Tenacious.

That’s why when the first webinar came along, CEO Patrick Fleming very kindly stepped in to give a short overview of how things are going and was also available to answer questions from the floor – something he’ll be around for after each of these quarterly meetings.

Patrick was joined by Dawn Ingram, the charity’s newly appointed Head of Corporate and Community Giving . Dawn kicked off the first webinar, talking about her role at the JST. Dawn’s appointment was a strategic hire to act as the go-between for the branches and the chairs, sharing information and feeding back any activity happening at both corporate level and branch level. She shared her vision for how to shape the future, as well as how to set up the communications going forward. These include reporting any news or requesting support for events.

Jim Phillips from the charity’s IT team was next up, presenting a Google masterclass, including a quick guide to how we can more effectively use our Google Drive and in-house cloud systems.

Patrick then ended the webinar with an overview and update. The fantastic news that all the JST’s summer voyages have been sold out, was also discussed and it was mentioned that there will be a mixture of disabled and non-disabled individuals arriving on board for these.

Finally, at the end, Patrick answered several questions as to how the JST will ensure its move to a virtual office will work effectively, along with updates regarding the sale of Lord Nelson.

This was a great first session, and we’ve had positive feedback from all that listened in. We look forward to hosting our next webinar in the next few weeks – watch this space for the new date coming soon.

These webinars will run once a quarter, will each be on a different theme, and have been designed to support branch members up and down the country.

Each webinar will be saved on shared drive for JST members to access at a time convenient to them.

If you would like to join our branches, or would like more info about what they do visit our branch page.