Could you be a volunteer befriender?
Are you a good listener? Got an ear to lend? If you are able to commit to one or two hours a week this might be the perfect opportunity for you.
Changes Bristol is recruiting volunteers to support the running of our telephone Befriending Service.
Befriending is an extremely rewarding role in which you will support our members who may be feeling isolated, lonely and in mental health distress. Our befrienders provide a safe, judgement free, and empathetic ear at these challenging times, allowing people to talk about their feelings and start making changes for the better.
Changes Bristol provides full training and supervision. After training you will be expected to commit to 1 hour of your time per week, per person you will be supporting, at the same time every week. We need volunteers to be dependable and committed when taking on the role and offer an ongoing relationship for a minimum of six months.
As we operate from a model of peer support, we value lived experiences of mental health challenges, so while this is not a requirement for the role, it can be to your advantage when talking with our members.
If you can reliably commit to supporting someone, please email for an application form.
We will process applications and conduct brief telephone interviews with those who meet our criteria ahead of the training.
If you have any questions or would like to request an application form, please email befriending@changesbristol.