Week 49 – Part 1: Volunteering at WomenVenture
December 16, 2010
Part of my master plan on completing one new experience a week is to find some new hobbies or activities that I will continue on with after the year is over. My first new experience of the week will hopefully continue to be an activity I am involved with for years to come.
In this shaky economy, volunteering is a great way to keep your spirits up, network and possibly use your professional skills. WomenVenture will do all of these things for me. As some of you know I will soon be looking for work as my contract is up the end of January (anyone know of any open Marketing Communications Manager positions?). I have been volunteering with Bridging for the last year in the warehouse and I love it, however it doesn’t use my professional skills. I still plan on volunteering with Bridging, but WomenVenture will be fulfilling for me in a different way. I’ll be able to help small business owners succeed as well keeping some professional connections and satisfaction throughout unplanned job hiatus.
WomenVenture has been around since 1978 and has helped thousands throughout the years. Although called WomenVenture, the organization serves both men and women with tools and support for new businesses, finding a new job, starting a new career path, financial education and even loans to new businesses.
I attended the Best Place to Start free information class and the volunteer session on December 7th. Although there is plenty of information on their website, it’s always insightful to hear about an organization from people who have been affected by it. The session facilitators weren’t only volunteers, but had also received support from WomenVenture. I was surprised that WomenVenture could help individuals on so many different levels. We divided into two groups – one group for those starting a business or planning to start a new business. And the other group was for those looking for work or a new career path. I am looking for work so I went with the 2nd group. The profiles of the people varied in this group, some had no college education, some with doctorate degrees, but all had one item in common – laid off due to no fault of their own in the last two years; some had been with their companies for many years. As we told our stories and discussed what we thought we needed help with, the facilitators would tell us a class or tool or a coach that could help us. It was uplifting to hear all the resources available. Unfortunately, I didn’t get to learn more about the resources available to the new business group, but no doubt there were great offerings for that group as well.
The volunteering session was great, Ann Mays is the Director of Volunteering and she was wonderful. We discussed my skills, how to use them with WomenVenture and how others could benefit from my skills. The session left me excited and energized about volunteering with WomenVenture. I could be doing anything from helping a new business owner with a marketing plan, designing a flyer or brochure or teaching a class of new business owners on the importance of marketing and how to include it in their business plan.
If you want to learn more about WomenVenture, go to www.womenventure.org. If volunteering at WomenVenture doesn’t sound like your cup of tea, but would like to volunteer, check out www.VolunteerMatch.org.
