Do you want to maximise your impact?
In our professional opinion, all volunteering roles are high-impact: they can make a real difference to the volunteers themselves, to the recipients of their volunteering, and to their community in general. However, some volunteering roles allow you to maximise your impact.
If you're the kind of person who wants to influence change through your volunteering, here's our solution: become a trustee!
Trustees are awesome
They are leaders and influencers, visionaries and innovators, strategists and decision-makers. They are people like you who bring their skills to help a charity achieve its aims and mission.
The Trustee board governs and provides the overall leadership for a charity, so it is a role of responsibility but one that allows you to be at the heart of the charity.
You will be able to share your skills and ideas, as well as learning invaluable new skills, such as leadership, decision making and business planning.
Being a trustee is beneficial to you
Being a Trustee is a rewarding experience and it is a great way to be involved in a community or cause which matters to you. We asked Melissa Zanocco, Volunteer Centre Sutton's newest trustee, to tell us why she had been keen to become one!
"I work with civil engineers to ensure their continuing professional development. I'd always been rather jealous of the system of support their employers put in place to ensure that their workers are fully trained and know exactly where they are heading, and it caused me to reflect on my own professional development. Having analysed the strengths and gaps in my skills and reflected on my long-term goals and the steps needed to get there, I realised that I wanted to do something that made a difference to my local community (and therefore to my own family as well).
"My skills are around governance, so I was led to looking at a Trustee position. The opportunity to join the board of trustees of Volunteer Centre Sutton (VCS) seemed perfect because of my experience managing volunteers. I was particularly attracted to VCS as they are determined to lead the way with best practice and continuous self-development.
"I wanted to make a difference to my local community"
"Becoming a Trustee has allowed me to take a step back from daily management of detail and to look at things from a more strategic perspective. I am able to use my strengths to present a different viewpoint and generate fresh and exciting ideas, or allow the organisation to look at things in ways that have not been considered before. I've also been able to build my understanding of a wide range of other areas, like finance and HR, that I don't usually come across in my day job.
"It's still early days in the role but I am looking forward to using my expertise to help VCS achieve its goals."
How do I become one?
- Go to our volunteer database role search
- Select “Trusteeships & Committees" under the 'Activities I am interested in' box
- Scroll down and hit the green 'Search' button
Search for a trustee role now!
You can also find information and resources about becoming a trustee at trusteesweek.org
