Volunteering Opportunity: Trustee with Citizens' Advice St Albans District (CASTAD)

At Citizens Advice St Albans District (CASTAD), we’re looking for volunteers to help lead our charity. We’re looking for people who can consider the big picture and who have good independent judgement and a varied set of skills. Ideally, if you have knowledge or a background in law, internal communications, publishing, marketing, fundraising or campaigning we would really benefit from your experience. However, if your skills are
more generalist you would also be of great interest to us.
You do not need experience of working or volunteering with the Citizens Advice service. The role will provide you with a great deal of experience and satisfaction, the opportunity to develop your skills and utilise your expertise and knowledge.

Opportunity Type: Long-term Commitment

District: St Albans

Location: Indoor

Time of day: Weekday Evenings

Practical Considerations: What’s in it for you?

● make a positive impact for people in your local area by
ensuring the local Citizens Advice is sustainable and meeting the needs of the community

● meet people, become part of a large team building relationships with other trustees, staff and volunteers

● build on your governance, leadership and strategy skills

● increase your employability

And we’ll reimburse expenses too.

What do you need to have?

You don’t need specific qualifications or skills but you’ll need to:

● understand and accept the responsibilities and liabilities as trustees

● be non-judgmental and respect views, values and cultures that are different to your own

● have good listening, verbal and written communication skills

● be able to exercise good independent judgment

● have good numeracy skills to understand accounts with the support of the treasurer

● be willing to learn about and follow the Citizens Advice aims, principles and policies,
including confidentiality and data protection

● be willing to undertake training in your role

How much time do you need to give?

Our Trustee Board meets in the evenings and you’ll likely need to give 6 hours including three hours to read the papers, four times a year. You will also need to attend other meetings if you’re involved in specific projects, or meet with volunteers and staff occasionally within the local Citizens Advice. There will also be on-going training, so that you can develop your knowledge & skills and become/remain compliant with the relevant governance
frameworks. The training might be face to face or on-line. We can be flexible about the time spent and how often you volunteer so come and talk to us.

Requirements: Relevant qualification or training, Will require a criminal record check (DBS)

Suitable for: Aged 26 and over, Older People

Suitable for volunteers interested in: Trusteeship & Governance, Voluntary & Community Action

Does this opportunity provide wheelchair access?: No

Full Description:
The board of trustees is collectively responsible for the governance of the local Citizens
Advice service, including setting an overall vision. This can broadly be defined as:

• Holding staff accountable, and being ultimately
accountable for the activities of the
local Citizens Advice service
• Providing leadership to all in the Citizens Advice service
• Developing policy
• Strategic management

You will:

• Take an active discussion during board meetings and
work with other trustees to:

-set policy and strategy direction, set targets and
-evaluate the performance of CASTAD
-monitor the financial position ensuring that CASTAD
-operates within its means and objectives, ensuring that there are clear lines of accountability for day to day financial management.

• Ensure that all the finances and supporting financial
control systems of CASTAD are in order including that full
financial records are kept for all transactions, that money
is only spent for the purpose given, and that proper
financial controls are in place to safeguard the
organisation’s resources

• Monitor CASTAD’s financial position ensuring that it operates within its means and objectives, ensuring that there are clear lines of accountability for day to day financial management seek the views of all sections of the community and monitor how well the service meets the needs of the local community ensure that the service plans for the recruitment and turnover of staff and volunteers review its own work and how effectively it operates including action for improvement.

● Maintain an awareness of how Citizens Advice St Albans
District (CASTAD) is operating
● read papers for board meetings and attend 4 meetings
per year
● work on specific projects with trustees or staff to further
CASTAD’s strategic objectives
● Complete an introduction for your role