Volunteering Portal/Featured volunteer/3

Chris McKenna is an experienced Wikipedian and has helped staff work on a survey of the chapter's members.

I think I found out about the chapter from the mailing list or UK meetups. It was from attending meetups, primarily the London ones, that I became more aware that Wikimedia UK was active and functioning. I am the sort of person who really enjoys helping people and I was at a point in my life where I had time available, so I was always ripe for recruitment as a volunteer!

The specific event that I became involved through was an invite to a discussion on-wiki. As part of that discussion I asked a question about what we know about our members. Little did I know at that point but Katherine - one of the staff - was preparing to run a survey to find out exactly that - and had been looking for help developing it. Before I knew it I had been co-opted!

Having previously worked in an office environment I would not have predicted my enjoying it as much as I have. The WMUK office is filled with a vibrant group of people who ensure that the atmosphere is friendly and welcoming to all-comers while still being productive. My work has been around developing and analysing the membership survey. This has involved working closely with Katherine, the staff member responsible, and also independent research and on-wiki discussions. I've also analysed the results from the survey and produced a report about what this tells us. This gives us valuable input into future projects etc.

Successfully working on the membership survey was the first success of this volunteering. The main one of course will be the final results, which are still in progress. By a coincidence of timing I have been able to outline the very initial findings to the governance committee which will provide input into their work to. Volunteering with Wikimedia UK has been valuable. Speaking from a personal point of view I've gained valuable experience for getting a job (volunteering looks good on a CV), and I've met some wonderful people both staff and volunteers.

I would definitely recommend others volunteer, too.

Chris can be contacted on his user talk page.