Join Our Volunteers

Our volunteers fill three types of rôle:

• Speaker / workshop leader - presenting and facilitating discussion on a job search topic
• Other meeeting / advisory rôles - meeting chairperson, host, mentoring and advisor at 1-to-1 sessions
• Organisational - members services, employers liaison, treasurer, marketing etc.

If you are interested in helping others relaunch their careers and can volunteer some of your time - as little as twice a year or more frequently if you can - then we look forward to hearing from you. Our current team of volunteers include a self-employed trainer, a semi-retired management consultant, a homeworker and the director of a small local business - see profiles of some of our volunteers below.

To learn more about what's involved, please contact us by email (volunteers@careerswestberks.org.uk), or by phone to George (Tel: 01635 253447) or Isabella (Tel:01753 870664).

Volunteer Profiles

Here are profiles of some of our current volunteers. We look forward to adding yours!

George Athorn – chairman, speaker and advisor
George was forced into early retirement due to a spinal problem in 2002 whist running his own successful training consultancy. Leading up to that point he had enjoyed a career in line management, Colthrop Mills in Thatcham and Raychem in Swindon. Whilst his training expertise was gained by working for The Industrial Society in London, this combination adds extra credibility to his management training programs. His particular expertise is in leadership, team building, problem solving, and time management and to date he has delivered courses to more than 5000 people in many blue chip companies spread over 12 countries.

Since becoming a wheel chair user he has worked as a volunteer with the West Berkshire Disability Alliance and Pathways to Employment, and helped them to design disability awareness training and Workready [disabled people back into the work place] courses. His partner works in the voluntary sector, so George has become Chief Executive (Domestic).

Bob Cooke - speaker, host
Bob is currently working as an independent IT Support Consultant providing support for home users and small businesses, specialising in Business Continuity and Disaster Recovery areas. His early career was in program development, progressing into IT management. He successfully ran a department of 30 staff consistently meeting budget targets, delivering new IT projects on time and on budget whilst running a daily production system with critical daily deadlines.

Bob is now applying his acquired skills, both IT and customer service, to provide IT Support for small businesses and home users. His speciality is disaster recovery where he has recently been able to assist a local business recover their data after all their IT equipment was stolen. At Careers Springboard he is assisting other people to re-deploy their skills for theirs and the community's benefit.

Isabella Kerr - speaker and sponsor
Isabella's career began in careers advisory work for both young people and adults. Later this developed into working as a trainer, delivering a wide range of courses including presentation skills, business writing, assertiveness etc. Training management followed, and Isabella is now managing a project assisting older managers and professionals who wish to remain economically active.

Michelle Lucas - speaker
Michelle has a background in HR with over 20 years experience of working in blue chip companies including household names such as WH Smith, Jewson and npower. In recognition of the depth of experience she has been awarded a Fellowship with the Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development. She set up her own coaching business, Greenfields, in 2003 and finally left 'corporate life' in 2006 to focus purely on coaching individuals.

With a background in psychology and achieving an MBA from Warwick University, Michelle brings to her clients both a commercial and personal approach to problem solving. She is an accredited coach with Oxford Brookes University and aims to complete her research by December 2008 in order to gain her Masters.

When not working or studying, Michelle enjoys spending her free time with friends and family over good food and wine which necessitates the occasional trip to the gym and justifies a night strutting her stuff on the local dance floors!

John Newell - programme manager, advisor and speaker
John is a Career Coach and Assessor. He delivers group and individual coaching assignments from junior to executive level across a broad range of industry sectors, both private and public. As an Assessor, he carries out competency based interviews and role plays. His previous experience included managerial roles in the fields of politics and the public service, including support for Government Ministers and MPs.

As a qualified HR professional, Chartered MCIPD and certificated Life Coach, and an active member of the Association of Career Professionals International (ACPi), John brings a wealth of recruitment experience to Careers Springboard's job seekers.

Michael Pritchard - finance manager.
Michael is a Chartered Accountant who consults in strategic planning, corporate governance, regulatory compliance and risk management in the banking industry. He has considerable experience of investment, retail and commercial banking, treasury, FSA regulation and pension fund trusteeship. In addition to his consulting practice, Michael Chairs the Board of Trustees of The BTMU Group UK Pension Fund.

Between 2004 and 2005 he was a Board Member of the AFB and Chair of World Group and from 1994 to 2004, Chairman of the Financial Controllers' Committee of the AFB. Michael is an alumnus of PriceWaterhouseCoopers, the international auditing and business advisory firm and worked in international and retail banking in the City of London for 33 years.

John Refaussé - advisor, speaker
Recently returned to the UK following a two year project in France, John has 15 years experience of consulting in organisation development and career management following a career as an HR Director in a number of blue-chip international companies. He has wide experience of change management in an international context and has pioneered a range of development initiatives aimed at improving individual and team effectiveness. He has been a director of a number of career management companies and has planned and managed career transition and outplacement programmes for senior executives in both the public and private sectors.

John will offer support to job seekers in building their confidence through one-to-one sessions, with an emphasis on personal analysis, self-marketing techniques and career transition planning including portfolio careers.

John is a Chartered Fellow of the Institute of Personnel and Development. Hobbies include renovation, history, walking and sport.

Janet Rutherford - advisor, speaker.
Janet had a successful career in the public sector and somehow managed tostart out as a mathematical economist and end up as a Director of Social Services followed by a stint as Director of Policy at the Local Government Association. From 2001 onwards she has been a carer and developed a portfolio career: investigating complaints for the Ombudsman; sitting as a Non-Executive Director in the local NHS; and undertaking consultancy projects in the voluntary and public sectors.

She has always had a passion for managing and developing people and this has found a new outlet in her own coaching company. Given the current economic climate much of her coaching is in out-placement and career coaching in all sectors. The 1-on-1 coaching she provides as a volunteer for CSWB fits neatly with this.

David Skinner - vice-chairman, speaker.
David trained originally as a chemist, carrying out research into the chemical and physical structure of wool for which he obtained a PhD. He then spent 28 years as an Education Officer in the Royal Air Force, holding a variety of posts in education and training in operational and policy roles. His most recent role was as head of the RAF's resettlement service, managing a group of advisers providing advice and counselling for those people preparing to move into a career in civilian life.

Since 1999 David has been a self-employed independent freelance trainer, specialising in business communication skills, management development and outplacement. He is passionate about the vital importance of written and oral communication skills, and together with his outplacement experience is ideally qualified to help job seekers at Careers Springboard. He is a volunteer driver for the Newbury Handybus and his interests include foreign travel, cricket and lifelong learning.

David J Skyrme - speaker and information manager.
David is a semi-retired management consultant and writer. He had a 25-year career in the computing industry, most of them with Digital Equipment Corporation where he held various roles in the UK, Europe and USA including salesperson, marketing manager, product manager and strategic planning manager. Following redundancy in 1993, he became a world-wide recognised expert in knowledge management, on which he has written several reports and books, has implemented projects and has carried out management training.

As well as Careers Springboard, he also volunteers for CPRE Hampshire. His other interests include photography, rambling, family history and chess.

Linda Sutcliffe - advisor.
Linda runs Best Practice HR Ltd, a recruitment company based near Thatcham. Her skills and experience are in assessment and selection processes, competency based interviewing and career coaching. Since being made redundant from British Airways in 2004, when she took the opportunity to start up Best Practice HR, Linda has been using her knowledge in job analysis, to help employers and individuals identify skills, attributes and behaviours suitable for a range of roles and working environments. She is trained to carry out psychometric testing including personality and ability tests. She is also a volunteer with the Alzheimers Society in Newbury.

Linda will be helping with CV writing, and in identifying our individual transferable skills and personal attributes. Improved self-awareness of our own skills, characteristics, and motivations, will bring confidence and focus to the job search.

This page last updated 15th July 2010