Monday, October 14, 2013

How Community Service Impacts More Than Just The Community

By Sebastian Troup


Community service is something that people want to accomplish since it is considered to be a "feel good" activity though we don't always have the time for it. This is quite apparent since everyone is so busy with their work and family. However, there are several reasons why volunteering is a good use of your time while at the same time also an opportunity to feel good about yourself.

Community service improves your community, and this is the most obvious reason. Why not take the time to make the community that you live in better? Simply by volunteering a few hours a month, you can have a huge impact with just a small investment of your time. Volunteer activities can include events such as park and street cleanups, local school projects, serving food at your local food pantry, helping with youth activities, and more. Volunteering in these activities will have high returns where it matters most to you and your family.

You'll become an example yourself when you do volunteering. Volunteering not only affects the greater community, but also directly impacts your family and friends. If you have kids, it becomes a great building block in teaching and mentoring them. If possible, find volunteer opportunities that encourage kids to participate so that you they can volunteer and help also. This will mold them to see that giving back is not only the right thing to do, but assisting others and the environment is a great investment for the years to come. This is also a nice chance to call you friends and invite them to participate by creating group volunteer events which can make an even bigger impact. The ever so popular social media makes it quite easy to organize group volunteering that can spread quite fast across the networks and as a result, will create a positive feedback not only on the volunteer experience and organization but also for you and your friends.

Depending on your schedule, several companies today are offering some workplace volunteer programs that allow their employees to spend a certain amount of hours per month that are approved during work hours. Why not spend such time to the community for the better good? The company is paying you for such tasks which make it advantageous for your family and friends to partake in such events to make to the most use of their time. If your company is not offering such volunteer program, then you might want to inquire about it from your management to help you get started.

Volunteerism enhances your skills and you gain more experience. This is one benefit that many don't realize, but is maybe one of the most important reasons to volunteer. You may have seen terms about volunteering such as "micro-volunteering" or "skills based volunteering." These are new concepts that are proving to be the most valuable to volunteers and organizations. Micro-volunteering or skills based volunteering means taking the skills you possess (often through your work experience) and applying it to a volunteer opportunity in small increments of time.

For instance, there are many nonprofits that don't have in-house web designers. There is a constant need for web designers and if you are a web designer yourself, you are in high demand. You can give a huge impact to the community by spending a few hours of your time in volunteering for couple of weeks and sharing your insights and skills to an organization. You can hone your skills and gain additional experience while at the same time the organization can benefit greatly from it. This is a great opportunity for freelance web designers to do some professional work that could lead to a long-term career and contract with the organization once they see how well you do volunteering.




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