What’s your position with Aptum?

Global Sales Operations and Enablement Manager

What got you started in volunteering?

The only thing invaluable is time. Giving your time to less fortunate is priceless. I volunteer with my husband and 18 year old daughter, who we have taught to give back from an early age.

What motivates you to volunteer?

As a newcomer to Canada I feel blessed by the opportunities and I am always looking for ways to give back and help the less fortunate. Also, it helps me to keep things in perspective especially through tough times. There is always somebody who is going through worse patches.

Is there a cause (or causes) that you’re passionate about?

Hunger – support food banks, shelters, or cook a meal for a neighbor. Donate groceries at church or at the market. I volunteer for Meals on Wheels, bringing food to elders’ homes.

Loneliness – visit seniors to talk to them, read a book, or hold a hand. Work with animal shelters to clean the cages or walk a dog or pet a cat. I volunteer with the Ontario SPCA

Health – there are many different activities with local hospitals. I volunteer with Sunnybrook Hospital, the largest veterans care facility in the country and with St. Michael’s Hospital. I also volunteer in different ways with organizations such as Ronald McDonald House, Junior Achievement, Second Harvest, The Scott Mission, and JVS Toronto where I am an integration volunteer for newcomers to Canada.

What benefits do you get personally from volunteering?

It inspires me as a person and makes me a better human being. I am more considerate, compassionate, caring, and respectful as a result.

What recommendations would you have for anyone considering volunteering themselves?

You are blessed already for being able to read this, reading from your computer at work. You belong to a community. Most likely you have been able to make it to the months end without making large sacrifices.

Look around in your neighborhood, at the supermarket, in your daily commute to work – there are lots of people dealing with illness, loneliness, hunger, worries. HELP THEM! Every small contribution, every minute can make a difference in somebody else’s life. Pay it forward, it always comes back doubled!

What’s your position with Aptum?

Senior Software Engineer on the Development Team

What got you started in volunteering?

In my former company I was involved in a global competition where any employee could come forward with a business idea. I was part of a team who had met on the internal web forums discussing how mental health issues were handled so very differently from one manager to another. Some of us had had some very bad experiences. So we formed a team with some specific recommendations and out of 220 teams globally we made it to the top-ten. This meant we were sent to Provence to enter in the Grande-Finale! We presented to the executive board and the other teams, telling our own stories. This caused a great reaction, including some tears! The judges decided that our proposal was so different to the other teams’ very “business” ideas that we couldn’t be judged beside them – so we should instead be given a special award – of their time. This allowed us to implement mandatory training for all employees in the basics of mental health and also more intensive training for all leaders across the organization on best practices. This continues to run today – 7 years later!

I was keen to keep this active role in mental-health alive, so I joined Samaritans. Samaritans is a charity in the UK and Ireland known as a suicide helpline, however we’re there for anybody in distress and in need of emotional support. In the five years I’ve picked up various roles in addition to my “Listening” role, including Branch IT Officer, Trustee and Communications Director for the Southampton branch of the charity. I have now been voted by my peers to become the new Director of the branch, ultimately responsible for the provision of the service answering calls/emails/visits from those in distress, with the aim to reduce the number of those who die from suicide. Our branch has 140 volunteers, and just one paid employee (the cleaner!). Recent UK news shows how vitally important this support is within our society.

What motivates you to volunteer?

I love being able to be there for somebody in need. We get calls from such a wide range of people. Some are struggling with unimaginable stress, whereas other have perhaps lost their way or the ability to see other options. We never advise, but simply listen and reflect with the callers. At the end of a call many callers will say how much better they feel for having just expressed their feeling to somebody. Talking to a complete stranger removes any barriers they may have.

What benefits do you get personally from volunteering?

Personally, I find myself to be a much better listener. Many people in conversation are thinking up their next response while somebody is telling us something – which means we might miss something really vital. At Samaritans we’re trained to really listen and allow silences – this gives the caller space to add any extra without any pressure to rush through their story. In fact, allowing silence during a call has to be one of the hardest things to learn in training.

What recommendations would you have for anyone considering volunteering themselves?

We run monthly information evenings at all branches over the UK and Ireland, so come along and find out more. If you’re in the UK then I’m really happy to speak to anybody. The majority of volunteers are Listeners but we also have Support Volunteers who do other essential duties for us – including fundraising, branch treasurer, manage administrative tasks, etc.

I was lucky enough to arrange a couple of Community Days with colleagues to go into the branch and redecorate our training room, transforming it from a rather grim and grotty room into a bright open space. We deal with very difficult topics during training, so this uplifting environment has made an enormous difference to us. Local staff donated over 220 hours for us, including Susan who, amongst other things, was very determined in making our grubby windows sparkle!!