What is Event Leading?
GO Event Leaders are present at every GO event and are responsible for the smooth running of the day, making sure volunteers keep busy, get fed, feel welcomed and have fun.
A checklist for the day might run:
Meet and greet, sign in volunteers, share H&S responsibility, organise volunteers into tasks, ensure everyone's happy, timetable the day so tasks get done, help with lunch, liaise with venue contact person, co-ordinate the tidy up at the end of the day, ensure everyone fills in the evaluation forms.
Why might I want to do it?
It's the next stage on from being a GO volunteer: if you've been to a few events and enjoyed them, you'll also enjoy leading them. It's also an opportunity to learn what happens behind the scenes of the GO project and of the many venues GO visits.
The training we give and the leading itself may teach you new skills, or put existing ones to new uses, and it's certainly something which could be a good example of 'Leadership' on your CV!
Do I need to have done this kind of thing before?
No. In the same way as doing GO volunteering needs no previous experience or skills, you don't need to have led groups of people before. All we need from you is the willingness to be trained in leading events in the way we find works best, ability to commit to the events you sign up to lead and common sense in acting appropriately as a leader.
If we think you're not suited to leading GO events after you've had a couple of opportunities to try it out, we'll have a chat and suggest you may be more suited to being a volunteer, and we reserve the right to ask any leader to step down from their role at any time.
Okay, you've got me interested… What now?
You need to have attended at least two GO events before training as a leader. This is because you need to have experienced the events from the volunteer point of view so you know what's important for the leader to think of. It will also help you be aware of some of the routines leaders need to maintain in advance.
1. The first stage is to complete this questionnaire and send it back to your local GO co-ordinator. Then you can complete the Event Leader training.
2. Event Leader training is delivered at your local CSV office and is usually on a weekday evening and lasts 3-3½ hours. The GO Co-ordinator will do training approx every three months but may be more often depending on demand. We need to train a minimum of 4 people so if the session you've chosen has a lot of drop-outs we may postpone.
Look in the Event Leader pages for the date of your next local training: if no date is shown please phone/email your co-ordinator and tell them you are interested; they can then let you know the date as soon as it's set.
3. You will shadow experienced leaders at one or two events as soon as possible after you have trained. You can then lead an event with an experienced leader as support in the background, and then you may lead alone, or in pair with other leaders. Some GO events will have a very experienced leader or the project co-ordinator attending and these events are for any newly trained leaders to ask any further questions which have come up since training, and to watch someone very experienced lead an event.
4. There is no minimum number of events you have to lead per year, once trained. Generally, most leaders will try to do an event every 6 weeks to 2 months but the only rule we have is that having signed up to lead an event, you take that undertaking seriously. We understand that occasionally circumstances may mean you have to pull out but please avoid this wherever possible. The leader is a key part of the day and the event can't run without you - we do rely on you to lead the events you tell us you'll lead!
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