What is the podcast?
Brick by Brick: Understanding Heritage Projects is the podcast for anyone with any questions about the heritage sector. It’s created by the Heritage Trust Network Youth Forum so you can expect many different hosts and we invite a range of people with totally different experiences and expertise so you can expect to hear something new in every episode. This podcast will showcase the varied experiences and knowledge of Heritage Trust Network members, their projects and career advice. Please tune in for more episodes to come!
The Production Process:
We have been discussing starting a podcast since Autumn 2022 after a successful event at the the Network’s annual conference in Caernarfon. As discussions progressed we set up a sub-group in the Youth Forum to organise and produce our podcast. We approached Fleur Elkerton, one of Heritage Trust Network’s trustees and a member of our forum to be our first guest. Fae and Will interviewed Fleur using Podcastle and recorded the episode. Laura then edited the audio while Harrison created the visual identity of the podcast. Now we have published the first episode, we are planning our next!
What’s in Episode 1: Being a Young Trustee?
“If you’re feeling impostor syndrome, it’s really important that you’re there!”
In our very first episode, Will and Fae spoke to Fleur about what it’s like being a young trustee. Hear Fleur talk about her training and experiences and answer our questions about everything from the actual role of a trustee to dealing with imposter syndrome.
If you’re looking for more information on the organisations or places Fleur mentioned, at these links you can find the Young Trustees Movement and Getting on Board and the Youth Forum’s Advice Library as well as The Weaver’s House in Spon End and Caernarfon Castle.
Join the Heritage Trust Network Youth Forum: https://www.heritagetrustnetwork.org.uk/join-network-youth-forum/
Listen here:
If you would like to read a transcript of the audio, you can find that below.
The visual identity of the podcast:
The visual identity needed to use the Youth Forum logo, and refer to heritage projects so Harrison came up with this fantastic design utilising the common podcast speaker logo but linking it with heritage buildings to create a heritage landscape keeping with the Heritage Trust Network colour palette.
Transcript of Ep. 1 – Being a Young Trustee
Will
This is the BRICK BY BRICK Podcast: Understanding Heritage Projects, so this podcast is created by the Heritage Trust Network Youth Forum. So today your hosts are myself, Will.
Fae
And I’m Fae.
Will
And today, we’re going to be speaking to Fleur, a youth trustee, and she’s going to be telling us about kind of her role and her experience working as a young trustee in the heritage sector.
Fae
So this is the first episode of our podcast, and we hope that it will be a series and there’ll be many more podcasts where we’ll talk to different people in the heritage sector about their jobs or roles or volunteering or what they’re doing. So we hope you enjoy it. OK, cool. Well, hi.
Fleur
Hi, guys.
Fae
Thank you for joining us and for being in episode one of our podcast.
Fleur
You’re very welcome. It’s very exciting.
Fae
The first thing is, would you mind just introducing yourself?
Fleur
Yeah, of course. My name is Fleur, I’m a trustee on the Heritage Trust Network Board. I’m also a young person. My day job, It’s a long one I’m sorry, but it’s a Senior Digital Communications Officer and Social Media Producer for Parliament, as in the Houses of, in Westminster, and they do lots of things in that role, it’s quite kind of, you know, rapid digital communications work. But really specifically, what I do there is I create content all about the heritage of Parliament, its archives and its architectural history, so I work with stakeholders that we have there from, like the architectural fabric collection for example, to find those stories and create them. In terms of background. I’m a trained design historian, so I studied an MA in history of design and material culture. That was the V&AMuseum at the Royal College of Art, and I’ve worked for the Sir John Soanes Museum, V&A, David Parhouse, which is an amazing historic house in Cambridge, if anyone knows it. If you don’t, you should. And an Edtech heritage app called Museumeo as well. And I ran kind of my own digital rapid response archive, which has evolved into a bit of a platform called Designing Quarantine, where we sort of archive design responses for the pandemic and do some funky stuff for web design there too. Yeah, lovely to be here.
Fae
That sounds like you’ve done so much different stuff. And I want to pick your brains on it. But we did invite you mainly to talk about being a trustee or young trustee.
Fleur
Yeah, yeah.
Fae
And could you tell us first, what that means? So how old or how young do you have to be to be a young trustee?
Fleur
Ah well, this is good cause actually I don’t think anyone’s going out there and sort of like, you know, defined the guidelines of what being a young trustee is. I think roughly probably being under about 35 without outing the age of a lot of people. But, you know, slightly younger than , let’s say the average age. Personally I’m 25 if that helps, and I think it was about 23 when I became a trainee trustee for the Heritage Trust Network. So yeah, I was a trainee trustee for about 18 months and I’ve very recently at the end of this year just gone become a full trustee. So in terms of actually what a trustee is. Is kind of broadly it’s just basically somebody trying to oversee the running of an organization. So you tend to do that with a group of other peoples, that’s. When we call the board like a board just means the group stays basically and that kind of that can. Those roles and the scale can differ kind of depending on the size of the organization and its function, and it’s normally for, you know, non-profit organisations and charities, so you kind of you help, organise support and steer the organization. And so everybody who’s trustee sort of comes from from a place of. Of some some kind of experience. So whether that is? So vacation experience, whether that’s lived experience, you’re kind of bringing a perspective in and you can help make decisions and sort of direct the future of the organization basically and actually being a trustee is technically legal. So when you’re a full trustee, which I’ve just become, you actually get. Registered to the charity kind of. So you get actually left in the post, which is quite exciting. So you actually kind of have like a legal duty to just maintain and keep that organization afloat. So that’s kind of the real difference between. And and being a trainee and being a fool is that you don’t cut if you’re not, like, legally tied into the charity. Ohh and it’s only actually it’s like you, you can only be a trustee for a maximum amount of time. Kind of like being an elected politician. So you can you kind of have have certain terms which I can’t remember if I had for you know, you’ve kind of can serve a maximum amount of. Years, basically. And then you kind of. To move up from. The board? I hope that helps.
Fae
Yeah, definitely. That’s a great definition, I guess of a trusty course.
Will
Really good.
Fae
Is it quite intimidating having those legal responsibilities? Like what happens if anything goes wrong?
Fleur
Yeah, I I I I think. You know, obviously that’s kind of. The point of being a trustee is that. These things won’t. Go wrong, right? You’re staring it in a good direction. Yeah, but I think obviously it’s some kind of be mine.
Speaker
Full of.
Fleur
If you if you. Are getting in you know do your vesting of the charity or the non profit organization that are going into and if you’re like, Oh no, I think something. Really don’t is going on here. You know, just just be mindful of that. Maybe before before getting into that. But yeah, it’s it’s it’s not. It’s not hugely heavy and it’s because you’re kind of part of other people. It’s not like you personally are gonna be pulled into it. You’re kind of like. Part of a board. Yeah, yeah. And I think that’s only for extreme circumstances. I don’t want to carry it all off. It’s just it’s. Very like it’s. Very kind of. It’s very kind of, yeah. Like run-of-the-mill kind of legal GC, you know, to comment.
Fae
Well, we went to the Heritage Trust Network Youth Forum and said that we were going to be talking to you about being a trustee. Your young trustee. And they have given us some questions that they wanted to make sure you answered while we had you here. Cool and and one of them actually was what is an actual role as a trustee, which I think you’ve answered.
Fleur
It helps. I can go into a bit more detail, I’m sure maybe depending on. The other question.
Fae
But I guess then what is your particular role? So is your role the same as all the other trustees on the board?
Fleur
Yeah, it’s a great question. So yeah, I mean, it depends from board to board and you know charity to to different charities so they can win and speak to ours. But quite often on the board you have like a chair, somebody who chair the board of trustees, and they’re kind of elected by the board. So you vote for that and again they kind of have like a set term to be the chair and and then we tend to have somebody as well who kind of come, you know, helps run the finances. So they’re a trustee, but they kind of, you know, direct and look into the finances and help report on that. Say it’s usually somebody, maybe with with a background in understanding finances. You can do that for you. And so yeah, for our. But these are kind of the the different roles. We also have trustees like for the different. Region so you know the Heritage Trust Network is UK wide charities. So you know we we try and have like representatives from from different areas around the UK and from the different regions. So we can we can really speak to, to being UK wide, yeah, yeah. But beyond that, there’s no, not really any like strict. Yeah rules.
Fae
Yes. And that makes sense.
Will
Or maybe like a good question was maybe in reference to like the legal side of. It as well was was the role as a trustee kind of what you expected or is not like additional thing that kind of sets you aside you weren’t expecting?
Fleur
So, yeah, like context. I kind of got interested in it just because I’d worked at sort of charities nonprofits before. So I dealt with boards of trustees. You know, I’d had to present the board of trustees or kind of, you know, interact with. So I was, you know, quite curious about, you know, what’s going on on that side of the table. And you know why, you know, or why why are there not that many young people on that side of the table? You know, why can’t I be on that side of the table sort of thing. So that’s kind of what led me into it. So I guess I had a little bit of experience because I kind of been on the end of, you know, working with them. As a non trustee, but in terms of kind of like what I expected I I came in and I I don’t think I necessarily expected to to be really like trusted and to kind of you know people to really value where I was speaking. And in my opinion, so you know what, what really happens in terms of and being a trustee is you have, you know, quarterly board meetings. Everyone tries to attend and before then, but we before you get sent like board papers, you get sent like financial report. You get sent, you know. In our case, we’ll get things like reports of how the membership are doing, maybe how events have done, how certain projects or kind of funding, you know, streams that they were working on, how they’re doing. We even get reports on like how the websites. Doing you know, so it’s. Kind of like that whole organization overview. So I think I didn’t necessarily expect to like, you know, be given the the workings of an organization that kind of granular detail, you know, just popping into my inbox every week, not every week. Oh my God, every a week before. Quarterly board meetings, but yeah, like, you know, you kind of, I was like, wow, you know, I’m really wearing trusted with this. And then when you look over the papers and then in the board meeting, you have an agenda and you you’re also getting played in new board papers usually at the agenda of the previous meeting and they kind of like, you know, write up how. How much progress has been done on the things raised or you know how, if things we’ve resolved or whatever and yeah, then you kind of go through your gender and you can, you know, bring your questions and bring your queries your opinions. And yeah, it’s it’s like a really collaborative environment and I think that’s especially you know our board’s really fantastic, it’s really open. Friendly, very assertive. Yeah, kind of get really positive environment to to to be a trustee. And so I think that was also, you know obviously I got that from the application status batch like being in the room and and and. All virtual room. And feeling that is always really nice and I don’t think I necessarily expected. That yeah, like level of collaboration as well. Trust, yeah.
Fae
Yeah, that’s great. And also as well as being trusted, do you feel like you’re quite supported in the role?
Fleur
Yeah, yeah, definitely. So yeah, through kind of my 18 months of being young trustee myself and our other kind of trainee trustee on the. Heritage Trust network. Linda and also Lisa, who’s also another trustee but joined at. The same time as. Us all three of us attended this really great course run by this fantastic charity called the Young Chesty Movement. And that kind of like gave us this sort of foundation. And you know what being a trustee is how to approach that as a young person, you know, really the incidence of governance, how to how to unpick like charities, finances, you know, sometimes you’re asked about things like, you know, like interviewing people. Or, you know, bringing on board and organization to consult on something and you know, you have to really kind of understand, you know, what’s good in application. We have an application things like that. So they gave us. All of this really great kind of foundational training. So I felt really supported because you know the Heritage Trust network put us on to this. That was really fantastic and we’re able to meet other young trustees and learn together. But it also gave us lots of really great info. And then in terms of like to kind of like support, well, yeah, it’s a supportive board in the 1st place first and foremost. But I also have like a great board mentor. To Alice, Alice is great. And so we kind of got into rhythm and now we, you know, we sit and once we receive those ball papers, we’ll try and get in a bit of a chat of an evening to go through them together and kind of I can ask us some questions to clarify things so you can put me in touch with the right person to clarify something, for example. So kind of having the Manship is really really help. Full cause. Yeah, you’re still kind of feeling a bit like. You know, you’re like. You’re you’re learning and that’s that’s fine. That’s absolutely fine. You know, you’re you’re valid to be in the room, but also, you know you you might need a little bit more mentorship and support.
Fae
Do you ever also talk to the other young trustees that you met while you were training and kind of compare experiences?
Fleur
So yeah, that was really that. Was really brilliant, so first and foremost just meet other people, kind of who’s the kind of people like us who signed up to volunteer their time to, to, to work in governance and, you know, yeah. And doing something really meaningful to them. And and we’re kind of at the. Now where we’re writing up we we kind of did all this amazing chaining and then we’ve done a bit of a project based on our charity. We’re kind of writing up and pulling it together and and then we will. Be hopefully meeting up together in the spring to sort of celebrate our progress and meet each other in person. Have a. Bit of a. So I’m really looking forward to that. Sort of yeah, of. Meeting these people that I spent lots of. In person and sort of, yeah, chatting a bit more about what it’s like to be young, chesty, and it’s also worth noting because this is something that came up in our training that, you know, some people don’t quite.
Fae
Like being called young trustee, which is fair enough.
Fleur
So some people, some people, kind of, just like why do we? Need to be. You know, you know. I should just be a trustee, you know, I’m just a young person who’s. A trustee to see what I mean. So it’s quite like sometimes it’s it’s interesting cause some people prefer to just be. Yeah, a young person. Who who, who’s a trustee or some people are terrified of being called young trustee. So yeah, it really depends. Yeah, how?
Fae
Do you feel about?
Fleur
Yeah, I know it’s a good question. I don’t really mind, to be honest, because I think it’s it’s quite nice like to have the optics of, you know, yeah, kind of highlighting the fact that I’m a young person who’s a trustee by calling me a young trustee. You know, you don’t want to ask people’s age, you don’t want to see him, you know. And you know if if there’s a blog post about, maybe as young trustee that gets out there and somebody finds that because they’re Googling on trustee and it really helps them learn about this kind of stuff, then I don’t really mind it, but I can definitely see the kind of the. Yeah, the argument. Like you know, we should just be equal. Everyone else should just happen to be a young person who’s being a trustee too. So I think it’s probably her. Just personal preference.
Fae
Yeah, that makes sense, yeah. And and then another question we had was where did you find the opportunity to become a young trustee that doesn’t, they’re looking for it?
Fleur
OK so. Good question. So. Kind of. As I said, I kind of worked with trustees before work with boards of trustees. Maybe had you know some. Opinions on that or opinions on ways that? Things have been. Run or just kind of like thinking about, you know why? You know why are they maybe. Not young people. In these places, so you know it. Was ticking away in my brain. Did some giggling. I found, you know, shout out again to the amazing young trustee movement. So I found them and the great work that they do, there’s also a really amazing other organization called getting on. Board as well. So young Christy movements kind of felt like, yeah, getting young people into being a trustee. So yeah, fun fact for everybody, that there’s only 3% of whom people who are trustee in the UK who are under 30s, they go. So they really don’t. Yeah, yeah. So that that shows you what we’re what we’re doing. So, you know, they’re kind of their. Forces to try and change that. Obviously I’m getting on board. Is also doing great work of young people and it’s also just kind of about diversifying and. You know the the perspectives coming to a board, so that might not necessarily from the point of view of age you know from just like making sure that everybody feels comfortable to yeah, bring their perspectives into a board and that board to set up to enable them to to be their best to trust yourselves you know.
Will
Yeah, definitely.
Fae
Yeah, yeah. And is that there to support you just as long as you’re a true? Instead of just at the beginning.
Fleur
Yeah, I think so. And you know, they sorry I didn’t actually answer questions. Those were two, those are two organizations that I kind of set up to. I were looking. At and you know. Hi I’m looking at their outfits, their social media newsletters and I think through that I found me the advert for H chess network and I was like that. That seems like quite nice fit, so I. Booked an application and here I. Am but yeah, no, they do so like like. This you know, of course I was mentioning kind of where they they train you. Fully, you know, yeah. Being a trustee and the foundations being a trustee. It was called board boost. But that’s that. Yeah, they run that. But yeah, there’s they have all sorts of other training. Both both organisations do. They’re really fantastic. So it’s always worth keeping an eye out over. Unlike drop in Sessions and they have online resources and things like that so. Yeah, yeah. It’s not just, you know, for people who are trustees, it’s people interested, people who have been and maybe want to go back into it.
Fae
Do you think you’d ever become a trustee again somewhere else for another organization?
Fleur
Yeah, maybe. Yeah, definitely. I mean, I I love heritage shows network. I mean you know well, what about heritage shows network here but you know I I love that they’re kind of peer-to-peer support you know community benefit whilst also helping protect you know yeah historic built environment at risk it’s like tick tick tick tick. For me. But yeah, definitely. You know I I mentioned that that you’re kind of you’re you’re on fixed terms. Being a trustee, a bit like, you know, being a maybe a politician or being councillor on a Council, you know, you’re only elected for a certain amount of time. You’re only able to be part of a board for a certain amount of time, so you know you have to kind of think about, you know, it’s a it’s a relatively, you know, sort of volunteer opportunity. For each organization. So yeah, definitely. I would say yeah. But it really depends on where you are in life and and you know your priorities and your capacities and things like that too, yeah.
Fae
So it’s nice to hear that you’ve had a positive enough experience and consider doing it.
Fleur
Again, yeah, yeah.
Fae
Yeah. Thanks guys.
Will
So you kind of mentioned that you’re kind of in the minority as a young interest network member.
Speaker
Yeah, yeah.
Will
So I think a few of the questions that we’ve received from our youth network is kind of surrounding the challenges you might face. So do you ever feel like a sense of like impostor syndrome, interesting workers? OK. Yeah.
Fleur
I mean, he doesn’t. Know what’s the process to do right? Like I feel like we in in most things. Right. I think it’s it’s sadly just a little bit inevitable. But yeah, of course I of course I did. You know, when I joined like I was you. Know I was. 23 and not that’s like the youngest person ever. Has been on a board, but you know, like we all come at different points and you know, I definitely felt quite, yeah, you know, like I had had maybe, as in many years and knocked out everybody’s age on the ball, but, you know, had had as much experience as everybody else to be there. But I think, you know, you have to. It’s relative to feel positive. Don’t get me wrong, but you have to have a think about where it’s kind of, why you may be feeling like that. So, you know, have a think about, you know, maybe feeling Boss syndrome cause you are a little bit different than everybody else on the board. But then that’s a really good thing because it means that you’re unique. And therefore, you’re bringing a really important perspective that isn’t in the majority that’s on the board and therefore it’s super important that you’re there putting forward your opinion and and. Your viewpoints on things. And and I think also you know for me as well, like you just gotta have a little bit of think about like you know why have you put yourself in that space in that room in that position, you know, they also thought that you were a good fit because you know you’ve got there. That’s brilliant. So they have faith in you, you know, thought you were a great fit to be there and and, you know, for me, I think it was also about like. So you want to be the change that you want to see in the world, right? Like I saw that statistic after having worked towards trustees and thought, hmm, you know, you know, maybe a certain, you know, you could definitely tell, but there’s, you know, certain. Yeah. Majority is our Board of trustees, let’s say, and I start to question that. And then I saw that statistic about, you know, only 3% of trustees in the UK are under 30. And I thought, Oh my goodness, you know, well, why can’t it be me? Right. So, you know, you it’s. It’s a bit scary when you’re trying to maybe change things or, you know, switch things up or make things, you know, more diverse. Think about things from different perspectives, but I think so long as you have a really supportive, open and friendly board, which certainly the Heritage Trust network is. Then you should hopefully be support to see it, not you know that’s that’s only a moment. You blip a feeling that impostor syndrome. But it’s also fine because everybody feels it, and that’s part of like changing and you know, growing and growing and confidence. And I think that’s definitely one thing that I’ve really noticed about my time kind of through being a Tony trustee and now as a full trustee. For the board is just like that, growing in confidence cause people trust you and it’s it’s really great. And then you feel really comfortable. Yeah, but that does take a bit of time to get used to that and that’s. That’s also fine, yeah.
Fae
And another question actually which links to that. You said that people do trust you, but have you ever experienced any issues arising from people making assumptions about your abilities because of your age? Yes, maybe at the beginning of coming the trainee trustee.
Fleur
So so I haven’t passed before our board because I have had very positive experiences, but I think this is definitely something that, you know, talking to other young trustees when we did some training together. That, yeah, came up a little bit about thinking about, you know, maybe maybe ways that, you know, younger people can be pigeonholed. I think one there to be a little bit cautious about or to be a little bit aware of, we both of us or other people listening you guys might have already experienced this and things that you’re working in have wanted hearing in but you know people assuming that you can run. Things just two things. Because you’re a young person, you know just being handed over to Instagram because they see you’re under 30 sort of thing and you know, I personally do do digital Commons and content so I can do that. That is my experience, but you know you don’t want people to sue because obviously we’re, we’re all young people, we’re all very different, unique. And that’s not what all. Of us do. Or kind of everyday people going well, of course you can, you know, just work out an entire tick tock strategy or something like that, you know? So just to be mindful that, yeah, you know, yeah, sometimes those things can happen, but it’s just, you know, how how you approach that and and hopefully you’ll have been able to kind of. You know, get the right bill for a charity or a number of organizations that that, that won’t kind of react to young people like that. So you won’t be, you know, experiencing that. But if you do, then that’s it’s also just shows you that you know you’ve gotta there’s there’s room for change, right. You’ve got to change their their perspectives. You’ve got to be like. Actually, you know, I’m happy to help, but I don’t see how I can just because I’m yeah, a young person doesn’t mean that I’m any more, you know, likely to help on this rather than this cause.
Speaker
Yes. Yeah.
Fleur
Actually I’m an expert in this, you know, so you’ve gotta be part of. Making that change, you know, like it it takes. A lot of work, yeah.
Will
This question I really kind of want to. Ask you myself.
Fae
Of course.
Will
So kind of working full time and talk about volunteering, volunteering quite important and big in the heritage sector.
Speaker
Yeah, yeah.
Will
So how do you kind of schedule your time efficiently to volunteer alongside your full time job?
Fleur
No, I mean, yeah, but it’s a very valid question. It’s constantly work in progress to be honest and you know. You know, sometimes sometimes I can’t. Maybe things you know because of things. And that’s also OK, you know, not every trustee can make every meeting because we do have, you know, in in the end fundamentally it’s. Entering so you know your. Your your job in your life. Kind of. Comes around that you know and can come. First, yeah, but yeah, it is. It’s it’s kind of being honest with yourself in terms of capacity being honest, back to your charity in terms of capacity, really the only cool duties for you as a trustee are to come along with those quarterly meetings to read the ball. Papers and to come to these meetings prepared like that’s it really. So that’s like the core thing that you’ve kind of signed up to which should be manageable around full time work? Another kind of you know, things that you’re doing, but you know beyond that you know, you do definitely get tempted into volunteering into different things or to. Helping different ways. So like I’ve been part of like for example like a steering group for the digital Heroes project, the HD and running on I have.
Will
Oh, nice.
Fleur
I’ve been helping like right now. I’m hoping that with. You know, we put out a call for some digital consultants. I’m helping a bit on kind of like looking applications for that, you know, I help with your forum case point. Here but it’s it’s. Just in case you’re being honest with yourself about your capacity and I think another really important thing to flag in this, definitely that came up in our young trustee movement training too is quite often. Because boards you know on on average and they’re the majority of people, there tend to be quite senior into their career and their you know. Kind of job level and quite often the more senior you are, the more kind of flexible and lenient things are to board duties, cause more people are on boards, right, the civil senior they are. So jobs can kind of, especially if they sit in the sector that you’re working in, you. Know you’re you’re. You’re quite able to to maybe take off a morning or afternoon. Do your board meeting so you know that sometime. It can’t be kind of as accessible to younger people, cause on average it’s all very different and I know we all have very different workflows, especially you know, in the digital flexible working life that we live in now. But on average, we’re we’re kind of career building, we’re at this stage in our lives. So we kind of a bit more tied in to you know that day stay work and we maybe don’t have the flexibility or the kind of understanding from managers. That, you know, we can take that time out of a of a work day to do board work. So you know, for example, that’s something that I’ve changed or kind of put forward to our board. So now what we’re gonna do is we’re gonna kind of vary the board times. So, you know, one meeting might be in the evening. One meeting might be during the day because, you know, we all have different, you know. Yeah, we all have different things that we have to do cause some people evenings might work because they have childcare or whatever. So you know, it’s all. It’s all a balance about to be accessible and I think actually probably changing it like like we have might be the. Best compromise in. The end, but that really helps with capacity too, because yeah, on on average, I found younger people. You struggle a bit more if if if board meetings like during the day because we tend to have to be there on the ground. In our jobs, yeah.
Fae
Yeah, I think that’s true of most volunteering as. Well for young people.
Fleur
Yeah. Yeah, exactly.
Fae
Like we could at this youth forum, we meet in the evening because people work. OK. Yeah, that makes a lot of sense.
Fleur
Yeah, it’s not. It’s not the general. You know, I don’t want to speak to everybody, but generally, as a younger person, you tend to have less capacity for doing probably during work during the day, for sure, yeah.
Will
And I think that’s really good advice as well. When you say you have to be honest with yourself on how much you can do the volunteering.
Fleur
Yeah, exactly.
Will
Because, Speaking of personal experience, I know it’s easy to like on paper. I think you can do this, this and this.
Fae
Yeah, yeah.
Will
We actually get to it. You know, you kind of overwork something like you start too.
Fleur
Yeah, definitely. Definitely, definitely. And sadly, sometimes it comes from getting to that point. Well, speaking from experience, you sometimes have to hit the point of yeah, sliding up too much stuff and be like, oh, I’ve hit my limit. Yeah, to know your capacity. So I think advice to anyone to see is like, yeah, sometimes you have to sign up. To a bit too much stuff to. Be like, OK. I can’t. I can’t handle this around like they work or whatever. And and getting enough sleep and whatever it is, you know, so you know you, you know, but that’s what. Especially being your past. You know, you’ve gotta try things out and then you kind of can can learn and and you know, the older you get, you kind of are able to really figure out your limits and your kind of capacities for things and what you wanna prioritize. So for me, this is. Doing the chesty stuff and the volunteering is safer filling. You know, I I really feel like I’m putting my skills into something that yeah, it really makes a difference and it’s really meaningful to me, so I I make the time and capacity for it because I. I I find. Yeah, I it’s really important, but I’ve also like fanos definitely from things, you know, I don’t come along to every year. Meeting because I can’t all the time and the slightly things.
Fae
It’s the same thing.
Fleur
Yeah, there’s certainly things that I’m like, I can’t make it or certain board meetings. Like the last board meeting, I had to leave halfway through because I had to go back to work. You know, things like that. But everyone’s so understanding because it’s volunteering, you know? People you know, you’re. Giving your time. So yeah, they they completely. Work around you, yeah.
Fae
And do you have any advice for anyone who’s thinking about trying to get on a board or looking to apply?
Fleur
Yeah, I mean those two recommendations are probably really good. So yeah, young trustee movement and getting on board, they both have some really fantastic resources to kind of check out the website and things like that. So you can they run session as well, so you can go along and ask. Questions and look at. Their resources just feel really clued up on. And what being a, just as young person is, you know what you might be in for, and then just keeping an eye out for those opportunities really. You know, as I said, you kind of like because trustees do serve a certain term and things like that, you know, sometimes these opportunities don’t come around that often. It’s sometimes every couple of years in certain, you know, charities and organizations depending. How how often people leave the board or join the board, so you might have a perfect charity in mind where you’re like I will only want to be trustee for this charity. But you might be worth waiting for. A few years, but obviously to come over, but it might really worth waiting for. You know what I mean? Or you’re kind of coming. With an open mind and like. Oh, I might just wanna do a charity and you. You know, you might just find one that’s advertising at the time that you want to be looking. So yeah, it’s just a case of kind of thinking about those priorities and and keeping an eye out on these really fantastic organizations, the resources they have and the opportunities there they’re showcasing. Yeah, sounds good.
Fae
Yeah, really good.
Fleur
All right.
Fae
Do you have any other questions? Will we have a fun last question that we’re planning to ask everyone who comes on our podcast, but do you have anything else?
Fleur
We love our last question.
Fae
Well before we do that?
Will
I think it’s quite a broad question, so kind of. Just answer it how you kind of see fit, but like maybe the heritage sector in general, any advice kind of people maybe coming have university maybe finish nails or maybe even finishing you know coming out of secondary or is there any advice you’d kind of give someone wants to get?
Fleur
Oh, my goodness.
Will
The sector and.
Fleur
Oh, wow.
Will
But I kind of want to get your opinion.
Fleur
Oh, my goodness. Well, I think, do you know what? It’s there’s so many different niches and corners and different ways that you can kind of places and ways that you can work in the heritage. So broadly, you know, I think. Probably biggest piece of advice if you’re just coming out fresh, like OK heritage is that is what it is, is to try and not pigeonhole yourself too much. You know, don’t kind of really get me through the area of heritage. Maybe you’re looking to be in or really get nice through the sort of type of role that you’re looking for just because, you know, let’s be real here. You know, it’s not the easiest sector. Get a role in. It’s not the easiest sector to get a permanent role in and you know and and and just have a think you know about keeping things quite open, you know, trying things out, maybe get. Being, you know, getting a money job and volunteering a little bit on the side, if you have capacity to try out different areas of heritage to really find what you really like, but also. Keeping that open mind. I hope that’s kind of making sense, but I think you’re kind of just keeping that balance of you. Know gathering experience. So you filter. Oh, OK, I like doing that a little bit, but I don’t like doing that bit or I like doing front of house stuff cause. To talk to general public about this fantastic collection, but I don’t really like doing loads of unknown. Like collection admin online, that kind of. Thing, so sort. Of filtering things through, but also keeping quite an open mind. So you have quite like a like a a diverse quite transferable skill set, which I’m sure is a phrase that people say all the time of these things. But yeah, I think especially in heritage, it’s really good to be quite like adaptable and flexible because different roles. Them up at different places you might thought of. And you wanna maybe, like, adapt to those to try and get in there. And it’s also totally OK. It’s totally OK to have a money job. You know, and I the the phrase money job is because I used to work. In theatre. And when you work with actors quite often, actors have money jobs where they have a job and then they’re kind of doing acting on the slide to try and get into the industry. And sometimes, yeah, that definitely is a case here. And that’s totally fine. And so many people do that. So don’t, don’t judge yourself on that at all, especially when you when you’re starting out and just have a think about those priorities. As well, you know like what is your priority going into the sector you know, is it to maybe I don’t know. Work in a certain region? Is it to maybe work with young people or is it maybe to do something where you’re I don’t know, strategising at a high level for across the UK? Do you see what I mean? So you like really thinking about what your priorities are as well and sometimes opportunities come from that. Yeah, kind of keep an open mind. We’ve got a really, really amazing and growing advice library to shout out from Heritage Trust Network Youth forum. We’ve started to build it from some of our amazing mentorship sessions. We’ve got literally such fantastic. Yeah, like resources, little Nuggets of advice. You would advise people to go and have a look there because they’ll say a lot more eloquently than I have just done. I’m sure fake and link. It in the in the link it in the.
Fae
Share that.
Fleur
Coffee like? Yeah, hope that helps.
Will
No, that was really good that. Was really good answer, yeah.
Speaker
All right.
Fae
I agree. I wish someone had said that to me when I. Started looking for jobs as well.
Will
Yeah, right. Yeah.
Speaker
Oh, it was.
Fae
So last fun question. Since we have tweaked a bit for you because you know Heritage Trust network is what is your favorite heritage building place or thing that you’ve learned about through Heritage Trust Network? Great question.
Fleur
I mean it’s it’s very, very difficult to choose because let’s be real here. Like all massive heritage birds. So yeah, we all love everything. It’s very, very difficult. I mean, so many things. In mind, I think like one of us, once it comes to mind, is when we had the commentary conference, I heard you chess network, we saw some really fantastic buildings and projects there, but one of which was called the Weavers House, which is this amazing like 15th century medieval terrace house in a little area in Coventry. And and and it’s kind of, yeah, like brings to life the the life of a Weaver who’s lived there in kind of like the fifty 16th century, I believe. And yeah, he used to be on a loom and his him and his family lived in the cottage, and they’ve restored it. But they’ve also left like. Layers of the different kind of. And choose a history there so you could got 20 century wallpaper on the walls and things like that a bit, but it also kind of brings to life. Yeah, like just the life. Like seeing things through just the microcosm of like one person or one person and their family really helps bring to life like, yeah, the historic buildings are definitely shout that out and it’s free, I think to go to, it’s just kind of, you know. Based on donations and volunteers, and it’s really fantastic. And then another, sorry not to do 2 to question, but it’s so hard not to was at the last conference that we had this too, yeah, in Grafton in Wales where Oh my God, we got to get like a preview of Carnarvon Castle which is opening soon I believe to the public. Absolutely fantastic. Like this incredible sort of modern day intervention within the medieval castles out to buttress architects who did that and they gave us this guide to tour of it. And I’m just so excited for the public to see it. Cause it’s just. So fantastic. It’s all built on like the premise of like the makers and the crafts. People who built the castle. Yeah, that I won’t give too much more away, but that was also just really fantastic and a nice like contrast to this like tiny little weavers house. Versus like this massive muscle. The scale and the differences in HTML.
Fae
You know, OK. Well, thanks for thanks for coming on our episode on our podcast it’s been. You definitely thank you.
Will
Some really good advice.
Fae
You’re very welcome. So that was us talking to flair about being a young trustee and a bit of an introduction on what that role means.
Will
And so be sure to follow the Heritage Trust network on social media. Find out when we’re going to be recording our next episode. Thanks for listening. Been a pleasure. Talking to you.
