Power volunteering

Mike Dickson

IN HIS BOOK The More You Give, charity veteran and donor consultant Mike Dickson explains how you can get truly creative with your charitable giving:

"Volunteering isn't just about working for a charity. You can create an entrepreneurial initiative yourself. In The Volunteer Revolution, Bill Hybels gives some great examples of how new volunteer ideas were born in his community.

"A hairdresser got some friends together and started offering hairdressing to people in the local nursing home, and at a centre for disabled people. A group of them even started teaching hairdressing skills to prostitutes, providing them with new means to earn a living.

"Another group started a food brokerage, collecting food, sorting and distributing it to hungry families. One person started a refugee welcoming programme; another began a teenage mothers' support group. Expert water skiers took kids away for the weekend and taught them how to water ski.

”Why on earth wouldn't I want to be involved in something useful and fun?”

"One of my favourites is an organisation called CARS, which stands for “Christian Auto Repairmen Servicing” (only in America!). These people repaired cars donated to the project by people in the church and community, and gave them to people who had fallen on hard times, quite often single mums. And then they continued to services the cars for free.

"The message is that we have talents and skills that we can use to help out in the world - that volunteering can be original, fun and of huge benefit to the givers as well as the receivers. Ask yourself: what could I do, and what would I like to do? Why on earth wouldn't I want to be involved in something useful and fun?

"Becoming a volunteer can have a profound and very positive impact on your own life, and the lives of others. There is a wonderful sign on the wall of Shishu Bhavan, the children's home in Calcutta, which reads:

What you spent years building may be destroyed overnight.
Build anyway.

People really need help but may attack you if you help them.
Help people anyway.

Give the world the best you have and you'll get kicked in the teeth.
Give the world the best you've got anyway..."