The big breakfast's guide to volunteering
Written by Esther Rai from Love Your Neighbour at Gas Street Church
The Big Breakfast, an initiative at Love Your Neighbour at Gas Street Church, has been flipping pancakes for almost 7 years, and serves the wonderful community of Ladywood.
The Big Breakfast, which was started by Jake Bateson and Esther Rai in response to weekend hunger, happens monthly at St John’s and St Peter’s CE Academy in Ladywood.
Everyone is welcome to join, with a free cooked breakfast and pancake station, crafts and activities for children, sports outside, and tea and coffee and a place to chat.
Although run by a specific church, The Big Breakfast volunteers come from different denominations and those with no faith at all, all that’s needed is getting on board with the vision!
Here are our top tips for volunteering, or organising volunteering!
Volunteering
1. Find something you’re passionate about
This sounds obvious, but if you’re passionate about making public spaces cleaner and greener, then volunteering at The Big Breakfast isn’t for you!
And if creating some weekend fun for children sounds like a great way to spend a Saturday morning, joining your local litter picking group is probably also not for you!
There’s so much out there, a great way to find volunteering opportunities for you is to connect with local community hubs in your areas. If you get really stuck, reach out to your local councillor, who will know what community groups are active in your area.
2. Let people know about your skills
A charity might be advertising volunteering opportunities in their kitchen, for example, but that doesn’t mean your other skills aren’t also needed.
If you have administrative or financial skills, or even you’re just good at creating cool spreadsheets, let the team know!
They might need to get to know you first, but with funding opportunities drying up due to the cost of living crisis, volunteering your skills could really help a worthy cause.
3. Embrace the mess
Lots of charitable initiatives are run by people with full time jobs, or with teams that are stretched meeting growing needs. Everyone is striving for excellence, but if the mark is missed, embrace the mess!
Organising volunteering
1. Fill people’s time
When it comes to volunteering, people want to feel needed. If there’s a lot of standing around then your volunteers might not give up their time to the next one if they don’t feel there was enough to do.
2. Cast the vision
Have a good vision for the event, let people know what it is they’re a part of and what you hope to achieve with it.
This sounds obvious, but having everyone united under a vision helps achieve it.
For example, at The Big Breakfast a volunteer might assume the vision is just combatting weekend hunger, which is of course part of it!
But our whole vision is actually to provide a space for the community to feel welcomed, loved and cared for. Knowing that means our volunteers know our priority is the people, not the food alone.
3. A thank you goes a long way
Budgets are tight, but is there a way you can thank your volunteers? A card with a personal message, organising a group trip to the pub, a homemade cake, any of these little things can remind people how precious their contribution is, and increase buy in.