Our Volunteer Programme offers an exciting opportunity to see how a festival works, whilst exploring your interests. There are plenty of ways to get involved, with roles spanning across all aspects of the festival. Take a look at the kinds of roles available, and find the one which suits you!
Volunteer Roles
Hospitality Team
Guest Liaison Volunteers
Team: Hospitality
As a Guest Liaison you will be assisting our festival guest, filmmaker and juries, helping them navigate the festival as required and supporting the Hospitality team with their schedule and attendance to their events.
Who is this suitable for?
You will need to be available every day throughout the festival. Have excellent knowledge about the festival or Sheffield, and have volunteered before. You will be an excellent people-person, have discretion, a professional attitude and have a curiosity about the film industry.
Additional Details: Note this role has limited spaces available. Full availability required.
Industry Team
Industry Crew
Team: Industry
Operating in one of the world’s biggest and busiest documentary marketplaces, you’ll be offering high-level support to a room full of international industry representatives, filmmakers and artists. This role will also see you helping to run the Industry sessions and networking events. The Industry activities are on a tight schedule so it’s important to make sure no meeting or session runs under or over their allotted time.
Who is this suitable for?
We need a crew of bright, organised team players with strong people skills and a friendly nature who feel comfortable keeping lots of important meetings on time and on schedule to help the team. If you’re interested in the business and development side of documentary, it's a great opportunity to see how creative and business discussions at a high industry level are conducted.
Communications Team
Film Crew
Team: Communications
You will be taking part in filming all the events throughout the festival, for delivery to our YouTube channel and beyond.
Who is this suitable for?
If you take part in this role, filming experience is essential. You’ll need to be super organised with good time management to stick to the packed schedule of events.
Photography Crew
Team: Communications
Photos and selfies are both important to capture the life of the festival. You'll be amongst the fun at all the events capturing snippets of sessions, pitches and the legendary parties!
Who is this suitable for?
For this role you will need some professional experience as well as your own equipment. You will need good time management skills when dealing with the busy schedule of events. You’ll need to provide us with a photography portfolio along with your application.
Additional Details: Note this role has limited spaces available. 4 shift minimum required.
Press Desk Crew
Team: Communications
You’ll be supporting our Press Team to organise meetings and interviews with our national and international press guests.
Who is this suitable for?
If you’re well organised, good at keeping people to a schedule, and efficient, then this might well be for you. We are looking for someone who is enthusiastic with a good knowledge of Sheffield City Centre to help the Press Crew.
Additional Details: Note this role has limited spaces available.
Social Media Crew
Team: Communication
You’ll be supporting the Communications team across the festival on our social media accounts, and will be responsible for keeping the world informed about what’s going on at DocFest. You’ll get to cover all aspects of the festival including filmmaker Q&As, talks and sessions, pitches and other live events, capturing some of the best content to come out of the festival and sharing it with our audiences online.
Who is this suitable for?
If you’re looking to learn more about the exciting possibilities of social media, are interested in content creation, or want to put your creative writing skills to the test, whilst engaging with audiences online, Social Media Crew is the one for you.
Additional Details: Note this role has limited spaces available. 4 shift minimum required.
Alternate Realities Team
Alternate Realities Exhibition Crew
Team: Alternate Realities
This role places you in our flagship Alternate Realities Exhibition programme. You will help our Alternate Realities team and digital artists bring their projects to life, before, during and after the festival.
Who is this suitable for?
If you have an interest in working with visual artists, emerging technologies or art-handling, this may be the role for you. You will talk to visitors about the works as a point of contact for audience members, you will be dealing with industry-leading technology, learning exhibition floor plans, supporting each individual project and maintaining a safe, smooth and inquisitive environment.
We engage with artists working in a range of forms including virtual and augmented reality, video, sound, performance art, game, installation, interactive documentary and many other media.
Additional Details: Please note the install and de-rig of the Alternate Realities Exhibition may require physical aspects.
Production & Operations
Head Volunteer
Team: Operations
Our Head Volunteers are the central cog to all Volunteer activities. This role supports the DocCrew volunteers on the ground and liaises with Venue Coordinators across the City. You will be stationed at the DocCrew Hub during the festival.
Who is this suitable for?
If you have volunteered at DocFest before or have a good understanding of the festival or perhaps you have been a Head Volunteer at a different festival, this role is for you. You will be organised, have good communication skills and can handle solving problems under pressure. This is a great role to gain experience and learn how festival operations run. You'll also learn about people management.
Additional Details: This role would require an interview and a Head Volunteer pre-Festival induction session on the 12 June. Greater availability during the festival dates is required.
Box Office Crew
Team: Operations
Be the face of the festival, someone who is a point of information for our single ticket holders, our DocLovers and our Industry Passholders. You’ll receive training in our ticketing software, distribute tickets for the entire DocFest programme, and advise on event times, venue locations, accessibility and sell festival merchandise.
Who is this suitable for?
Our Box Office Crew is central to the success of our festival. You will need to be calm, friendly and have a professional manner with great verbal communication skills and a passion for film and events. This is a fantastic opportunity to interact with our audiences, in a busy part of the festival enhancing your customer service skills and event knowledge.
Delegate Centre Crew
Team: Operations
The Delegate Centre is the buzzing industry hub – the first point of arrival for thousands of attendees of the Festival. You’ll be welcoming them to the Festival, giving them everything they need and assisting with any queries they may have.
Who is this suitable for?
You need to be friendly, approachable and have great people skills. If you’re considering a career in events or hospitality, this is the perfect role for you, and you’ll get invaluable first-hand experience of how one of the UK’s biggest film festivals is run.
Festival Runner
Team: Operations
This is a varied, diverse role that requires you to cover any and every aspect of the Festival. One minute you may be delivering sponsor signage to a venue, the next you might be helping at an industry networking event or assisting a guest speaker get to their venue on time.
Who is this suitable for?
An enthusiastic and energetic individual with a can-do attitude is required of all our runners. This is a fast-paced, exciting, challenging role that will give you a great insight into how a massive film festival like DocFest operates
Team Hub Crew
Team: Operations
You’ll be based where the magic happens – the DocFest office! Fielding questions from anyone looking to liaise with DocFest staff and assisting in any tasks that need to be carried out.
Who is this suitable for?
This role will sharpen your administrative skills, giving you a great behind-the-scenes insight into how the festival operates, setting you up for a career in the arts and beyond.
Additional Details: Note this role has limited spaces available.
Venue Crew
Team: Operations
Our Venue Crew is a diverse and important role that sees you carrying out Front of House duties at our venues. It's a fast-paced role in which you're making sure our audiences have a seamless experience. You could be counting attendance, managing queues, using our bespoke ticketing system, helping attendees to their seats or meeting guests of the festival and ensuring they get to their Q&As on time. You’ll also be the welcoming face of the festival dealing with enquiries as and when they come.
Who is this suitable for?
If you love being at the Festival, are passionate about people enjoying their time at DocFest and want the chance to meet people and gain front of house experience, you’ll be right at home on our Venue Crew.
Production Crew
Team: Production
Supporting the Production Manager, this role involves supporting the delivery of the festival across multiple locations ensuring essential equipment and materials are in the right place at the right time. The role might contain some physical aspects.
Who is this suitable for?
We’re looking for outgoing team-players who want to get some event production experience behind them. A technical background, with some geographical knowledge of Sheffield, would be desirable.
Cinema Production Crew
Team: Production
A peek into the production side of the Festival, supporting the cinema venues to ensure everything is ready for the screenings to start on time and run smoothly. Along with checking technical aspects you will be meeting and greeting Q&A participants, directors and other festival guests.
Who is this suitable for?
If you’ve always wondered what goes into getting a film on-screen and enjoy working with all things tech and production, as well as meeting the people behind the films, then this one’s for you.
Additional Details: Note this role has limited placements available
Events
Special Events & Parties Crew
Team: Events
This role puts you in the middle of DocFest's exciting events! You’ll be helping with setting up, dressing and closing down the events, whilst ensuring everything runs smoothly.
Who is this suitable for?
Do you want to pursue a career in events? Have a bit of experience in front of house and customer service, or maybe you want to pursue a career in hospitality management? This might be the one for you.
Additional Details: Please note this role predominantly has evening only shifts and we will help you get home if public transit has stopped before the end of your shift.
