The Listening Place is a volunteer-led London based charity aiming to transform how we support people who feel suicidal. Our trained volunteers are part of a team delivering face-to-face, confidential, ongoing support to thousands of people each year. They help create the warm and welcoming environment that encourages people struggling with suicidal thoughts and feelings to talk openly without being judged or given advice.
We know this support works. Feedback from people who have used our service has been overwhelmingly positive and we have robust valuation methods that demonstrate that our service helps reduce suicidal feelings and increase feelings of support after an average of four months.
We are looking for listening volunteers and helping volunteers to join our volunteer team. Listening volunteers (LVs) provide ongoing face-to-face support to visitors on a regular, fortnightly four-hour shift, during which time they meet up with up to three visitors. No experience or specific qualifications are necessary. We look for warmth, empathy and resilience in our volunteers, and the ability to be non-judgmental and avoid giving advice.
To ensure continuity for our visitors we ask for a one-year minimum commitment from our LVs, as well as three months' notice of intention to leave.
Helping volunteers (HVs) are central to each shift as they meet and greet our visitors and support the LVs on shift. For this varied role, we are recruiting volunteers who have the empathy to greet distressed visitors, the willingness to undertake a variety of admin and other tasks and the resilience to support their team. Our HVs need to be proactive, self-starters and team players with a basic understanding of IT who are able to commit to a regular weekly four-hour shift.
We ask our HVs for a six month minimum commitment and one month's notice of intention to leave.
Our London sites are in Victoria, Kings Cross and Hammersmith, open 9am to 9pm 7 days a week.