9 questions that will help you to find your volunteering opportunity
Every year, more than 28 million people in Germany get involved, according to the 2019 Volunteer Survey! The topics are as diverse as society itself: Sports, culture, education, nature conservation, migration, democracy promotion, food saving, you name it. But how can you find a volunteering opportunity or commitment for you from this apparently endless number of possibilities?
To help you along to find your volunteering opportunity, we’ve put together 9 helpful questions. Each of them is designed to give you an idea about the topic and the way you would like to get involved in society.
Volunteering often starts small
For many people, finding a suitable commitment or volunteering opportunity often fails because of the motivation and the presumed effort involved. This is due to a widely held belief, which we would like to clear up right at the start:
Commitment and volunteering are always time-consuming and long-term.
That’s not true. You can start your volunteering journey in a very small way: By watering flowers for your neighbor, signing a petition, or donating money to a cause close to your heart. All these simple activities already have great added value for society. The real difficulty lies in consciously integrating them into one’s own everyday life.
As inspiration for such small volunteering activities, we recommend you take a look at our 5-Minute Commitments. The exciting thing is that when you realize that you enjoy one of these small activities over a longer period of time, you can build on it and gradually become more involved in the topic to find an volunteering opportunity.
Also getting involved with an organisation often starts small
When you get involved with a non-profit organization, you’re not just thrown in at the deep end. At the beginning, the first step is to get to know the subject and each other. For this purpose, many organizations offer get-to-know meetings to start with or start with a personal interview, where you first learn something about the organization, the tasks and your potential co-workers.
With many organizations, you also have the option to get involved in a one-time volunteering activity to start with in order to find out whether you could imagine a repeated commitment in this area.
9 questions for your volunteering search
Whether you want to build on your previous experience or start with something completely new, we’ve put together 9 questions for you to find your volunteering opportunity. They should help you to find an commitment that fits your interests, your skills and your personal schedule. We hope that they will give you a good orientation!
Question 1: What do you want to get involved in?
In our experience, one of the most important questions is: What social issues motivate you? In order to filter the variety of possibilities, we have collected a few key areas of commitments in the graphic. You can also find these and other filter options for an volunteering opportunity on our website.
Questions 2-9: How would you like to get involved?
Once you have found the topics that are exciting for you, you can ask yourself a series of questions that go into more detail and have a lot to do with your personal preferences, skills and opportunities. We hope that these will also serve as helpful guideposts in your search to find your volunteering opportunity.
2. Spontaneous or planned?
Do you simply have some available time and would like to get involved spontaneously? E.g. tomorrow with a shift at the food bank. Or do you prefer to plan longer in advance and support, for example, a children’s camp next summer.
3. Online or offline?
Do you prefer to be involved online and therefore independent of location? E.g. in an online language group? Or do you prefer your volunteering opportunity to be on-site and in direct contact with others ? E.g. in tutoring for school children.
4. Contact with target group?
Would you like to come into direct contact with the target group? E.g. on a walk with senior citizens or reading aloud to elementary school children. Or would you rather support the organization in the background? E.g. with social media, designing flyers, photos or image films.
5. Co-create or execute?
Would you rather create something yourself? E.g. an information evening on food rescue or a workshop against bullying and for better belonging. Or do you prefer it when someone assigns you fixed tasks? E.g. sorting clothing donations or painting a shelter for refugees.
6. Use your knowledge or learn something new?
Is it important to you to contribute your existing knowledge? E.g. in the creation of a website or with your language skills. Or do you want to learn something new to balance your everyday life? E.g. by doing crafts in a repair café or about wild meadow biotopes in a nature conservation project.
7. Long-term or short term?
Would you like to get involved with an organization or an issue on a long-term and repeated basis? E.g. as a store assistant in an Oxfam store. Or would you prefer a one-time and short-term commitment? E.g. at an intercultural cooking evening with locals and refugees.
8. Individual or fixed times?
Would you like to organize your volunteering time flexible? E.g. with the design of social media posts or flyers according to your own schedule from your home. Or do you prefer to be at your place of work at fixed times? E.g. at a food distribution for homeless people.
9. Changing activities?
Is it important for you to get deeper into a topic or an organization and build up more and more experience? E.g. to become an expert in nature conservation. Or are you more interested in getting to know different areas and activities? E.g. different activities in one organization or even in different organizations.
Discover all volunteering opportunities at vostel.de
You already have an idea of your perfect volunteer work? Then look directly for specific projects on vostel.de. With the help of the various filter options, you are sure to find a suitable volunteering opportunity for you!
Your vostel.de team wishes you success to find your volunteering opportunity!
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