Essex International Jamboree was lucky enough to play host to Mhairi Mackay, Assistant Chief Guide today. This is Mhairi’s very first Jamboree and she is “excited to look around, find out more, find out what folks are doing and just immerse myself in the Jamboree experience.” When she is not being the Assistant Chief Guide, she runs a “lovely” Ranger Unit and visiting EIJ2024 has “totally inspired me to take them to a Jamboree.”
Mhairi is clearly a passionate advocate for the work that Girlguiding does and is a fantastic example of those skills in use. When applying for the role, she said “the big hurdle was believing that I could do it. I think we are so used to talking ourselves out of things and convincing ourselves that we can’t do things.”
She also told me a little about the application process, “I went through quite a difficult interview process with some young people who really grilled me!” Mhairi was then appointed in November 2023 and hasn’t looked back since! “it’s just been the most fab opportunity!”
Mhairi’s Guiding story started in Brownies like many other Guides here will have done. “I saw the Brownies playing in my local park and was like ‘I want to join, they look like they’re having the best time!’ So I forced my mum to take me along to my first Brownie meeting and never left!” The true turning point came when Mhairi was an adult leader, “I wanted to really give back to Girlguiding and was thinking ‘hmm… how could I use my skills? What opportunities are out there?’ So I got really involved with Peer Education for a long time.” Peer Education is the programme that trains 14–25-year-old members in a range of subjects that are relevant to young women and girls such as personal safety, challenging stereotypes and mental wellbeing. This put Mhairi firmly on the path to her current role and the rest is history!
So far coming to EIJ2024 has been a real highlight of Mhairi’s time as Assistant Chief Guide but another was going to Westminster Abbey for Thinking Day, “It was so interesting, we got a guided tour around and the guy was point out all the wonderful women and saw Baden-Powell’s plaque as well.” However her biggest highlight is getting to interact with leaders and girls all over the country, “the most fab thing that I’ve been doing is going around and speaking to volunteers and girls across the country, that’s always the best part for me.”
When she isn’t Guiding, Mahiri works for the NHS, “I work for the NHS as a programme manager in Health and Social Care Integration to make sure that regardless of who you’re employed by or where you like you get the same access to opportunities and care. We’re doing lots of things with leadership which is obviously something we want to promote in Guiding too so there are great bridges and great links there.”
Finally, most importantly, we got onto the topics of campfire songs and she said her favourite is “the chicken song! It has a little dance, starts out quiet and gets very loud so a perfect campfire song!”