It’s taken me a few days to get round to posting this, but I felt it was well worth bringing to people’s attention. Each year, in mid-October, the specialist charity sector recruitment company, Charity People, run an event in London, called Forum 3. It is a combined exhibition and seminar event held on a Friday and Saturday.
For the last five years, I’ve been contributing seminars. This year I did a couple each day – one on Emotional Literacy and the other on Portfolio Working. These form part of a programme of about 40 different sessions each day. It’s a pretty good cause and I’m glad to be able to do something to help.
Now, a lot of people will tell you that it is increasingly hard to get people to give to charity and that it is equally hard to get people to volunteer their time. They will also talk of the difficulty getting good calibre people to work in the charity sector, because they can attract far higher salaries elsewhere.
Well, I’d just like to put forward the counter argument. At each of my seminars I had between 60 and 100 participants. These are individuals who have stomped up their own hard-earned cash to attend.
The exhibition itself was packed with a couple of hundred different charities telling their story, and seeking volunteers and paid-employees. They came from just about every area of charity work and
were all buzzing with interest and activity.
In total over the two days, more than 13000 – yes, that’s thirteen thousand! – people attended the exhibition.
Now that’s an awful lot of people seeking a place in the charity sector – whether paid or voluntary. What’s more, I spoke to a lot of them and I have to say that the calibre of folks was definitely at the top end of the scale.
So, I’m enthused. I figure that’s a pretty good reflection on the society that we live in and a bit of a rebuke to the kill-joys and moaners who reckon this world is becoming totally self-focused and highly materialistic.
Best wishes
