Tag Archives: volunteerism

Traditional volunteering is now EXTREME volunteering

I laughed out loud at this!

The rise of ‘extreme’ volunteering, by Nesta, a registered charity in the United Kingdom.

Yes, now traditional volunteering is rebranded as EXTREME VOLUNTEERING. The author talks about the revolutionary idea of… ready?… ready?…. volunteers helping patients in hospitals! Or taking a year off to volunteer!

Sigh… okay, if you want to rebrand these traditional forms of volunteering, that require longer-term commitment and put volunteers in direct contact with clients, as EXTREME VOLUNTEERING, fine.

I laughed because, after being told over the last three years again and again that what people really wanted micro volunteering – short-term, no commitment, just a few minutes of helping here and there whenever they might maybe find a little time – and me pushing back and saying, no, what people really want are real connections, deeper connections, through volunteering, even leadership roles that require longer commitment, and that kind of volunteering is what organizations want as well, it’s nice to read that, at last, the “buzz” is changing and recognizing reality!

The reality is this: different people want different kinds of volunteering. Some want micro volunteering. Some want long-term volunteering. Some want volunteering they can do by themselves. Some want volunteering that brings them in contact with staff. Some want volunteering that brings them in contact with clients. Some want a group volunteering experience. And organizations that need and want volunteers may or may not be able to accommodate all these varieties of volunteering – it depends on their mission, their priorities, their staffing, their expertise and their funding.

Also see:

Call for Papers re: Internships

Call for Papers: Special issue of tripleC: Communication, Capitalism & Critique: Interrogating Internships

Edited by Nicole S. Cohen (University of Toronto Mississauga), Greig de Peuter (Wilfrid Laurier University), Enda Brophy (Simon Fraser University)

Download complete call for papers in pdf format

tripleC: Communication, Capitalism & Critique is a non-profit open access journal focusing on the study of media, digital media, information and communication in contemporary capitalist societies. For this task, articles should employ critical theories and/or empirical research inspired by critical theories and/or philosophy and ethics guided by critical thinking as well as relate the analysis to power structures and inequalities of capitalism, especially forms of stratification such as class, racist and other ideologies and capitalist patriarchy. The journal is especially interested in how analyses relate to normative, political and critical dimensions and how they help illuminating conditions that foster or hinder the advancement of an inclusive, just and participatory information society. It publishes both theoretical and empirical contributions as well as reflections and book reviews.

From the call for papers:

When publisher Condé Nast cancelled its internship program in October 2013, the response was mixed: many cheered the end of a program that asked debt-laden youth to labour for free, while others lamented the closure of one of the only routes into media work. When depicted in the mainstream media, internships are surrounded by an aura of glamour: rapper Kanye West did a stint at luxury designer Fendi, Lady Gaga arranged one at designer Philip Treacy, and Hollywood portrayed the phenomenon in the movie The Internship. The gloss is fading, however: digital electronics manufacturer Foxconn was caught employing student interns on dubious terms on its assembly lines; former interns launched a successful class-action suit against Fox Searchlight Pictures; and Ross Perlin’s Intern Nation: How to Earn Nothing and Learn Little in the Brave New Economy (Verso, 2011) was vital in pushing internships into a critical spotlight internationally. Within just a few years, internships have become a high-profile subject, garnering media attention, catalyzing activism, provoking government action, and sparking lawsuits against massive corporations.

Although internships are prevalent in communication, cultural, media, and entertainment industries, scholarly literature on internships from communication and cultural studies remains limited. This special issue of tripleC seeks to situate internships within the labour turn in research in communication studies and beyond. The issue will interrogate some of the multiple articulations between and among internships, capitalism, communication, and culture.

Length:

  • Peer-reviewed academic articles: 5,000-8,000 words not including references
  • Interviews, reports from organizations, non-academic articles: 1,000-2,500 words not including references
  • Key concept entries: 1,000-2,000 words not including references

Publishing Schedule:

        Jan. 15, 2014: deadline for proposals (300-500 word abstract)
        Feb. 1, 2014: notification of acceptance (scholarly articles still subject to peer review)
        June 1, 2014: deadline for first drafts
        Aug. 1, 2014: editorial feedback provided
        Oct. 1, 2014: final drafts submitted
        Nov. 1, 2014: publication of special issue

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Me now: it would be so great if someone would submit a paper regarding interns as volunteers at nonprofit organizations!

also see: It’s real: the unpaid internships & volunteers controversy.

Virtual volunteering & a rose by any other name…

Virtual volunteering – it goes by oh-so-many names, and not just in English:

  • virtual volunteering (and variations such as virtual volunteers)
  • online volunteering (and variations such as online volunteers)
  • evolunteering (and variations such as e-volunteering, e-volunteers, etc.)
  • voluntarios virtuales
  • voluntarios en línea
  • voluntarios digitales
  • voluntarios en red
  • bénévolat virtuel
  • bénévolat enligne
  • bénévolat Internet
  • e-wolontariat
  • e-mentoring (and variations such as online mentors, online mentoring, telementoring, etc.)
  • microvolunteering (and variations such as micro-volunteering, microvolunteers, etc.)
  • microtasking
  • micro work
  • crowdsourcing
  • wisdom of the crowd
  • crowd computing
  • crowdcasting
  • distributed computing
  • distributed development
  • distributed thinking
  • hive mind
  • smart mob
  • virtual community of practice
  • virtual management
  • virtual teams
  • virtual workforce
  • Internet-mediated volunteering

More?

Wiki re: virtual volunteering in Europe

In the course of researching and writing about Internet-mediated volunteering (virtual volunteering, online volunteering, microvolunteering, online mentoring, etc.) in European Union (EU) countries, I created a wiki to serve as a publicly-shared knowledge base for resources used to inform this project, resources that could inform future research projects related to the subject matter, and to invite further submissions of relevant information from any wiki visitor. The ICT4EMPLOY wiki includes:

  • More about the overall project & researchers
  • The information we are seeking / How to submit information
  • Online Volunteering-related recruitment or matching web sites
  • Organisations that involve online volunteers in the EU
  • Resources related to volunteering as a contributor to employability
  • Resources related to arguments against and concerns about volunteering by unions/professionals in Europe
  • Resources and research related to Internet-mediated volunteering (focused on, but not limited to, Europe)
  • Resources related to telecommuting, virtual teams and remote management
  • Legal status and regulations regarding volunteers
  • Resources related to volunteer engagement and volunteerism in EU countries statistics, studies, volunteer centres, volunteer matching sites, sites for volunteers, sites for those that want to involve volunteers, etc.
  • RSS feeds for keywords associated with Internet-mediated volunteering
  • Información en español
  • Informations en français
  • Informationen in Deutsch

I’ll update it as long as I’m working on the research.

Looking for EU charities & NGOs to offer feedback

I’m looking for employees, consultants and volunteers at charities and NGOs based in the European Union to comment on any or all of the following three (3) subjects, based on their own observations or experience. Various people at one organization can comment, since different people at any one organization may have different perspectives. The identity of anyone who responds, and that of any organization a respondent represents, will be kept anonymous in any published material that might include that person’s comments unless that person gives express written consent otherwise.

If you are an employee, consultant or volunteer at a charity or NGO based in the EU, I welcome you to comment on any or all of the following three subjects, in a direct email to me at jc@coyotecommunications.com or, if you want your identity and comments to be fully public, in the comments section of this blog:

(1) The lack of widely-available online volunteering work in the EU, compared to, say, the USA, may include:

  • lack of support at charities, NGOs and other organizations for the engagement of volunteers (online or off); support includes staffing, knowledge and funding
  • lack of understanding regarding the value of volunteer engagement, in general (not just online) for a charity or NGO
  • lack of awareness or understanding regarding online volunteering
  • lack of availability of online tools at charities, NGOs and other organizations for the engagement of online volunteers (many organizations have prohibitions instituted by senior management or the IT department with regard to using social media, VOiP technologies like Skype, or cloud-based platforms)

Do you agree? Disagree? Have comments?

(2) For organizations based in the EU that are involving volunteers online in any way (this can include volunteers from outside the EU):

  • Why did your organization start involving volunteers online?
  • What did you have to do or change at your organization to start involving volunteers online?
  • How have you evaluated the impact of the work of online volunteers at your organization (and if you have not evaluated the impact, why not?)
  • Have any of the volunteers who have contributed to your organization somehow online said that their online volunteering experience lead to paid work, to their greater employability or to career advancement?

(3) Obstacles to leveraging online volunteering work into greater employability/career advancement in the EU may include:

  • lack of available online volunteering work
  • lack of awareness of this type of volunteering among those seeking/needing employment
  • perceptions among potential employers regarding the value of volunteering, online or onsite, for application to paid work (“it’s just volunteering” or “you were just volunteering, rather than really working”)

Do you agree? Do you think these factors might affect this as well:

  • lack of computer or Internet access?
  • lack of basic skills needed to engage as a volunteer online?
  • lack of literacy?

If you are based in the EU and work for an organization based in the EU, as a paid employee, consultant or volunteer, and this organization involves volunteers online in any way, and you have any comments or questions on the aforementioned three subjects, I would welcome your response. The identity of anyone who responds, and that of any organization a respondent represents, will be kept anonymous in any published material that might include that person’s comments unless that person gives express written consent otherwise. If you are an employee, consultant or volunteer at a charity or NGO based in the EU, I welcome you to comment on any or all of the following three subjects, in a direct email to me at jc@coyotecommunications.com or, if you want your identity and comments to be fully public, in the comments section of this blog.

Why am I asking? Because I am working on a research project for the EU for the next several weeks. The project is called the ICT4EMPL Future Work project, and I am contacting various organizations based in the EU, or that have offices in the EU, and that I know, or strongly suspect, involve online volunteers. I define online volunteers as people who do some or all of their volunteering (unpaid service) for an organization via the Internet, via a computer, smart phone or tablet they are using from home, work, school, or elsewhere offsite from the organization. The online volunteers that your organization involves do not all have to be in the EU.

My part of this research is to explore the state of play of internet-mediated volunteering: virtual volunteering, microvolunteering, crowd-sourced labour, crowdfunding, internet-mediated volunteering, internet-mediated work exchange (timebanks and complementary currency), etc., with regard to developing entrepreneurship and self employment, skills and social inclusion, and transition from education to employment for young people in the European Union.

I have a wiki that details this research project.

To stay updated about this project:

Volunteer Engagement the Roller Derby Way

logoSunday, I did an intensive, advanced training (as opposed to an introductory/basic training) for representatives from the roller derby leagues in Portland (the Rose City Rollers) and Seattle (Rat City Rollers) regarding volunteer management. These leagues involve several hundred volunteers – and have done so, quite effectively, for a few years now. Volunteers don’t just help at games; women’s roller derby has a particular focus on empowering women and girls, and most meets include fundraising components for a charity, which means volunteers are engaged in a huge range of activities.

But the rapid growth of these leagues – which shows no signs of abating – means that they don’t always have the procedures and policies in place to handle volunteer management challenges as they arise, or even how to identify issues long before they become bigger problems for the organizations. I hope that my training helped them to be able to access the resources they need to deal with specialized volunteer recruitment, board recruitment, volunteer conflict, keeping volunteers motivated, tracking volunteer information and contributions, and anticipate and address issues regarding volunteer engagement long before such becomes a program killer.

But with a staff made up of paid employees and volunteers, most of whom have NO training in working with volunteers, these leagues have done a remarkable job of engaging volunteers already.

What are people at these roller derby organizations doing that many traditional organizations that involve volunteers are not?

  • They have organizational-wide commitments to volunteers being satisfied with their experiences. Supporting and honoring volunteers is EVERYONE’S job. It never dawned on them that this should be just one person’s job at an organization, or that an employee could refuse to work with volunteers.
  • All staff work with volunteers. ALL STAFF. That means all staff — every paid person and all volunteers — create assignments for volunteers and/or work with volunteers. That means, even though there were just two organizations represented at this training, I wasn’t speaking to just two people: the designated volunteer coordinators. Instead, I was also talking to paid staff, volunteer staff, players, event volunteers, committee chairs, skating officials and on and on.
  • It never dawned on them to value volunteers purely by an hourly monetary amount, and some of them were actually offended by the idea. They acknowledge that it’s sometimes necessary for a grant application, but otherwise, they have much better reasons for saying they involve volunteers, and why volunteers are necessary to the organization.
  • They use every Internet tool and software tool they can find to work with and support volunteers – the value of such is obvious to them, with no need for a virtual volunteering workshop to convince them (as is with most traditional organizations).
  • Volunteers go to the same meetings as employees, and take leadership roles in coordinating events, reaching out to sponsors, selling merchandise, and representing the organization. You can’t tell who is or isn’t a volunteer just by a person’s title!
  • They didn’t blink over the phrase, “If a task can be done by a human, it can be done by a volunteer.” When I use that statement in a training for traditional organizations, there is often an uproar (which is why I use it – how I love stirring things up!). The Roller Derby reps reaction: “yes, and?”
  • They don’t look for ways to thank volunteers with regards to mugs and pins, or posters that say things like, “Volunteers are our angels!” They know what their volunteers want: real, sincere appreciation that permeates the organization, that doesn’t happen just on a volunteer appreciation luncheon that, at many other organizations, the board nor the Executive Director would even bother attending.
  • While they want to be great at handling conflict among staff, including volunteers, they completely accept that conflict and criticisms happen and have no fear of such (most orgs I work with want to know how to prevent all conflict and criticism).
  • They embrace the idea of most volunteers joining up because they want to have fun. They don’t think that’s a bad idea for volunteering.
  • They have an organization that welcomes people of all ages and all walks of life, and these organizations could probably lead their own workshop on how to creating a welcoming environment for teen volunteers, LGBT volunteers, low-income volunteers, homeless volunteers, volunteers with disabilities and various other groups that are under-represented at so many other organizations. It’s a workshop I would LOVE to attend!
  • Not once did I ever hear, “Oh, we’re not allowed to do that.” I hear that at least twice during presentations to other organizations. Not that these organizations don’t know and follow rules, like how to screen and supervise volunteers that will work with teens – but when it comes to ideas about new ways to work with volunteers, they never come from a place of fear.
  • They laughed heartily at my story of a certain online discussion group for volunteer managers in the USA that shall remain nameless having constant discussions about where to find examples of forms and policies (“Don’t they know how to use Google?”) or how to ban volunteers that have tattoos (I can’t repeat what was said re: this).

I got this gig because I did a presentation earlier this year for the Northwest Oregon Volunteer Administrators Association (NOVAA) on trends in volunteer engagement. NOVAA serves the greater Portland metropolitan area, including Vancouver, Washington. Afterwards, a woman came up, handed me a card, lauded me for my presentation and said, “You are soooo roller derby.”

As I learned from attending two match nights, roller derby players leave everything on the track during a game, and I left everything in that conference room for this training on Sunday; I have never been more exhausted after a training, so determined was I to win these folks over and point them to the resources they need to be even more successful at engaging with volunteers. And one of my favorite comments afterwards was this:

“Srsly, this was awesome. I have a very low tolerance for BS facilitated meetings about hypothetical nonsense. This was none of that.”

Almost made me want to cry… a high compliment, indeed.

If you are putting together a volunteer management conference, listen up: I’m happy to train, and I really hope you will invite me to do so. But invite someone from a roller derby league too – I recommend the Portland league in particular, of course. Because it’s long overdue for these conferences to get a shake up. And I think roller derby may be just the org to do it!

I have seen the future of volunteer engagement and IT’S ROLLER DERBY.

Here’s a photo on Facebook that sums up just what an amazing experience matches can be, btw.

Magical paychecks

I’m on a lot of online communities, most focused on nonprofits in some way. And recently, on one of them, someone posted this:

I need to have some kind of porn blocker software on the computers at our office, since volunteers have access to the computers.

Sigh.

Yes, that’s right: while employees, because of their paychecks, aren’t at all inclined to do anything inappropriate on work computers, volunteers, who are unpaid, just can’t stay away from online pornography.

Sigh.

I’ve heard people at nonprofit organizations talk about extensive training and supervision for volunteers regarding confidentiality, working with children and working with money, who then balk when I suggest exactly the same training and supervision is needed for paid employees.

Paychecks are NOT magical! A paycheck doesn’t make someone more knowledgeable than a volunteer, more experienced, more trustworthy, more respectable nor safer.

I love a paycheck as much as anyone! But it doesn’t give me super powers.

More about working with volunteers.

I’m a volunteer & you should just be GRATEFUL I’m here!

On a LinkedIn group, someone asked for a resource to help with volunteer evaluations (forms, policies, etc.). A couple of folks, myself included, responded with some references/resources.

And then came these two comments:

(1)
Volunteers generally do not expect to be evaluated, after all, they are doing the organization a favor.

(2)
As someone who has volunteered in over 30 organizations in a large array of positions, some with intense responsibility, if I had to be vetted each time I volunteered, I would never do any of it. In fact, if I had been appraised, they probably would have disqualified me in the first place when in actuality, I did better than some of their paid and “experienced” staff. It is not worth my time to go through that nonsense, I am a volunteer for goodness sakes. Whenever someone imposes requirements, I just walk away. I have sat on advisory boards of non-profit organizations, as well, and have been entrusted with finances, operations, etc., if they had said you will have to go through some job interview hoops, I would have just laughed and also kept my wallet closed to any further contributions.

Volunteer managers have been working to raise the standards of volunteer involvement schemes for a few decades now, often with success. Yet, there are still oh-so-many entitlement volunteers, those folks who think organizations should take ANY volunteer and whatever that volunteer offers, and simply be grateful for what they get. No standards, no quality control, no performance measurements when it comes to volunteers. To demand quality from volunteers is insulting.

For me, as a volunteer management practitioner and someone who is committed to the success of nonprofit organizations and NGOs, I’m only to happy to show those people the door. I don’t need nor want their services as a volunteer. My organization — and those it serves — deserve better.

Nonprofit organizations are businesses. They aren’t there to be nice, they are there because they are necessary. A nonprofit has a mission — to house stray animals and reduce pet over-population, to present quality, professional theater performances, to educate people about HIV/AIDS, to provide care for victims of domestic violence, to keep a local environment clean, to help family farms survive even the worst economic times, to keep a state park clean and vibrant and accessible, and on and on. For a nonprofit, that mission trumps everything else — including the egos of entitlement volunteers. Nonprofit organizations have very limited resources to meet their mission, and they cannot waste those resources waiting and hoping entitlement volunteers maybe possibly might spare some time this week to staff the information booth at the local fair or come to the board meeting or counsel clients or attend a training or coach a youth soccer team or lead a childcare class or raise the money they have committed to raise or follow the rules.

Let’s say it again: volunteers are not free. An organization has to expend a lot of time and resources to involve volunteers. Organizations have to provide at least one staff member to supervise volunteer work and ensure volunteers don’t do any harm. Staff has to develop activities for volunteers to do — activities that often would be probably be cheaper and done more quickly by staff themselves. The organization has to monitor the volunteers and record their progress to the board and donors. And they must make sure the work volunteers undertake is of the quality and type the organization’s clients deserve.

Therefore, organizations want the people who volunteer to be worth all that investment of time and money. They want volunteers to take their commitment seriously, finish what they’ve started, and continue to support the organization, as volunteers and, maybe, as donors. They don’t want volunteers who aren’t going to show up, who do substandard work, who won’t be on time, who won’t follow policies and procedures, and who will reduce the trust and respect clients, donors and partner organizations have for the organization — those volunteers not only aren’t worth the effort, they aren’t worth the damage they may do.

When I am in charge of recruiting and screening volunteers, I have raised the bar high for applications – and the higher I have raised the bar for new volunteers, the more strict I’ve been regarding standards, the more hoops I’ve required volunteers to jump through with regard to reporting and work quality:

  • the less volunteer recruiting I have to do
  • the fewer conflicts among and with volunteers I’ve had to deal with
  • the fewer volunteers that drop out mid-assignment
  • the fewer volunteers I’ve had to let go (in fact, I’ve had to fire a volunteer just once)
  • the higher the quality of the volunteers contributions
  • the happier volunteers have been (based on their comments and how long they volunteer)
  • the less time I spend trying to put together reports showing volunteer effectiveness (because they provide the information automatically; I always have the information on hand, ready when needed)
  • the less time I have to spend trying to restore the faith of clients, staff and the general public in the work of the organization, and in volunteers in general, because of volunteer missteps

Nonprofit staff should never be afraid to say no to an offer of volunteer services. They should remember that their organizations and those they serve deserve the very best when it comes to services, including services provided by volunteers. And there are plenty of people out there ready to jump through your hoops and commit to quality volunteer service — and have their own service evaluated.

A version of this blog appeared 11 August 2010

Also see:

Corporate Volunteer Programs: What Do Nonprofits Want From Them?

In defense of skills over passion

No more warm, fuzzy language to talk about volunteers!

Volunteers: still not free

graphic by Jayne Cravens representing volunteersWikipedia is free – for users. Its more than 12 million articles can be accessed free of charge. It’s maintained by more than 100,000 online volunteers – unpaid people – who create articles and translate them into over 265 languages. That makes Wikipedia/Wikimedia the world’s largest online volunteering endeavor.

Unlike most organizations that involve volunteers, Wikipedia doesn’t screen the majority of its volunteers: anyone can go in to the web site an edit just about any article, any time he or she wants to. You want to volunteer for Wikipedia, you just start editing or writing any article. That makes the majority of its volunteer engagement microvolunteering, the hot term for short-term episodic online volunteering.

But, wait — maybe Wikipedia is not free…

This is from a blog post in 2012 regarding its latest fundraising campaign:

The Wikimedia Foundation’s total 2011-12 planned spending is 28.3 million USD.

Funds raised in this campaign will be used to buy and install servers and other hardware, to develop new site functionality, expand mobile services, provide legal defense for the projects, and support the large global community of Wikimedia volunteers.

That emphasis is mine – some of those millions of dollars are needed to support Wikimedia’s involvement of volunteers. Because volunteers are not free. It takes a tremendous amount of time, effort and expertise to wrangle more than 100,000 online volunteers and all that they do on behalf of Wikipedia/Wikimedia. And that takes money.

But it’s not just Wikipedia: any nonprofit organization, non-governmental organization (NGO), school, government initiative or community initiaitive that wants to involve volunteers has to:

  • Provide at least one staff member – an employee or a volunteer – to supervise and support volunteer work, to ensure volunteers don’t do any harm to the organization, its clients or other volunteers/staff, and to ensure everyone working with volunteers has the support they need to do so appropriately and successfully. That person has to know how to do that part of his or her job, even if it’s just 25% of his or her job, and that might require the organization to send the person to workshops or classes, to subscribe to e-volunteerism (the leading online resource in the USA regarding volunteer engagement), to read books about volunteer screening, supervising volunteers, child safety… and that takes FUNDING.
  • Everyone that works with volunteers must make sure the work volunteers undertake is of the quality and type the organization’s clients deserve. That might require sending multiple staff members to workshops or classes, to read books about volunteer screening, supervising volunteers, child safety… again, that takes FUNDING.
  • Staff has to develop activities for volunteers to do — activities that often would be probably be cheaper and done more quickly by staff themselves. Those activities must be in writing, to ensure everyone’s expectations are the same. And, newsflash: the majority of people charged with this task do NOT know how to do it! They need support and guidance in creating volunteering assignments. Who is going to do provide that support and guidance?
  • The organization has to monitor volunteers, record their progress and report it to the board and donors, as well as to the volunteers themselves and, perhaps, the public. That takes time and expertise.

Any organization that does not allocate time and resources to these volunteer management tasks ends up with:

  • people applying or calling to volunteer and never getting a response
  • people coming to volunteer and standing around for the majority of the time, wondering what to do
  • volunteers that don’t complete assignments – which means the organizations has to either recruit more volunteers and start again, or give the work to employees
  • volunteers that don’t complete assignments correctly
  • volunteers that blog and tweet about their negative experience with your organization and, perhaps, about volunteering in general!
  • staff that does not want to involve volunteers

Volunteers are not free. I’ve said it many times before, before, and before that and… well, you get the idea.

I’ll keep saying it until I stop hearing people say, “Volunteers are great because they’re free!”

I’ll keep saying it until campaigns to encourage people to volunteer also include resources to help nonprofit organizations, NGOs, schools, communities and others involve and support more volunteers.

And don’t even try to say volunteers save money, because that starts yet another blog rant…

Debate: volunteer manager qualifications

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: