Why do I volunteer, and why should you do it too?
I started to volunteer with WrOpenUp in 2016, a few months after moving to Wroclaw. I don’t remember exactly how it began, who invited me to my first meeting on Google, or even what my motivations were at that time…
The only thing I know for sure it was one of the best decisions I took in my life in Poland: be an active part of this constant, gentle, and progressive (r)evolution that WrOpenUp aims to conduct in our society starting from the best place: the youth.
What is WrOpenUp?
WrOpenUp is a fantastic project that put together dozens of high-skilled volunteers from the most critical companies in Wroclaw, Poland, like Google, IBM, Hewlett-Packard Enterprise, Volvo, UBS, Credit Suisse, and others, to create and deliver specific workshops about Cross-cultural competencies, Project Management, Presentation Skills and Leadership to hundreds of Teenagers.
In 2016 I started as a workshop assistant, then progressively, I start delivering cross-cultural competencies workshops. In 2017, my engagement grew up since I began to help with the development of the workshop’s content, in particular, Project Management and Presentation Skills workshops, co-creating the manuals and training other volunteers.
In 2018 I helped the WrOpenUp’s management to rethink and redesign its internal structure since it has been continuously growing in numbers of volunteers, companies, and schools impacted over the years.
During 2019 I will be contributing as a Program Manager, in charge of organizing the teams, set up and coordinate the execution of all activities performed by the volunteers and to ensure the quality and performance of our operations.
Every year WrOpenUp becomes more structured and insightful, with more and more high-skilled volunteers, and every year we are reaching more schools and more teenagers. I feel like we are surely making history here.
Volunteering in a very active and highly-impacting organization like WrOpenUp should not be considered as a simple spare-time activity; we must have the right level of commitment, responsibility, flexibility, and open-mindedness since we are talking directly to the young leaders of tomorrow.
Why do I volunteer?
One of the most exciting characteristics of WrOpenUp, as I said, is that is formed by dozens of very high-skilled volunteers from the most valuable companies in the town; all these volunteers have an intensive professional life, have their families, friends and social life and anyway we find time to dedicate. It requires one thing first of all: Motivation!
With so many people volunteering in so many different ways, the personal reasons for volunteering are endless. Motivation is very subjective, so I can share what is for me my main reasons.
Due to the values, structure, high-quality teams, and fantastic content of WrOpenUp, I believe that volunteering it’s an excellent opportunity to gain professional experience and skills since every volunteer can gain valuable knowledge and skills which are likely to be useful in the future. For example, many volunteering roles will help us to achieve experience in working as a team, project management, and public speaking.
One factor that I never underestimate is the capacity of this type of activity has to help people who volunteer to feel more confident in all sorts of ways. I cannot define myself as quite a shy person, but I saw during my volunteering experience how WrOpenUp helped many volunteers and especially our teenagers to gain brilliant confidence in talking to strangers and public speaking.
Also, volunteering has many “social life” benefits! I can say that one of the best things about being part of WrOpenUp as a foreigner is meeting the other exciting and inspiring people from all around the world (we are more than 30 nationalities), and it may happen that then just turn out to be great friends too.
From the professional point of view, it’s proven that volunteering has a positive impact in our careers, partially because the relationships people create while volunteering can be leveraged for professional benefits while they give you access to new information and opportunities.
WrOpenUp, in particular, is formed by very well-connected professionals to the most valuable companies in our city, it is highly supported by the city government, and it has excellent visibility in general. This is something that, in our connected world, I believe, can worth more than any financial rewarding!
Last but not least, being part of this fantastic team, with like-minded people, sharing the same passion and engagement should typically result in an enjoyable time. I never forget how I feel good after every WrOpenUp edition, knowing that I am doing something for a good cause in a city that opens its arms to me since the first day.
I could probably enumerate other dozens of compelling reasons why I suggest to anyone to look for volunteering opportunities considering that there are many different things that we can get involved with.
How can you start?
I recommend starting with something small, with a short engagement. Committing even as little as one or two hours a week can have a profound benefit on your own life, and the organizations like WrOpenUp that rely on such help will be able to thrive.
Now, if you aren’t currently volunteering, the most important thing to remember is that as well as helping others, you can help yourself too. Any volunteering is good volunteering, no matter what kind of volunteering you will do, it’s essential to do it with your heart, doing your best, and being open to new challenges and experiences.
Volunteering can be incredibly satisfying about acting in a way that is consistent with our principles, being able to say that we are changing the world, having an impact on the lives of others. Having more meaning to our being here beyond just looking after ourselves, it’s amazingly rewarding.
I believe that the best way to change something in this world is by starting with ourselves. In this direction, my engagement with WrOpenUp is changing my life from being purely self-centered to being something with meaning for others, too.
Jair Ribeiro
Originally Published on LinkedIn on February 3, 2019