Charity Sector Jobs

[Soccermumamir]

Hi,
I'm looking for some advice and guidance. If you work in the charity sector or know someone who does and you love it, please can you tell me what roles you do and what you needed to get there.
I am currently working within an office in education, four days a week and from January will be volunteering one day a week in a local charity shop to try and get my foot in the door. Any advice would be awesome 😊

I work for a family charity, my role includes designing/planning different courses which I run for parents to attend - for example learning how to cook, budget, routines, getting their child ready for school etc.

I needed childcare experience and a level 3 childcare qualification to get the job.

Incredibly rewarding job, I get paid peanuts and I work more hours than I'm paid for - it's a good job I love it.

Pros - rewarding, reasonably flexible hours, able to use my own ideas.

Cons - poor pay, worry about job security (no gov funding, so rely on funding from CIN etc)

PS, I helped as a volunteer in the same charity for a few years, so whilst it wasn't a given that I'd get the job (I still interviewed and had to be fairly marked etc) but it's definitely helped already knowing everyone

About to leave a national charity after 2 years. Senior HR. Thought 5 years in the NHS (including Covid) would have prepared me but it is unbelievable.

Charities are businesses but often very behind on their internal culture work. 25% of uk charities are currently making redundancies.

Think about a role which is transferable to what you do now.
I was in policy and public affairs in the town sector, and I loved the flexibility and the chillness of the sector however, the wages are particularly low and don't really keep up so do bear that in mind.

It really depends so much what kind (and size) of charity you want to work for, and what kind of job you want to do (office work? Or directly carrying out the charity's work?). What sort of things do you have in mind?

Working for a "charity" is a massive spectrum. What exactly is it you want? To help people or do something meaningful?

I've worked in "charities" and they're just jobs for a lot of people. It's not all do-goodery. Also highly precarious in terms of being depending on funding and can be poorly paid.

I agree. I got my job summer 2022 and was on about £1 above MW an hour. When the MW went up significantly in April, my wage didn't move with it - so I'm now on about 10p above MW.

It's going up again in April and my boss has already said she's concerned how we're going to afford to raise everyone's wages

I'm a welfare benefits advisor with a local charity and represent people at tribunals (eg if they were turned down for PIP). I started out as a volunteer but they took me on as paid staff after 6 months. It is straight up the best job I have ever had, but agree with pp that one of the downsides is not having job security beyond the term of grant funding.

I have worked for charities for my entire working life, both small local, UK and regional. I'm now Head of Volunteering and on a decent wage, but it's taken 20 odd years to get here. For the first 15 I was on under £30k (much less and closer to NMW for the first 10).

I have qualifications in teaching, business degree and a MBA and also Early Years. I've worked in adult education, neighbourhood projects, Childrens Centres in front line roles (earlier in my career) then progressed on to more remote regional/UK management roles in the last 10 years. I've been an administrator, centre manager, family support worker and all different volunteer management related roles.

Pros: loads of flexibility in hours, good benefits, feel like I'm making a difference (important to my motivation), I've done loads of training too for free

Cons: job security, although I've made it through most restructures many of my colleagues haven't, pay is low in most roles, I'm only now reaching a decent wage after 20 years and there's not huge scope for it to get much higher without CEO level roles.

The one thing I've discovered is important for me is that I have to believe in and be passionate about the cause. My current role is tough, stressful, I have responsibility for over 1000 people, and on the bad days I find I'm struggling more as the cause this particular charity supports, although fantastic, doesn't match my absolute passion of working with children and families, it's more adult focused and I'm finding it harder to motivate myself than in other roles.

Agree with a PP in that you need to be more specific in what you actually want to do rather than just say 'I want to work in the charity sector'. I've worked in charity retail for a long time but the experience can be very different depending on the culture of the organisation... in one of the charities I worked for I could have been working at any retail store ... but I really enjoyed working for a different one where you really felt engaged with the aims of the charity ... so choose carefully.

I worked four years at a carers charity,
Best job I ever had.

Then the funding was awarded to a for profit organisation whose ethos did not agree with mine so I left. Many got made redundant.

It's just so unsecure.

What sort of charity are you looking to work in, and in what sort of role? I feel like if you work in an office in education you likely have a lot of transferable skills? So could look at similar office-based roles for charities or roles within education-related charities?

(I work in a fairly senior role in a small organisation which is related to supporting people into work in a specific industry. I had no direct experience doing what I do now but had worked in the specific industry for two decades at pretty much all levels m. I consider my self to be a fast learner and pretty adaptable but I'm not going to lie, it's been a bit of a culture shock and a steep learning curve!)

Hi,
Thanks everyone. I am honestly not sure which direction I'm going in to be honest. I enjoy working in an office environment and will not be diving head first in to any new role. I've worked in education for 14 years and have become so disillusioned with it, it's so stretched. But I guess it's like that everywhere at the moment. I'm lucky that I work 4 days at the moment, but due to go back to 5 days from September (not if I have my way lol) I just thought I would volunteer in a local charity shop on my day off and take it from there really. Put the feelers out and see what happens. Considering my job role, our pay is poor also. So pay is not a major issue for me. As long as I feel that the work I'm doing is making a difference.

Lots of roles in the children and young people's charity sector are full of people from education. I work in an office type role (mostly WFH) after being a teacher and I love it.

As others have said though, job security and low pay is a huge factor. I'm fortune in that my role is permanent but after 18 months my problem is finding the next step up from entry level as lots of recruitment freezes going on ATM.

you dont necessarily have needed to have volunteered for a charity to work in one. eg if you have an HR qualification - guess what? Charities need HR managers too! and teachers, cleaners, carers, marketing and other office staff and all sorts. What kind of charity would you want to work for? If you go to the charity jobs website, you can filter jobs by education, youth, children etc. You can also select distance you want to travel, and whether you'd prefer onsite, hybrid or remote.

I think this is wise advice.

What are your criteria? Type of cause? Distance to travel? Flexible working? Front line service or back office? 9-5? Team working or independent/autonomous? Creative or data driven? Permanent or contract?

Third Sector website. Low pay but often good terms and conditions. Charity shop managers get paid slightly above minimum wage but get more autonomy than usual in retail. The best jobs are working for trade unions. Excellent wages and lots of annual leave!

Try some of the insurance companies - admin roles.

You get paid more, treated better than education, can buy extra holidays, work from home parties and bonuses etc - they need good staff!!

Oh thank you I didn't realise there was a specific job board. I've been on indeed and reed, but it's been quite sparse. Thank you 😊

Thank you I will definitely look at this 😊

The biggest job board is charityjobs

Why do you specifically want to work in the charity sector? Do you have the impression that it will somehow be any less stressful, more inclusive of diversity, better paid or more fulfilling than a public sector role?
I moved from the education to the charity sector some 15 years ago and let me assure you it is often no less stressful, with much lower pay rates, virtually no job security and with very little in the way of support, training or protection for staff. What we do can be fulfilling for staff and life-changing for some of our service users but it can also be challenging, frustrating and badly managed due to lack of resources and training, unrealistic targets and insecure funds. We rightly expect high professional standards, skills and behaviour from our staff but they aren't always valued in the way they deserve.
I've met so many people who think working in a charity will somehow be easier and the colleagues kinder than in other sectors but it's really just like everywhere else. Parts good, parts bad, some bits boring, some exciting, most people lovely and a few less so.
My advice, choose your job based on the role not the sector it's in and you'll be grand. Good luck

I work at the head office of a children’s hospice charity as a data support officer, I support the database systems that are used in the hospices and train staff, correct errors etc. I used to work in school offices. My current job is a million times less stressful than my school office job, and better paid. I wfh 4 days a week. It’s quite boring though tbh. There are so many things within my company that I could process into, or would look to move somewhere else in a few years but for now it works for me.

I worked in the charity sector and loved it. Great people, great clients, however still the same pressures and stresses that other sector jobs have. Choose a charity you have a connection to.

Got the job by the nature of accepting a fixed term contract, had three extensions so far as it covering staff sickness of more than one person. Generally there is a lot of sickness throughout the whole team and sparse/no real policies just get me. Everyone is friendly enough.

I enjoy it as it is helping others and isn’t a back to back calls contact centre job. There is a permanent job going which is face to face in another division but that’s not me and it kind of gets my back up that another temp who has worked all of three full weeks without making up some excuse why they can’t show up to do a day’s work it makes me worried that when they let the charity down as they will likely get selected, I’ll have to stand in.

We went out for Xmas drinks when the manager brought up that again funding is the constant thorn/buzzword which I don’t understand now in any of this situation. Unless of course the people I’m covering for aren’t perm themselves but I don’t see how you’d get cover in for people with under 12 months service themselves if they have the same temp ‘contract’.

There was recognition for picking the job up so quickly on our own, although every day is a school day so constant picking up things as you go on the job.