Chamber Charity Spotlight | Motiv8 Addiction Services | June 2023
13 June 2023
The Motiv8 team.
Tell us about your charity and what your aims are?
Motiv8 was set up as a charity in 1978, to support anyone who was struggling with their own alcohol use. We have developed since then and now we support anyone who is impacted by their own, or someone else’s, use of alcohol, drugs, gambling or gaming.
With an 11-strong team of counsellors, and 8 peer mentors we aim to provide discreet and effective support as soon as clients get in touch, either through one-to-one or group counselling sessions with no time limit on recovery support. From the first contact with our charity you are speaking to a trained professional who is non judgemental and can find the best way of supporting you.
The service is completely free, with no waiting lists and no time limit on support.
An important aspect of our work is with young people and families; we help families understand what is happening, build resilience, prevent intergenerational misuse and bring families through the recovery journey together. Statistics compiled in the UK showed that for every £1 spent on preventative work with families the economy saw a £2.76 saving, this is a great way to look at things, our work really does have an impact! it gives people opportunities to develop, reframe, recover and build resilience. We are actively looking to break the cycle, give the younger generation the option of a different path.
We also work in partnership with the Isle of Man Police through our Drug Arrest Referral Scheme (DARS) which is solely funded by ourselves and offers a session for those who have been stopped for a first-time personal use drug possession, as well as providing recovery management to those in the Island’s prison during their prison term and as they move towards and following their return to the community.
Our overriding aim is to bring people out from the grips of a substance dependency or gambling disorder by supporting them with counselling sessions and giving them the tools to travel their recovery journey.
Feedback from those that we have supported is very important, recently we have had a piece ran through the Isle of Man newspapers where a family that we supported set out to raise money to thank the service. This is the link, it’s a great piece that highlights the support that we have given https://www.iomtoday.co.im/news/walk-to-fundraise-for-charity-motiv8-613570
What current projects are you undertaking or have in the pipeline?
The pandemic has seen an increase in numbers seeking our help and some of the projects that we need support for are:
Family Service Support Funding
We have an amazing family service team and their work is ongoing. We have received some match funding from a private donor, we are looking to find other funding to support this and allow our family service to continue to develop.
Education Access Funding
To access more younger people and to give them the open door to engage with us now or in the future. We are looking to gain financial support for a dedicated professional to role this out. Our current work in schools and with young people really works, opening the doors to support but we want to develop this further and reach more people.
Mature Care Support Worker Funding
Due to the increase in numbers needing care, we need to raise funding support to enable us to bring in an additional support worker for the over-55 age group. Specialist training for each age group is the most effective way to support our clients, also providing care in the community for those who are unable to travel to our Douglas location.
Website / Brochure Redesign
We need to upgrade and refresh our website to make it more accessible and user-friendly. We are looking for support with this both
Client Feedback
We would love to hear from anyone that has had experience with Motiv8 and its support, to give us more real person experience and see how people are getting on. This can be sent confidentially to nicola.browne@motiv8.im we would of course keep this 100% anonymous.
We appreciate that many charities simply do not have the resource or skills required for example to market themselves, run social media platforms or carry out functions such as HR or accounting. If any Chamber members wished to support your charity by offering some time, what kind of skills would you be appreciative of?
We are always developing and would love to hear from anyone that could support us in increasing our awareness and removing the stigma that surrounds addiction.
In particular we need help with building our social media presence, our website and print design.
If you work in a business and have community volunteering schemes we would like to see how that might work with Motiv8, we hold wellbeing sessions where people come, create amazing things like Christmas Cakes, Christmas Wreaths, Needle Felting etc and there are so many gifted people in businesses that we know would bring so much to everyone involved.
In addition to the above how can the business community support your charity?
The business community can support us by considering us a charity to support through their CSR / ESG programmes, or by fundraising through events such as the Parish Walk or Santa Dash, cake bakes and other fundraising ideas too.
A recent success has been via a local business that gifted us four tickets to every home match of FC IoM. Feedback is amazing with one client telling us that they were able to meet with friends that they haven’t seen in years, as well as avoiding their usual trigger points on a Saturday evening.
We would like to take some of the children we support to see this years pantomime, so if there is a business out there that might be able to support us in taking a small group then please get in touch.
Another way is to help raise awareness so people know where and how to access help when they need it. This might be by displaying posters or arranging short talks on the work that we do and how to identify behaviours in yourself and those around you to encourage earlier intervention where needed. This is something that we are keen to build upon, maybe it’s a lunchtime talk where staff can simply drop in for 20 minutes. We can tailor talks to cover personal support, identifying support needs in others and how to support your internal and external customers should they need support and signposting.
Finally, where can our members find more information or contact you?
You can contact our fundraiser Nicola Browne by calling freephone 0808 1624 627, emailing Nicola.browne@motiv8.im and by connecting through LinkedIn. More information at