8. April 2022
Julia Kriegel

VAST Volunteering

In a Lunch & Learn in November, VAST GREEN Lady Julia introduced us to the topic of corporate volunteering.

The first steps of our VAST GREEN implementation mainly focused on the ecological and economic aspects of sustainability as a company. Making progress, we also take into perspective which actions we can bring on an individual level. Following our VAST GREEN principles we particularly look at social aspects – as they form an important pillar of sustainability.

In our Lunch & Learn we therefore focused on different ways of volunteering, as a form of corporate social responsibility. Within the team, we all agree that we want to try to make a difference through volunteering. VAST FORWARD as a company supports our voluntary engagement with a defined time contingent within our working hours. Yet, after asking about our personal experiences in the field of volunteering – our VAST FORWARD team is by no means inexperienced.

Julia has been actively supporting Fatima, a young Afghan woman who fled to Germany in 2015. Vanessa once packed lunch boxes for school children, Maria used to be a volunteer referee for athletics, Jenny gave free city tours during her studies, Hanna helped out as a volunteer at a kindergarden, Simone can be met during park cleanup events, Franzi had a short intermezzo in a rescue dog squad, and Matthias developed a communication strategy for a volunteering service in Bremen with fellow students when he was still at university.

Of course we also support our fellow human beings in everyday life – as parent representatives, helping with the organisation of events at the kindergarden, school, or university, or as everyday helpers for our neighbours. These are all activities that we can easily integrate into our own daily routine.

 

 

Social aspects are important in regards to the three pillars of sustainability. Julia

To share inspiration of incentives and ideas on how and where we can continue to volunteer in the future, Julia introduced us to different volunteering platforms. Via govolunteer, Aktion Mensch, or Ehrenamtssuche, for example, there are many ways to find information on volunteering-offers. Not only are there location-specific options listed, they also include online volunteering opportunities for which the demand has grown steadily in the last years. “Digital volunteering”, as opposed to traditional forms of volunteering, expands the scope for volunteering opportunities even more and helps to overcome time and space barriers in our everyday lives.

Now it is up to us! Whether digital or traditional: through volunteering we can not only make an important contribution to social sustainability, but also create a balance to our personal daily work routine.