Touchstone Volume 25 (Autumn) | Page 14

INSIDE CPL Meet our Volunteer Services Manager, Letitia! In 2016, CPL volunteers contributed over 9000 hours! Letitia Bouloukos, CPL’s Volunteer Services Manager shares her team approach to matching volunteers with clients, projects and services all across Queensland. Why is volunteering important? At CPL, volunteers provide opportunities for new and meaningful relationships to be naturally created between our community and clients. Volunteers share many of the same passions and interests as clients. We saw a great example of this in Springfield recently, when a client passionate about Manga (Japanese comic books) became connected to a volunteer who is equally keen on Manga – and together their interest and passion in this form of art expands. How special is that! Volunteers are the beating heart of CPL; the social networks of our clients and in turn, the broader community expand and grow because of volunteers. In your experience, why do people like to volunteer? What does an average day look like in your role? People choose to volunteer for various reasons, but fundamentally it’s important for many to feel connected to their community and to make a difference in their world. Other motivations include: gaining new skills and experience, building friendships and workplace relationships or fulfilling a school or workplace opportunity to give back. Full of excitement. The average day is spent examining how we could best find a person with a specific skill set who is seeking to give back to their community through one of our volunteer opportunities. An example in Townsville, our service recently requested a volunteer skilled in theatre, who could facilitate drama workshops in Townsville. Through our targeted recruitment approach we found a perfect match – securing the Artistic Director of a local theatre company! Are there any myths about volunteering that you’d like to break? Volunteers are diverse in their interests, skills and passions. Their motivations to volunteer are equally diverse. People who volunteer are incredibly talented and make a huge difference to our society and the work we do at CPL. “ We are in awe of our incredible team of volunteers that give back at CPL. 14 Touchstone Autumn 2017 ” could be achieved through the placement of a volunteer. It’s really exciting for me to see the massive growth in volunteer services as we now re