Volunteering is not just for Christmas

Volunteering is not just for Christmas.

At least that's what we, as volunteer managers, try to reinforce when promoting opportunities throughout the year. However there is something magical about volunteering at Christmas time.

2016 has been a rollercoaster of celebrations, reflections, challenges and forced me to grit my teeth and keep persevering. I've scaled new heights in my career by achieving re-accreditation for the organisation through Investing in Volunteers. I've led on ensuring we had the highest number of volunteers engaged in the history of Peabody (1149 volunteers in March 2016) and I've challenged myself to study to build on my abilities as a leader and have others celebrate these victories with me.

All of this though, pales in comparison to me finding joy again in volunteering this Christmas time. Peabody organised a toy and food bank donation run with corporate partners and staff members to assist families and older people who were experiencing crisis or would be on their own at Christmas time. This is the second time we were running our Christmas Elves project, but the first time I was able to actively get involved. We had 27 employees gift wrapping individual hampers for residents and recruited teams of volunteers to deliver them to their homes. We were able to spread some joy to 33 older people and 136 children. I volunteered to be a part of the Christmas choir who sang at our annual Carol service at St Martins in the Field. An event which is open to residents across the London. Last week, I stood proudly, for the first time since high school and belted out traditional choral favourites such as "Rise Up Shepherd and Follow" by John Rutter and "The Angel Gabriel from Heaven came", where more than 700 people were present. In the final days before the office closed this week, I headed to the Sundial Centre with fellow employee volunteers to carol once more to an audience of older people living with Alzheimer's and Dementia. The significance of giving time for the benefit of others, especially at this time of year, became such a stark reminder of the vital role volunteers plays in society. I learnt in the course of one of my hamper deliveries that it would be the last Christmas together for a mother and her 11 year old son because she was in the final stages of battling cancer.

This piece is really not an attempt to paint myself as a saint, but to highlight how, now more than ever, as we enter 2017, the conscious decision to do something to effect change is so important. I strategise and report and policy write about volunteering week in and week out, but the actual deed of giving time this Christmas has reminded me why our roles as volunteer managers is so important, not as a means to serve the organisations we work for, but as ambassadors who have a responsibility to continue to shine the light on the issues that deeply affect our friends, neighbours, those who are homeless, queuing at food banks, fighting for welfare benefits and to provide for their children.

My days of marching in protest are long gone, but if I can make a statement and continue to challenge myself and those around me through volunteering, then I feel like I have found my purpose, even if this feeling comes around just once a year.

Happy 2017!