More Than Just Your Time – Sharing Skills in Volunteering

All of our amazing volunteers have skills and qualities that they bring to their organisations. In volunteering, some people want to learn new skills, and perhaps do something totally different from their 'day job'; whilst many people love to use their existing skills to help out. People who offer their specialist skills often say it's because they want to give back or 'pass it forward' to others, or it may be simply because it’s something they love doing. 

As well as individuals offering their time, increasingly, we see employers with policies encouraging staff to take time out for volunteering. Sometimes they want to complete a one-off project as a feel-good team building exercise. This can be a fantastic offer for organisations who are able to take advantage of an occasional group of volunteers, though even more beneficial are the employee volunteering policies which give employees more freedom and flexibility to find their own volunteer role to match their personal passion and actively deploy their skills within a local charity or community setting.

Maybe you could be an amazing social media volunteer, getting creative with Canva? Perhaps you have good IT skills and get a buzz from passing on your knowledge to the more digitally challenged? Love driving? Perhaps you’d enjoy joining the team of volunteers who support Community Transport schemes across the country, enabling vulnerable people to more easily got to and from important medical appointments. There are so many different opportunities to deploy your skills and experience through volunteering. 

At GoVolHerts team, we've seen the benefit ourselves, being lucky enough to have wonderful skilled volunteers to help for example with our administration and with photography at our events, capturing moments from our annual Volunteer Fair and Trustees' Conference.

Have a skill that you’d like to use in your volunteering? Here are our tips:

1. Get smart-searching our database! Try putting different search terms related to your skill into the first blank field of our volunteer opportunity search here. Select appropriate filters in the Cause and Activities tags. You can fine-tune the activity by clicking the little pink arrow at the right. Experiment with different combinations to help you find a great opportunity.
2. Offer your skills up to organisations on GoVolHerts, by adding yourself to our Volunteer Pool. Complete your profile and being in the pool allows organisations to contact you directly if they think what you have to offer might be a great fit. Find out more about joining the GoVolHerts Volunteer Pool here.

And it's not just about what you're giving; volunteering can also be a great way for you to further develop your own skills. For instance, whilst charities literally couldn’t run without the skills of the fantastic volunteers who make up their Board of Trustees, research shows that 57% of trustees under the age of 30 said that the role supported their career development. What a win-win situation!

There are hundreds of opportunities on GoVolHerts from hundreds of local charities and non-profits groups. Everyone is different and we believe that there is a volunteering role out there for everyone, whatever skills you offer.

Here are just a few examples:

Driving

Advice

Legal & Financial 

Gardening

Counselling

Cooking