Preparing for VSO - again!

Having just arrived in Kampala to start my new VSO journey I want to reflect on how I came to be here.

Facebook is reminding me on a regular basis that 8 years ago I was living in Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia living in -40 degrees centigrade and having a great adventure as a VSO volunteer working with local organisations as a fundraising and marketing specialist. I returned to the UK to complete my legal training and qualify as a solicitor, but my VSO experience stayed with me. Having travelled, lived and worked overseas since Mongolia including in Zimbabwe and Madagascar, as well as doing lots of volunteering with the British Red Cross and Girlguiding, doing a long term volunteering stint again overseas has always been a possibility.

The VSO process has changed a lot since my previous experience, no longer are volunteers recruited for general pools of candidates, instead volunteers are recruited for specific vacancies which are advertised on the VSO website. I think this is a great change - you know a bit more about whether you will be a good fit for VSO's current needs before you even apply.

I had been applying for different posts for a while when I was contacted for an interview in October. I made my way through the first interview to check that my motivations and personal circumstancs were a fit for doing VSO now. Then it was on to the "competency" interview, identifying whether I matched the VSO volunteer competencies - 90 minutes of talking about me was a bit of a slog, but I was pleased to make it through and to be assessed as "suitable to volunteer with VSO".

The process then bore quite a few similarities to my previous experience as I was put forward for the couple of roles my recruiter and I thought I matched the profiles of and waited to hear back. Finally, I was selected to have a technical interview with the local office in relation to a resilience post in Uganda. This was different from my last experience with VSO, to get to actually speak to the local country office in advance of being offered/accepting a post meant that both I and they could assess whether I would be a good fit for this particular placement. I really enjoyed my interview with VSO Uganda and was delighted when they offered me the role within a few hours.