You've all seen them. Some of you may even have stopped to talk to them. But most of you, statistically speaking, have probably avoided them. You've deliberately crossed the street, possibly without checking for oncoming traffic, so keen are you to escape. You've made a great show of taking out your phone and starting an imaginary conversation. Maybe you've said “no thanks” and smiled. Maybe you've said “no thanks” and not smiled. Maybe you've frowned and said “you must be joking” or “why don't you get some training and get a real job” or simply “get lost”. And you've probably complained bitterly about how much they've disrupted your day, even if they haven't really disrupted your day at all (which they probably haven't).
I'm talking about street fundraisers (or “chuggers”, to use the horrible but catchy portmanteau of “charity muggers”), those frighteningly chipper and confident men and women who bound up to you, attempting to engage you in conversation and hopefully persuade you to donate to their represented charity. They get a lot of negative press, as the general perception is that they're not just wasting your time, but also the money of the charities for whom they're collecting.
This is obviously not the case, otherwise why would charities use them? The street fundraising method is actually responsible for a huge percentage of the money raised for charities annually, hence the proliferation of “chuggers” in cities and towns across the country. This swelling in their numbers, paradoxically, makes people feel even more negative towards them, and thus more likely to avoid them. But the numbers do still add up, I promise. I can't tell you anything about the specific charity for whom I briefly worked, but I can tell you that in 2009, nearly 50% of all the money raised for charities came from the face-to-face method (the other 50% having come from donation boxes, sponsored events, one-off donations etc). So not a bad rate.
It's a hard job, and you should all be much nicer to them. And I say that with the absolute confidence and certainty of someone who managed to do it (very badly) for a week before my employer had to (very politely and apologetically) let me go.
I was rubbish at street fundraising. It's hard to put my finger on exactly why, although the fact that people seemed ready to throw themselves under buses rather than speak to me is probably a contributing factor. Plus the fact that in my heart I really didn't believe that anyone would want to stop, a paranoia which then leaked out through my body language and facial expressions, subverting my cheerful facade and making people less likely to stop, which made me feel even more useless, which in turn made people even less likely stop, and so on and so forth in a vicious circle from which there seemed no escape (especially since, despite my best efforts, I stubbornly refused to improve).
No escape, of course, until I was dismissed.
This is all a very roundabout way of saying that it's quite tricky getting a job at the moment. You may have heard about it. A staggering 64.5 million people are out of work in the UK right now, and over 80% of those are young people with degrees. And those figures have in no way been massaged, exaggerated or miscalculated. I graduated from university in 2010 and managed, through various lucky coincidences, to avoid looking for a job until the middle of last year (I was being productive while I was avoiding it, let me assure you, not that it's any of your business). Then suddenly all of that “apocalyptic climate” and “worse unemployment since before the invention of jobs” stuff I'd been reading about became a bit real.
Now at first I felt I probably wasn't the right person for a street fundraising role, so I didn't consider it. But after months of sending covering letters and CVs and applications and being grateful to receive an acknowledgment of receipt, let alone a constructive no, or God forbid a maybe, I thought “hey! I believe in charity (I honestly do) and I like the idea of working towards something meaningful. I'm enthusiastic and personable. Surely it's worth a try?”
Amazingly enough I managed to get an interview, where I obviously made a good impression, because they very kindly agreed to hire me. At which point I thought “hey! Maybe I can do this. In fact, I'm sure I can!”
Of course it quickly turned out that I couldn't. At all. But at least I tried, and if there's a lesson to be learned here, it's that anything is worth a try. And that street fundraisers deserve a lot more respect than they get. Imagine standing in the cold and the rain for seven hours every day, knowing in your heart that you're trying to some good, and being made to feel about as popular as someone who dispenses parking tickets for a living. It takes a pretty singular individual to turn those lemons into lemonade. And if you think it's weird being approached in the street by a stranger, imagine how weird it is for the stranger doing the approaching. As one of my fellow fundraisers said, 'Mate, don't worry, this job is out of everyone's comfort zone', before going on to sign up about five people in the space of an hour, as well he might.
So yes, I tried. And as I return to trawling through Gumtree and various other depressing job sites, at least I can feel safe in the knowledge that I can completely ignore anything connected with sales. Because if I can't persuade people that donating money to help rescue children from prostitution is a good idea, I sure as hell won't be able to persuade people who already own a kitchen to buy a kitchen.
Stefan Mohamed - My name is Stefan Mohamed, and I am a writer and musician. I am an author, a published poet and a journalist, and I write songs on the ...
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