Naomi Harris is Executive Committee Secretariat at Linklaters. Naomi tells us about how ELBA’s flexible volunteering offering allows her to fit volunteering around a busy day job, and about her passion for supporting young people to help them learn about career paths and how to fulfil their ambitions.

Why do you volunteer?
I appreciate the opportunity that volunteering provides me to give back to the community. As I work at a law firm, there are lots of opportunities for lawyers to get involved in pro-bono work – whilst I can’t work on those same projects, working with ELBA has given me many different opportunities to support a wide range of different community initiatives and education projects. I appreciate how ELBA’s volunteering offering is flexible and varied, meaning I can easily fit in volunteering around a busy day job. I especially enjoy the opportunity to work with young people through my volunteering. I am passionate about sharing career advice as I feel having a strong understanding of the wide range of careers available can be of great value to young people who may otherwise have limited visibility of different career paths.

What have you gained from your volunteering experience?
My most recent volunteering experience with ELBA has been fortnightly mentoring of a Year 10 student, supporting them predominantly through career planning and workplace preparation activities. I have enjoyed building a relationship with my mentee and as I have got to know him better, I have seen him grow in confidence and enhance his communication skills. I personally have benefitted from being a mentor – it is not an experience I have done before and has allowed me to develop my own coaching and guidance skills. Knowing that I am supporting my mentee in preparing for their future is very rewarding.

Would you recommend volunteering to a colleague and, if so, why?
I absolutely would recommend volunteering. Not only is it a personally rewarding experience but volunteering has also helped me develop a different skill set to that I use in my daily work and affords me the opportunity to see things from a different perspective. ELBA makes volunteering easy to make time for, and even volunteering on a small scale can make a difference. The more we make volunteering a part of our working routine, the more people we can support.