Voluntary engineering— charity begins at home

Professional engineers are often asked to provide free advice but it is less easy to say no when the client is a charity or community group with little or no funding. There is also much evidence to suggest that providing pro bono advice to local communities is actually good for business in terms of networking opportunities with other volunteer professionals, increased employee satisfaction and improved public perception. This papers describes the work of ProHelp, an initiative by the Business in the Community charity to help engineers and other professionals provide coordinated and effective support to local community projects in the UK.