Volunteer Counsellor

SEL Mind presents this exciting opportunity, we are looking for 6 Volunteer Counsellors who can give one day a week to a fantastic new provision: “Building Power” is a new counselling service aimed at supporting Black communities who aren’t accessing other mental health services, often because they are not accessible or not relevant.

As a Volunteer Counsellor for Building Power within the Southwark Wellbeing Hub, you will provide compassionate, culturally sensitive, and ethical counselling support to adults experiencing emotional distress across the London Borough of Southwark. As an integral member of the Hub’s new Counselling Service, you will deliver time-limited counselling and psychotherapeutic interventions. Through this support, you will empower individuals to better understand, manage, and improve their mental health and emotional wellbeing.

This role is specifically focused on supporting members of Black African and Black Caribbean communities, as well as the wider Black diaspora, with an emphasis on decolonial ways of working in collaboration with Black Psychotherapy to ensure counselling is responsive to cultural experiences, individual needs, and diverse backgrounds. You will manage a caseload of clients, maintain accurate and confidential records, assess and respond appropriately to risk and safeguarding concerns, and work in accordance with the BACP Ethical Framework and SEL Mind policies.

Volunteer Counsellors are expected to engage in regular clinical supervision, contribute to service monitoring and evaluation, and participate in ongoing professional development. The role requires a reflective, professional, and client-centred approach, alongside a strong commitment for promoting equality, diversity, inclusion, and positive mental health outcomes for all service users. In addition to a stipend towards your clinical supervision, we will provide group supervision from Black Psychotherapy, to ensure you have access to spaces enabling you to enhance your de-colonialist and non-western practice.

By joining the Southwark Wellbeing Hub, you will play a vital role in improving access to mental health support and helping individuals build resilience, wellbeing, and emotional strength. Please note this role requires lived experience of Black communities.

We are also looking for candidates from a diverse range of backgrounds and welcome applications from people of all identities, including different disabilities, gender identities, sexual orientations, ethnicities, religions, and lived experiences. We are particularly keen to hear from counsellors who are fluent in Igbo, Yoruba, Twi, Spanish, or Portuguese, as these language skills would help us better meet the needs of the communities we serve.

Please download and complete the application form attached.