May is always one of the busiest months on the Volunteer Calendar. It includes one of the highlights of the year at LINK – National Volunteer Week. While we appreciate and value our volunteers year-round, this is the time of year we tend to be a little louder about demonstrating it. Following the success of last year’s Volunteer Appreciation Dinner, we again booked the International Buffet at The Highlands Hotel in Craigieburn to share an evening out with our volunteers and their families. It was wonderful to spend some social time together and to see our volunteers smiling and laughing together over a great meal.
May also marks the first of our bi-annual Volunteer Sub-Committee Meetings chaired by board member Sara Pantaleo. The meeting is an opportunity to review how our volunteer program has been going over the previous 6 months and to share new ideas and strategies for improvement. It’s extremely valuable to be able to benefit from the experience of Sara and fellow board member Irene Opper (also on the Volunteer Sub-Committee) in reviewing strategies for implementation for the coming period.
We’ve had 3 new volunteer drivers and 1 new volunteer outing host join us since the last newsletter. And we have another 6 outing hosts and 5 drivers coming through the onboarding process at the moment.
The additional outing host numbers are much needed to meet the increased number of outings we’re delivering over the next 6 months. And our new drivers help bolster the ranks, as many of our current volunteers take well-deserved holidays or are dealing with illness and injury. To all our volunteers taking time out for health, we wish you a speedy recovery and look forward to seeing you again when you’re back on your feet.
Instead of our monthly volunteer gathering, this June we have a whole-of-team gathering to celebrate everyone’s effort over the past years and to give a fitting send off to Cliff as he winds up his time as CEO.
During his time with us Cliff has been a great proponent of LINK’s volunteer efforts and the perfect example of “quiet leadership”, exemplified by his modesty and humility in fostering a collaborative environment, his trust in empowering team members, his thoughtful decision making, self awareness and calm and steady approach.True to his lead-by-example approach, he is taking the leap to do what he loves – departing to pursue his own entrepreneurial goals.
I’ll shortly be posting information for our July Volunteer get-together – a pizza and trivia night here at Thomastown.
Just a reminder that myself and the Transport & Outing Teams are here to support you and ensure you have a great volunteer experience. Please don’t hesitate to reach out – we’re here to help!
