Monthly Archives: July 2011

Free: Planning, Monitoring & Evaluating for Development Results (handbook)

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This is yet another example of the plethora of free, detailed information available online to help nonprofits, NGOs, and other mission-based efforts. Various offices of the United Nations, as well as state and national governments all over the world, publish these kinds of materials online. Meeting government and international standards – even if you have nothing to do with the UN or government, even if you aren’t in a developing country, even if you work just locally and never internationally – is going to help your organization land grants / donations and build credibility.

The Handbook on Planning, Monitoring & Evaluating for Development Results, recently updated, addresses planning, monitoring, and evaluation in the context of the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) and its evaluation policy. It provides practical tools to strengthen results-oriented planning, monitoring, and evaluation in UNDP – but anyone who works to improve communities anywhere will find this manual helpful. The contents include:

  • Planning, monitoring, and evaluation for development results
  • Planning for results: Practical applications
  • Planning for monitoring and evaluation
  • Monitoring for results
  • Evaluating for results
  • Initiating and managing an evaluation
  • Assuring the quality of evaluation design and methodology
  • Enhancing the use of knowledge from monitoring and evaluation

It’s 220 pages long and available in English, Arabic, French, Russian and Spanish.

Tags: fundraising, fund, raising, donors, donations, funding, credibility, donating, evaluation, evaluating, planning, monitor, monitoring, design, project, program, programme, results, charities, charity, NGOs, non-governmental, organizations, nonprofit, civil, society, transparency, accounting, accountable

Debate: volunteer manager qualifications

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What should the qualifications be for a person that is responsible for volunteers at an organization?

That’s a hot topic right now, and there is a LOT of disagreement about it. Heck, we can’t even agree what to call such a person! (volunteer manager? volunteer resources manager? volunteer coordinator? director of community engagement?)

My view:

If an organization views this person as merely the purveyor of free labor, and sees this person as the primary manager of volunteers in a single activity – volunteers staffing the gift shop or the help desk, working in the food pantry (more with the food than the clients), serving food in a shelter, cleaning up beaches on one-day events –  then the qualifications are going to be quite low. The person in charge of volunteers will report to the head of human resources, won’t be a senior manager, and will be judged on whether or not all shifts are filled and all tasks are completed. Those are skills that can be taught to someone on the job – no need for volunteer management credentials – though some volunteer management workshops would be helpful.

This is how most corporate folks and very traditional organizations view managers or coordinators of volunteers. This is how most volunteer management workshops and most volunteer management conferences view those responsible for volunteers at an organization.

By contrast, if an organization views this person as responsible for:

  • community engagement, demonstrating that the community invests in the organization and believes in its mission
  • building the capacities of other employees to involve volunteers in their work and supporting employee involvement of volunteers in a variety of roles, including in leadership roles
  • being up-to-date on legal issues, political rhetoric and trends that can affect volunteer involvement
  • creating ways for volunteer involvement to relate directly to the organizations mission

then the qualifications required for the person in charge of volunteers are MUCH higher. The manager of volunteers or director of community engagement is not merely the purveyor of free labor; this manager has a direct role on program delivery and, therefore, should report to the director of programs – if not directly to the Executive Director! And credentials are essential – though not necessarily a certificate in volunteer management.

Here’s all the places this is a hot topic right now – check out what’s being said and join the conversation!:

Also see:

How I Use Twitter / Microblogs

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I’ve written a primer for mission-based organizations on using microblogs, including Twitter, so rather than repeat that advice on how to get started using such, thinking strategically about using such, etc., I’ll tell you exactly how I use Twitter.

I seek out Twitter feeds:

  • dedicated to activities that help women in developing countries have more control over their lives (it’s a priority issue for me), OR
  • dedicated to resources to help nonprofits, NGOs and other mission-based organizations use Internet, computer and other networking tools, OR
  • dedicated to resources to help mission-based organizations effectively engage the community/volunteers

AND

  • from organizations or individuals I want to follow and that/who share information I feel is a priority for me to receive daily or that’s mostly different from their Facebook page or email newsletter

If I already get all the information I want from an organization or individual via their Facebook page or an email newsletter or a blog, I don’t subscribe to their feed via Twitter as well. And I don’t follow every Twitter user that follows me, though I do check out every new follower. That offends some folks – they feel you should follow every person or organization that follows you, that you should follow every person or organization that you already follow on Facebook or via a blog or as a newsletter subscriber, etc. I don’t. I’m on information overload already; Internet tools, including so-called social media, is not just about receiving information – it’s about controlling it in such a way that it stays meaningful and essential to you.

In addition, I also follow certain phrases on Twitter. Some of these I search for daily, some I search for weekly. These include:

  • #volunteer
  • #volunteers
  • #VolunTweet
  • #microvolunteering
  • #nonprofits
  • #nonprofit
  • #ngos
  • #humanitarian
  • #ict4d
  • #TechWomen
  • #WomenInTech
  • #Tech4Good
  • #digitaldivide
  • #NP
  • #NPTwitter
  • #VirtualTeams
  • #distributedteams
  • #workshifting
  • #TechSoupDYB (for TechSoup microvolunteering projects; I helped relaunch this initiative earlier this month)

A term I follow, but doesn’t generate much information regularly, is #withoutvolunteers, a tag that allows someone to post a short message that says what the results would be if an organization didn’t involve volunteers. Sadly, most posts with this tage are phrases like “We couldn’t do what we do!” or “We would have to cut services”, both of which imply that volunteers are just unpaid staff and reduce the need for employees.

Lastly – your nonprofit, NGO, or other mission-based organization or department needs to make it clear to staff about who owns a Twitter feed – this story from the BBC does a good job of explaining why establishing ownership is essential.

Also see: my primer for mission-based organizations on using microblogs (including Twitter)

And, ofcourse, follow me on Twitter! I post a lot to my Twitter feed that I don’t share via Facebook.

Tags: microblogs, microblogging, Twitter, Tumblr, social, media, outreach, communications, marketing, public, relations, collaboration, community, volunteer, engagement

More women developing/promoting FOSS!

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Abel CAINE, OER Programme Specialist at UNESCO, in charge of coordinating the OER Community on the WSIS Platform, says in the online group for this community, “we had a discussion on how OER Initiatives should practice what they preach and use open software tools. For those of you who are interested in free and open source software AND would like to help in increasing the number of women who are developing or promoting FOSS, please join the new “Gender and FOSS Community” at: http://www.wsis-community.org/pg/groups/329964/gender-equality-in-free-and-open-source-software-foss/. The Community which is managed by the UNESCO FOSS Programme aims at creating a network of different institutions, networks and actors that deal with the Gender Gap in FOSS. Please contact my colleague, Mr. Davide Storti (d.storti@unesco.org) for more information.”

Also see this walk down memory lane: photos from the United Nations Volunteers (UNV) Telecenter at WSIS 2003 Geneva.

Tags: women, gender, woman, girls, ICT4D, UNESCO, WSIS, information, communication, communications, ICT, collaboration, community, engagement, OER, development, developing, FOSS, online, Internet, open, software, source, Africa, Asia, South America, Latin America

 

Feuds in the nonprofit/NGO/charity world

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I work with nonprofit organizations, international agencies and even government offices that don’t get along with each other. And it leaves me in an awkward position when I’m talking with such an organization about some activity or resources that would be oh-so-appealing to another organization. I know that, when I make the suggestion for collaboration, or even just an email update or event invitation from one organization to the other, a heavy silence will fill the air – or some quickly-made-up excuses will flow and the suggestion will be ignored.

Entire organizations hurt each other’s feelings all the time, just as people do – because organizations are made up of people. But often, what one organization views as a criticism or an act of conscious disrespect by another organization is actually incompetence or thoughtlessness – it’s not at all a deliberate act. It can be an email that doesn’t receive a response or a phone call that doesn’t get returned (They are ignoring me! They hate me!) or a duplication of activities (They *know* we already do an event like that! They did this to try to steal our thunder!) or an event that doesn’t get announced until late (They didn’t tell us about this earlier so we wouldn’t be able to participate!).

I know one organization that believes it’s in a feud with another organization – but that other organization has no idea there’s any hurt feelings! So while the Hurt Organization takes every action by Other Organization as an attack, a slight, an insult, etc., Other Organization is completely oblivious that Hurt Organization feels that way.

Sometimes, a feud is acknowledged by both organizations – but there’s no effort to get over it. And there always be an effort to get over it, because there’s no room in the nonprofit / NGO / charity world for feuds. Disagreements? Yes, those need to happen, and it may be you never see eye-to-eye about what the approach should be to homelessness, or women’s health care, or stray animals – but the disagreement can be acknowledged by both parties without a silent and/or nasty feud between them. Debates? Absolutely – we won’t evolve or learn if we don’t debate! But silent feuding? That hurts all of us and those we serve.

When I take on public relations/outreach activities for an organization, one of the first things I do is to look at the distribution list for press releases and announcements, invitation lists for events, etc., and I make sure every organization that has a similar mission and is working in the same area is on those lists. That can include groups that have publicly said they disagree with the organization’s mission. There might be some cringing from other department heads, even a closed-door meeting where I’m assured the overture won’t lead to anything positive, but I insist. And every time, maybe after weeks, maybe after months, there’s a thawing of relations: Someone has lunch with someone else. Someone attends another’s special event. A white paper is shared. Small steps.

Maybe the organizations will never like each other; but I don’t have to like you to work with you!

Also see:

How to handle online criticism

Community Relations, With & Without Tech

How to help Somalia

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Questions about how to help Somalia – where to send money, if you can send in-kind donations, where to volunteer, etc. – are starting to show up on various boards, such as YahooAnswers. So, here’s the answers to those questions:

ReliefWeb is tracking the crisis (as well as those in other countries).

Also see:

Fund Raising For a Cause or Organization

How to Make a Difference Internationally/Globally/in Another Country Without Going Abroad

Volunteering To Help After Major Disasters.

Ideas for Funding Your Volunteering Abroad Trip.

Details on volunteering abroad (volunteering internationally).

    Motorcycles in Development / Aid / Relief & Volunteer Efforts

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    Motorcycles for good? Indeed! This web page tracks the use of motorcycles in development / aid / relief / humanitarian efforts in developing countries. This isn’t so much about volunteers going to developing countries and using motorcycles for relief efforts; rather, these efforts are more about training local people to ride and service motorcycles themselves as a part of such efforts, which not only helps get aid, including medicine, where it needs to go, but also helps create small businesses.

    Are you an individual, or part of a group, that wants to travel and do good (transire benefaciendo) via motorcycle? You have several options for helping either domestically (in your own country), or abroad (in another country), but note that it will take planning before your trip, as well as a lot of coordination in the weeks and days leading up to your on-the-road activities. This web page, transire benefaciendo, will help you coordinate such an efort. See in particular the section on Volunteering On Your Own Abroad. Also see this page on Finding Community Service and Volunteering for Groups, as well as the links at the bottom of that page.

    I haven’t been to a developing country on my own motorcycle yet, but I’m working up to it:

    Road into Garnet Ghost Town 2010

    Of course, everyone knows Expat Aid Workers love motorcycles.

    Tags: motorcycles, motorcycle, bikes, bikers, motos, travel, volunteer, volunteering, outreach, collaboration, community, engagement, international, community, service, help, helping, NGOs, nonprofits, INGOs, Africa, Asia, South America, abroad, good, work, assisting

    International volunteerism conferences in 2011

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    You may remember that 2001 was the International Year of Volunteers. What you probably don’t know is that, as it’s 10 years later, there are IYV+10 activities going on. Not many, as promotional activities about IYV+10 have been few and far between – in stark contrast to the outstanding job the United Nations Volunteers (UNV) programme did promoting IYV more than a decade ago: online communities are largely silent on the subject of IYV+10, and when I have asked at my workshops if anyone knew it that IYV+10 was happening, I’ve been met with confused looks and shaking heads.

    One of the main events regarding IYV+10 is the newly-announced Global Volunteer Conference in Budapest, to take place 15-17 September 2011 and being planned jointly by UNV and the International Federation of Red Cross/Red Crescent Societies (IFRC). The conference theme is Volunteering for a Sustainable Future, and “will look at ways to mainstream volunteerism in peace, humanitarian and development work. Linkages between volunteering and issues such as climate change, migration, youth involvement, solidarity between generations, crisis prevention and recovery, disaster risk reduction, gender or growing urbanization will be addressed. The conference will focus on the following broad themes:

    • Volunteering during humanitarian crises and emergency situations
    • Volunteering for peace and development:  MDGs and beyond
    • Promoting an enabling environment for volunteering
    • Enhancing evidence of the impact, value, and power of volunteering and its contribution to peace and development
    • Engaging national and international policy makers to enhance protection, recognition, and promotion of volunteers”

    This conference was announced on July 15 – just two months before it’s going to happen! As of now, there is no information on speakers or specific workshops, let alone goals for the event or how to register. And even though this event is being hosted in Europe (in fact, in one of my favorite cities on Earth!), there’s no mention that 2011 is also the European Year of Volunteering.

    There will also be regional conferences, such as the Southern Africa Conference on Volunteer Action for Development, also hosted by UNV, as well as the Volunteer and Service Enquiry Southern Africa (VOSESA), in Johannesburg on October 17-19. Alongside that meeting, members of an African Working Group, consisting of African delegates that attended the International Association for National Youth Service’s 9th Global Conference in Alexandria, Egypt in October 2010, will meet to continue their efforts promoting opportunities for Africans to engage and interact on national youth service and youth civic engagement in Africa. 

    If you are attending either of these events, please let me know if you will be blogging about such – I would be happy to link to all those that will be writing about the event while there or shortly after.

    Tags: volunteering, volunteers, community, engagement, volunteerism, service, help, development, MDGs, humanitarian, aid, international, global, presenters, presenting, conference, event, presentations, Africa, Europe

    Photos & videos by & of volunteers online – privacy issues?

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    Following up on the post from yesterday regarding why nonprofits, NGOs and other mission-based organizations shouldn’t use stock photos, let’s talk today about privacy issues with photos of volunteers, particularly children.

    Back in 2010 on UKVPMs, a discussion group for volunteer managers in the United Kingdom, someone wrote:

    I have vague memories of this issue being discussed before, but I’m looking into guidance (mainly for volunteers, but also for paid staff and service users) around people posting photo’s or video clips etc on You Tube and similar sites. If working with children and/or  other vulnerable groups, are there clear legal responsibilities we need to be aware of ? I don’t have a deal of experience in this area, so don’t know how much vetting the sites carry out themselves and how reliable this might be. Is data protection an issue

    Video and photo-sharing sites do NOT vet any photos or videos submitted to their sites, just as the phone company isn’t responsible for what you are saying in a phone conversation.

    It’s important to remember that, in most countries, you cannot legally control what people take photos of or film at a public event. Think of it as the picnic in the public park rule — you cannot control someone taking photos or film of you if you are having a picnic in a public park, regardless of whether or not kids are present.

    That said, you should ask your staff and volunteers (same rule for all) to adhere to certain rules regarding taking photos or filming at any of your organization’s activities, public or not, and to adhere to certain rules regarding what they do with that film and video. You need to determine what those rules should be. You need to let volunteers know this includes whatever they do with their cell phones (so no one can say — “Oh, I thought you just meant cameras“).

    Do all of your staff and volunteers already sign photo release forms, saying that photos may be taken of them at organization activities in which they participate and may be used in your own outreach activities (your web site, your blog, brochures, slide show presentations, posters, etc.)? Do parents of all children participating in your programs sign such a form? If not, you definitely should get busy getting such a form put together and signed by everyone now, and everyone who joins later. You can find lots of examples of photo release forms on Google.

    I don’t know how much these releases would count in a court, but they do create awareness among participants that photos are sometimes taken. I haven’t lost any volunteers over the signing of such a policy — has anyone else? (I’d be interested to hear how you handled such in the comments section below — or did you lose the volunteer altogether?).

    Do you already have a policy regarding how your organization identifies children in photos? (first name only, no names at all, etc.) Make sure all staff and volunteers know this policy. If you don’t have such a policy, again, look on Google — lots of organization’s share their policy. Some I found:

    With the photo release and children-in-photos policies taken care of, talk with staff and volunteers and involve them in the development of further policies regarding taking photos and film during organization activities, and how they use these photos and videos. Reinforce your confidentiality policies and children-identification-in-photos policy during these conversations. Be clear about what cannot be filmed or posted under any circumstances (personnel discussions, staff meetings, counseling sessions, etc.). I find that involving people in the conversation about policy development (asking for their feedback in my online discussion group for volunteers, at onsite meetings, informally when we meet, etc.) better guarantees people will embrace it and make sure it is enforced.

    If you are going to prohibit all such photo and video-taking, you need to have very clear reasons why (in writing and in conversations), and you need to talk about what the consequences will be to staff and volunteers if the prohibition is violated. You also need to consider the consequences of such a draconian ban — you will be losing out on a significant public outreach tool. Volunteers can create a LOT of interest among their friends, family and associates for your organization when they share photos and videos of their activities as a volunteer. Also, you will probably lose more volunteers over such a draconian ban than you will if you allow photos to be taken.

    One of the guidelines I have is to ask staff and volunteers to always announce to their colleagues “I’m taking photos/video now!” before they start doing so, and to respect the wishes of people who say they do not want to be filmed. Ask staff and volunteers to respect the wishes of their fellow volunteers who may contact them and ask that an image that features them on their own Flickr account (or other photo-sharing site) or YouTube account to be removed (note that these accounts are owned by them, not you). Ask staff and volunteers to share links to videos and photos with the organization, as a courtesy. Talk with volunteers about what a photo dispute might look like and how such could be negotiated/mediated (you could give them two or three fictional scenarios for discussion). And, as noted above, ask for their own suggestions for policies.

    For whatever you come up with in terms of guidelines, you will have to reinforce the message frequently — you can’t just deliver the message once and expect it to be heard.

    Related blogs and sites:

    Social media policies for mission-based organizations

    Forget the stock photos; make your own photo archive

    Photos of me at work

    Tags: photos, communications, communicating, mission, outreach, story, news, volunteering, volunteers, community, engagement, volunteerism, smartphones, PDAs, camera, phone, cell

    Don’t use stock photos; make your own photo archive

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    One of the many online communities I’m on had a posting by someone from a nonprofit organization looking for stock photos of volunteers to use in a brochure they were producing.

    And I cringed.

    Stock photos are professionally-produced photos made available for companies and organizations to use to express a certain notion or idea. Stock photos are also of people who have no affiliation with the company or organization that uses them on their web sites, in their brochures, etc. You see stock photos in picture frames for sale.

    A stock photo used by a nonprofit organization on its web site, in its brochure, or on a poster is obvious — and dishonest. To me, it screams, “These are professional models who don’t actually volunteer here/aren’t actually clients here!”

    Unless the identity of your volunteers or clients needs to be protected (and that certainly does happen — for instance, with domestic violence shelters), you should have a folder on your computer system (on your local network, in the cloud, whatever) filled with digital photos showing genuine volunteers, clients, staff and others, ready for use in your marketing materials and fund-raising proposals.

    The good news is that you can easily compile such a stock photo archive!

    Begin by ensuring that you have a signed photo release for every volunteer at your organization. Volunteers should be asked to sign such a form at the time they attend the first orientation or volunteering session or with their completed volunteer application. If you intend to take photos at an activity or event where clients will be present, you will also need to get a photo release form for any clients (or anyone else) who might be photographed. You can find samples of photo release forms by typing in this phrase into Google.com or your favorite online search tool:
    photo release form

    Next, make sure every paid staff member, every unpaid volunteer, every client and every parent or guardian of a client knows your organization’s policies regarding taking photos in association with your organization’s activities (again, just type photo policy into Google.com or your favorite online search tool to find examples of such), and within the boundaries of those policies, invite them to take photos in association with your organization’s activities and to share these photos with your organization. With most smart phones and other handheld tech coming with a camera, your volunteers and clients may already be taking photos. Remind everyone associated with your organization, via regular meetings or regular online or print communications, both of these policies and that you would like such photos shared with you (people need to hear messages more than once in order to have them in mind).

    Note in your event or activity announcements if photos might be taken. Whoever takes photos should identify him or herself to those being photographed. This should be a part of your photography policies that you have communicated organization-wide.

    When photographing at events where people may not know me, I ask that whomever kicks off the meeting to announce that I’m taking photos that could appear on our web site or in printed materials, and that if anyone does not want their photo used, they should raise their hand any time they see me taking a photo they might be a part of so that later, when going through photos later, I will delete any photo of a person who is raising their hand, or crop them out of the photo. This worked really well when I took photos at community meetings in Afghanistan (more about Taking Photos in the Developing World, a resource I developed while working in Afghanistan in 2007).

    Frequently encourage volunteers, employees and clients to share photos they have taken at your events or during volunteering activities with your organization (they need to hear this message more than once!). The best way to share photos is, IMO, via Flickr (photos can be shared with just your organization, without sharing them with the entire world) or via Drop Box (don’t accept photos via email – it uses too much bandwidth and will slow your emails down!).

    As photos come in to you, create a folder on your computer or drive for photos you might want to use on your web site, in a brochure, in a fundraising proposal, etc. Look for photos that have at least one of these qualities:

    • shows action
    • shows smiles
    • shows diversity
    • teens
    • seniors

    If you don’t have software or an operating system that allows you to organize and search photos easily, create a naming system for photos, sub-folders and files on your computer so you can easily find photos for certain kinds of images, such as photos that show:

    • female participation
    • senior/elder participation
    • multi-cultural participation
    • physical action
    • enjoyment/happiness
    • caring
    • etc.

    If you can afford to use a professional photographer and have photo setups, where volunteers pretend to be in the middle of a service activity, or where staff pretend to be engaged in their work, great! It’s okay to set up a photo — just use your own folks, not professional models.

    Stay genuine! That attracts people much more than even the slickest of stock images.

    March 26, 2018 update: I was working on a very large PR campaign with a colleague. I wanted to solicit photos from various sources to use in our campaign, photos of people engaged in an activity that related to our campaign. She wanted to use stock photos. I relented for various reasons. A year later, I stopped at a gas station in Kentucky, and while inside, looked up at a poster about job opportunities with this particular company. There was a series of photos that I guess were meant to represent people that work for the company. And among that series of photos was one that we had used prominently in our own campaign, which had nothing to do with gas stations… I realize it’s unlikely that anyone else made the connection, and I certainly don’t dislike gas stations – I’m quite fond of their services. But it was a reminder of why using stock photos is often a very bad idea.

    March 8, 2021 update: Here is a fantastic blog about a company that created its own photo stock library, using its own assets (it’s own offices). I think going round your building with a smartphone, taking snaps and adding insta filters will always trump purchasing stock images. What a great task for volunteers to undertake for your organization!