Our benefits
For people to reach their full potential, they need the right environment. As a member of Team Young Lives, you’ll be made to feel supported, valued and appreciated and you’ll end every day knowing you made a difference.
Working for Young Lives vs Cancer is more than a 9 – 5. It’s being part of a team who’s committed to making a difference. It’s waking up in the morning knowing you’ll have an impact on the lives of children and young people with cancer. And it’s ending every day feeling fulfilled and inspired by the people you work with.
Our culture, community and work environment
We launched our first Diversity, Equity, Inclusion and Belonging strategy in 2021. We’re on a journey to become fully inclusive and equitable – making Young Lives vs Cancer a place where everyone can be their full selves. Our DEIB strategy is the manifestation of our commitment to change. Developed with staff, volunteers, young people and families from across Young Lives vs Cancer, it’s the result of many honest, and sometimes uncomfortable conversations about who we are, how we work, who we promote, and how we support our staff and volunteers and support children, young people and families.
We will be #bravenotperfect.
We have also made Our Pride promise. We exist so that no child or young person has to face cancer alone. This means we exist for LGBTQIA+ young people and their families. To make this possible, we’re committed to creating space to hold honest conversations about the issues that affect fellow LGBTQIA+ staff and volunteers in the workplace. This includes taking time to better understand the barriers faced via our systems, policies and processes. So we’ll be devoting time and space to defining what a healthy and supportive work environment looks like for all in Team Young Lives and will commit to making that a reality.
Work life balance and wellbeing
We recognise how important work-life balance is, so we want to create a work environment that helps everyone to manage their life both inside and outside of work.
Roles may have different requirements and each of us may have different personal needs. Where we can accommodate it, we invite our colleagues to vary their location, working hours and days to help them achieve a good work-life balance.
Our hybrid working model allows colleagues across the charity to work in a number of different ways, from site/office based, part home/part site working to fully remote working.
Looking after ourselves and others is critical, so we take your individual health and wellbeing seriously, and appreciate how many things can affect it, both inside and outside of work.
To help with your physical and mental health, there are various schemes from healthcare plans, assessments and services to enhanced sick pay which increases the longer you work with us.
Wellbeing and development days
Once a quarter, we have a Wellbeing and Development Day. This is a day when, wherever possible, we don’t hold any meetings or send any emails. It gives us a chance to reflect, spend some time on our development and wellbeing, and to reset.
Employee assistance programme
We offer a free, confidential, independent telephone advice and counselling service through an independent provider. The service is available 24 hours a day, 365 days per year and offers guidance and advice on different aspects of personal and work life, ranging from stress, bereavement, child and dependent care to help with managing your legal and money affairs.
Learning and development
At Young Lives vs Cancer, we never stop learning and growing, which means we encourage and supporting our team’s personal and professional development. A dedicated People Development Team helps our workforce to be the best they can be and to enhance their talents so that they and the children and young people with cancer they support benefit.
We offer a wide range of learning and development opportunities including a comprehensive induction, on-the-job training and coaching, quarterly development reviews for all staff and access to our in-house learning content and bespoke workshops. Our training and development specifically for our social care teams includes safeguarding, bereavement and other key CPD opportunities. There are also apprenticeships and commission development programmes for our leaders and managers.
Annual leave
We offer 27 days of leave a year plus bank holidays. We also offer the opportunity to increase (+5 days) or decrease holiday (-2 days) through our Holiday Trading scheme. These entitlements are pro-rated for part time working. There is also a 3 day shut down between Christmas and New Year which are additional AL days.
Family leave
We want to support colleagues taking time off to have a family or take care of their loved ones, so we have a range of policies that offer enhanced pay and leave for different circumstances. These include:
- Enhanced maternity and adoption pay
- A range of paid or unpaid leave to accommodate time away from work such as carers’ leave, compassionate leave and emergency family leave.
Volunteering days
Volunteering gives our colleagues the opportunity to try out new roles, learn new skills, and do something completely different to their paid work.
All staff can take up to two working days per year to volunteer for a charity, and have the choice to either volunteer internally at Young Lives vs Cancer, or externally at another charitable organisation.
Financial Support and Wellbeing
Employee savings
Every member of our team can make their money to go further by signing up to our employee savings website, which features discounts and offers, with local and major national retailers, on household shopping, health and wellbeing, fashion, days out and entertainment, travel and more.
Enhanced pension scheme
We offer a competitive pension scheme to which we contribute of 8% when employees give 3% or more of their salary through salary exchange.
Life cover
Every employee is part of our group life assurance scheme. So if you worked for us, we would pay a lump sum your beneficiary/beneficiaries of two times your salary in the unfortunate event that you were to die while employed by us.