Community Partner – Suited for Success

Community Partner – Suited for Success

Suited for Success is a Birmingham based charity ran by Patricia White to support unemployed people with the skills and suitable outfit for successful job interviews.

Volunteering Works has partnered with Suited for Success since 2018 to source reliable and professional volunteers from businesses such as National Grid and Visa.

About the Suited for Success and Volunteering Works partnership

Working with Volunteering Works has been amazing, especially in the early stages of the Suited for Success journey when we only had 2 staff members. We had the drive to do a lot more; with the support of Volunteering Works and the teams of volunteers we have been able to achieve so much! 

We have some fantastic success stories!

Volunteering Works helps us source professional volunteers for workshop days for the unemployed and our ex-forces day which supports veterans struggling to find employment. The volunteers have been involved in supporting with interview preparation and coaching individuals to assist them in getting back in to work. This runs alongside the professional interview styling service that Suited for Success offers.

We’re a small charity so sourcing volunteers and setting everything up ourselves would be very time consuming – Volunteering Works takes all that leg work away. Project Manager Janet and the rest of the team have been great in providing us with incredible support and volunteers over the years.

Many of the individuals supported have now found jobs thanks to the coaching they received from the volunteer teams. 

A group of three employee volunteers  chat around a table.

Success stories

One great success story is a man who was going through depression and had found himself unemployed. He attended one of the Suited for Success sessions where he received skills-based coaching from National Grid volunteers and practised his presentation with them. The charity also provided him with a suitable interview outfit. He went on to be offered the job later that day!

We also had a veteran, who was going through a difficult and low period in his life, attend one of our ex-forces days. After attending the session and receiving coaching, he went on to set up his own business as a locksmith which made a huge difference to his outlook on his career and life.

There was even one time that an individual was directly offered employment by one of the employee volunteers on the day – great success!

Stress-free volunteer recruitment

The support from Volunteering Works, has made everything so easy and took away all the stress of recruiting volunteers, allowing us to achieve successful days and workshops to support people seeking employment. 

It’s great to have that point of contact with Volunteering Works to take the stress out of it all and handle the communication and risk assessments etc.

Volunteering Works has also helped us pilot a different kind of volunteer day centred around a ‘Dragons Den’ themed activity with volunteers from Visa

Without those volunteers and the support from Volunteering Works we simply would not have managed to make this happen. 

Overall, the partnership has just been phenomenal!!

Get in touch to find out more about how we can help your volunteering programme.

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