Health and social care is one of the largest volunteering sectors in the UK. This includes organisations like the NHS and charities which improve the wellbeing of people of all ages. So what do helpers actually get involved with? The opportunities are more diverse than we imagined as our bloggers reveal.

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Tuesday May 04, 2010

Bokbokbok

This Thursday at the shelter seemed fraught and was fast paced. Im not sure if it was the storm brewing outside that had an affect on everyone feeling hot and bothered and edgy but everyone seemed a little fed up. When I mean everyone, I mean the kitchen volunteers in particular. It didn’t help that we were deboning and skinning chicken for an hour and a half . Hey! Who says volunteering isn’t glamorous?!

But were not phased easily and it was wonderful seeing how some people cope under pressure. Tammy made me laugh and joked about the whole chicken disaster and Ed, a new volunteer took everything in his stride. I spoke with a volunteer who I hadn’t had a chance to speak to before and I learnt a lot about her. By the end of the evening we had the giggles and the stress of it seemed to have disappeared.

It reminded me of boring maths classes at school when I would sit in the back row and giggle about the ridiculousness of maths equations with one friend or another.

But what do you do when you have stress in the “volunteering place”? Well, we did what we would do in any work place. We approached the Volunteer Manager, Louis. Louis is great, he seems to have a whole heap of energy and it really rubs off on the people around him. He motivated us and made us feel good about what we were doing. He encouraged us to continue. As a volunteer manager in my paid non-volunteering job I know I can learn a lot from Louis.

So, volunteering doesn’t just allow me to say “I can help cook meals for a lot of people” on my CV it also allows me to say I can cope under pressure, I can work with people from different backgrounds and who work differently to me and it means I can say I understand how volunteers feel and the importance of excellent volunteer management, because I have first hand experience!

So what was for dinner? well it was surprisingly delicious chicken and mushroom sauce and rice. We even got ice cream for afters, although I may never want to see another chicken. Ever.

Posted by Jenni ( 3:57 PM )
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