The act of volunteering can have numerous benefits for one’s community, yet it can also have many great advantages for the volunteer. As Joseph Dale Guerrieri understands, volunteering can be a great way to improve one’s life, achieve a better, more fulfilling career, and even help one obtain the ability to better understand and navigate through their own community.

Below are some of the unique benefits that volunteering can provide the individual, not only as a way to improve the neighborhood they live in, say J. Dale Guerrieri, but also as a way to enhance their skill set, meet new people and be the recipient of new and exciting life experiences.

Skill-Building

The possibilities for skill development and improvement are endless in the volunteering community. If you’re seeking to learn something new, or to want to improve on your ability to do something you already know, says Joseph Dale Guerrieri, consider the act of volunteering. The skills you pursue don’t even have to be related to your career, and can rather focus on what you like to do in your spare time.

Sense of Accomplishment

Helping a family receive a warm meal, collecting toys for children, cleaning up park, etc., are all examples, says Joseph Dale Guerrieri, of the opportunity to accomplish something real, to know that you’ve done something tangible and useful that has made a real and lasting impact in someone’s life. This may seem selfish to some, but the gratification that comes from a rewarding volunteering experience can be immense, and can be strong motivation for volunteer participation in the future.

Career Enhancement

Some studies currently show that employers are more likely to hire a candidate with volunteering in their background than those without. Employers, says J. Dale Guerrieri, tend to believe, and rightfully so, that a candidate with volunteering experience has added skills, many of which can be applied inside the workplace. It’s also important to note, he says, that volunteering within or close to your chosen career field can give you hands-on, firsthand experience with an industry or profession you are looking into, something that always looks good on a young professional’s resume.