October’s Volunteer of the Month is Mark Collins, Retail Liaison Manager for Broadgate Estates, nominated for his work across various ELBA programmes.

Mark has contributed to the Broadgate Connect training into work scheme, where he worked hard to get retailers to host unemployed residents of Tower Hamlets and Hackney for up to two weeks on placement, giving candidates real life work experience, transferable skills and direct employment. He has also taken part in a huge number of employability workshops, and has also led a bespoke insight tour of Broadgate for young leaders of the Young Black Men community project, in the process brokering employment opportunities for some of them. Finally, Mark has been providing valuable mentoring to an SME in Poplar, while also looking to expand the programme to others in the area. It is fair to say Mark has gone truly over and above our expectations of volunteers.

Why did you volunteer?

For the past two years I had been working closely with ELBA to fulfil our companies CSR initiatives, which in my role as Retail Liaison Manager meant matching young job seekers from often deprived parts of East London with employment opportunities and vacancies in one of the 68 shops, restaurants, bars and gyms that I current manage.

I volunteered because I was acutely aware of the importance small businesses often play in giving young people their first chance of meaningful employment. I therefore offered to mentor a small independent card shop in Chrisp Street Market called Smarty Party. I was hopeful that my retail and property management background would allow me to give useful relevant advice to the joint Director’s as they continued to grow the business.

Why do you think volunteering is important?
I think it’s important to realize that a few hours of your time each month can actually have a tremendous impact on the individual or businesses you are mentoring. For me it was also educational I had not lived or worked near the borough of Tower Hamlets and was shocked to learn of the levels of poverty in the area “49% of children in the borough are designated as living in poverty” (Source: New Policy Institute, 2015).

Would you recommend volunteering to a colleague and if so why?
I certainly would. I think there’s still a slight misconception about what volunteering actually entails and how much time it will potentially take up. For example an email update, skype call or face-to-face meeting once a month can often be all that’s needed in order to provide the individual or business with the direction and advice they need.