Author: Samantha Hooker

The End of the Road

I have now completed my one-month internship with Anthony Nolan. For those of you who haven’t read my previous blog posts, Anthony Nolan is a charity that saves the lives of people with blood cancers or blood disorders. They match patients in need of a bone marrow transplants to selfless donors who have signed up to their register.

The internship was not quite what I had expected. This was in part because my original project goals changed. Initially my project was to create and share digital content that would encourage young men to sign up to the register. My first week went to plan and I studied research into how young men interact online but after that instead of creating new content I worked on promoting a piece of content called Donny and the Professor Cure Blood Cancer that tells the story of how a bone transplant works in a comic book themed story (and it’s a lot better than anything I could have done). The whole series can be found at www.anthonynolan.org/Donny.myths-donny-professor-e1s4I also used the time to develop a spreadsheet of patient appeals from the past two years using Facebook to find the reach of each post and how much it was interacted with in terms of reactions or shares. This can be used by Anthony Nolan to determine which kind of appeal is most successful when they create future content.

So although my project didn’t go exactly to plan it was not half as scary as I expected it to be. The experience was very fulfilling and enjoyable.

During my internship I learnt the importance of teamwork both within one division and between divisions and how vital communication between teams is so the experience has taught me a lot about how to interact in a work environment. It was also so useful to gain an insight into what working for a charity entails and especially great to do it in a charity I care so much about.

I also very much enjoyed working with the Engagement team, they were all kind, considerate and helpful from my first day until my last and I just want to Thank them and everybody else that I worked with during my time at Anthony Nolan for making the experience so good.marrow

I look forward to the year ahead, working with the Marrow team to run fundraising and recruitment events within Imperial.

When you get the timing just right….

I picked the best month to do my internship at Anthony Nolan. (A charity that saves the lives of people with blood cancer or blood disorders). I have now started my third week and last Friday was the annual staff picnic. This is a day where the whole charity comes together (minus vital staff required to keep the charity running) to look at what has been happening over the past year and what the goals are for the coming one. This lead to a gathering of around 300 people in the great hall of London Metropolitan University.

The morning started off with a speech from the CEO. She was very uplifting about what has been achieved over the last year, such as the charity being in the Sunday Times Top 100 not-for-profits to work for and achieving a one-star accreditation in the Sunday Times Best Companies annual ranking. She also was very positive with the goals for the future, ultimately a three-star accreditation and a higher rank.

In the course of the morning there was also a speech from a transplant recipient. Her story really brought home the reason why what Anthony Nolan does is so amazing. Without the bone marrow register she would not have been up there giving that speech.

There was also a Q&A with the Senior management team with questions that ranged from the light-hearted ‘What did you want to be when you grew up?’ to ‘How is Brexit going to impact the company?’. Then there was a chance for all of the different departments to showcase what it is that they do. Most used comedic videos to achieve this, such as filming from a camera strapped to the back of a dog and making it into a silent film. This was great and it showed me that despite the serious work that they do they sure know how to have fun.

After all this was done everybody migrated to Hampstead Heath to have a picnic. Despite having to queue for 20 minutes to get my sandwiches this was a great opportunity to get to know my co-workers a little better and was a very enjoyable experience. If you are reading this blog because you are thinking of doing charity insights I cannot recommend highly enough taking opportunities to socialise as knowing your colleagues makes the whole experience more enjoyable and far less scary.
Hampstead Heath 2

My first week at Anthony Nolan

Anthony Nolan save the lives of people with blood cancers or blood disorders by matching individuals willing to donate their blood stem cells or bone marrow to people who need lifesaving transplants.

I first got marrow (2)involved with Anthony Nolan through Marrow at Imperial. This is Anthony Nolan’s University Branch and we run recruitment events to sign people up to the register, fundraise and spread the word about how easy it can be to save somebodies life. Next year I will even be taking the plunge along with a whole group of nationwide marrow volunteers and jumping out of a plane to raise as much money as possible. It’s a society well worth being a part of.

The goal of my charity insights project is to increase new donor engagement with Anthony Nolan particularly to increase interaction with young men online. This group is targeted because 50% of donations come from young men while they only make up 15% of the register. In 2015-16 only 27% of all online applications came from young men. This needs to be changed by creating engaging content on platforms that young men are influenced by.

During the first week I have been analysing the current research Anthony Nolan has done as well as looking at different methods by which they could increase awareness around the charity. This could be done through livestreaming events and looking for vloggers/bloggers who may be willing to discuss Anthony Nolan with their audience.

I also have used the opportunity to explore different aspects of the charity. On Tuesday I had the opportunity to meet a donor and it was inspiring to meet someone willing to do something so selfless. Later that evening I had another interesting experience in the form of a spit kit social. To add people to the register they must first be tissue typed which requires a spit sample. At the social the tubes required for this are individually labelled by volunteers before being packed up and sent out. I didn’t appreciate the effort required until I’d labelled and packed a bag of 70 kits!

I have learnt a lot about the charity in this past week and what impressed me the most was how much everyone I have met cares about the charity and not only the patients that they aid but the donors too. Great care is taken of the donors from getting a visit from a volunteer during donation to travel and accommodation for them and a friend being paid for and follow up phone calls a few days and weeks after donation.

Anthony Nolan has been an amazing charity to work for. Before the first day I was nervous as I knew the style of working would be very different to anything I had experienced before but as soon as I arrived at the office I was put at ease by the friendliness of the staff and I soon adjusted to the offices way of working (though I’m not sure me or my bladder can get used to drinking so many cups of tea). I look forward to the next three weeks.