You want to make friends while you learn? You want to have fun while you help others in the community? You want to get hands-on experience and see what it would be like to work in your dream organization? TRY volunteering! This may sound like an advertisement to you but volunteering can help one achieve the goals mentioned above and plenty more.

Volunteering surely helps you contribute and give back to the society. Volunteers get a chance to support the cause they are passionate about and become change agents. People have a notion that volunteering is all about only helping others, and thinking of volunteering benefitting the volunteer is not right.

Volunteering is not just about doing a good deed but also gaining from it personally and professionally. Volunteering should be considered more like an exchange where the volunteer serves the community by offering his services and gets benefits in return.
 

Some of the benefits that volunteers could gain are-
Volunteering helps you connect– Volunteer can make new friends, improve their social skills and even expand their network. Some volunteers may also get references for their future jobs!

Volunteering boosts your CV– Whether you are getting back to work after a break or are a fresh graduate, volunteering can surely add value to your resume. Volunteers can learn through experience during projects that they take up, and this would reflect positively on their resume. Volunteering helps one learn new job skills that may be very useful when one takes up full time positions. Volunteering can also act as a rich experience to fill gaps in the work experience.

Volunteering helps you to try out new things– Volunteering helps one try out things that one is passionate about and may not have had the time to pursue as a full time work. Volunteering is really helpful when one wants to learn new skills without any long term commitments. One can explore new challenges and discover new career options.

Volunteering helps one build new skills– Volunteers can learn or improve not only their interpersonal skills but also their life and career skills. Volunteers can learn skills such as leadership, effective communication, time management, taking initiatives and setting & achieving goals.

Volunteering helps one to explore– Volunteering assignments may require one to go to a new country or an unfamiliar place. This would be a unique and rich experience for the volunteers. Spending extended period of time in a new land gives the volunteer an excellent chance to get immersed in a new culture, learn a new language, and learn and try out new things.

Volunteering can really open new doors of opportunities for those willing to do hard work and give their time and effort. There is a lot that one can gain while they work for those in need. Volunteering is not merely a selfless deed but is also about serving as an effective volunteer and in the process meeting one’s own personal and professional goals.