Tag Archives: volunteers

Volunteering & social cohesion in a post Brexit world

On 15 September, the National Council for Voluntary Organisations (NCVO) National Volunteering Forum met in Manchester, England to talk about the potential implications of Brexit for volunteering, and to discuss evidence and real life examples demonstrating the role that volunteering can play in improving social cohesion. The slides from the event are shared online, and the associated tweets, here.

The tweets are SO worth reading, a mix of comments said at the forum and comments from people following online. GREAT questions and comments that will give you pause, because you shouldn’t think of obstacles to social cohesion as just a British phenomena: all over Europe, as well as the USA, Pakistan, India, Afghanistan, Mexico, and on and on, societies are struggling with divided socio-political landscapes. Emotions are running high, driving nationalist movements and, often, racist and xenophobia movements as well. In many places, neighbors aren’t talking to neighbors because of differences in politics, religion, language, values and more.

As I note in my paper “Internet-mediated Volunteering in the EU: Its history, prevalence, and approaches and how it relates to employability and social inclusion” for the European Commission in 2014, researchers for vInspired, in exploring the contribution of volunteering to employability for young people, found that volunteering contributed to young people’s feeling of social inclusion:

Volunteering helped young people to develop their networks and mix with a more diverse social group. It also increased their ability to work within and across authority structures. This suggests that providing volunteering opportunities to a wide range of young people will help to break-down social barriers and lead to greater community cohesion and personal well- being.
The positive contribution made by young people to the organisations and communities with which they were involved, helped to overcome the negative stereotypes often applied to them, and improved perceptions of young people amongst adults such as staff, volunteers and service users.
Many young people are currently in a precarious economic position with the high level of youth unemployment, and some commentators are warning of a lost generation. Helping young people to stay connected to society and their communities, to develop leadership and employability skills that will shape their future, is one of the most urgent and critical tasks of the next decade.

As I note in that paper, this and other research demonstrates that volunteering can play a crucial role in building the personal resilience and capabilities that young people need to prosper in the work place and in society in general.

However, garnering those benefits from volunteering, as well as using it to encourage social cohesion, multi-cultural understanding, reconciliation, etc., is a tall order giving the current landscape in many countries:

War and dire economic circumstances are driving immigration at a historic rate, with desperate people seeking to migrate to more peaceful, prosperous countries, straining resources and emotions of those living in areas immigrants want to travel through or to.
Different ethnic, socio-economic and religious groups, among others, are clashing over everything from perceived threats to their culture and values to police relations to access to jobs to perceptions of crime rates and quality of life compared to the past.
Certain people are being excluded from participating fully in the societies where they reside, or from receiving the same employment, educational, societal and other benefits others in that society may receive. These people feel they are marginalized, that they have limited access to decision-making bodies, various institutions and employment.
Some people’s religious and ethical values clash with public social and working life, where others that have different ethical values also socialize and work. Not everyone embraces ideas of free expression, equality for all humans in all aspects of life (employment, education, marriage, etc.), democracy, non-traditional roles for women, and the value of diversity and inclusiveness. When these people are living in a society that insists on these values, by practice and laws, hostilities can arise, with ideas of tolerance and multicultural understanding clashing with deeply held beliefs and legal practices regarding human rights.
Change is rampant and is frightening to many people, particularly when economic situations are fragile, or perceived as such. People are hearing different languages than the one they have grown up with, they are seeing people dressing in a way that’s different than what they believe should be the cultural norm, and technology is rapidly changing employment, education and how services are delivered. The popularity of a restaurant serving food that isn’t perceived as indigenous or is perceived as being from a country local people don’t like, a poster in a church that isn’t in the official or unofficial national language, a woman not wearing what local people believe she should be wearing – all of these acts can be perceived by a community as a threat to their local culture and values, and lead to hostilities.

The result of all of this is people feeling more and more powerless over the decisions and forces that affect their day to day lives. Fear and uncertainty is sweeping many communities, misinformation is rampant, and everything in the environment feels politicized. Many communities are becoming more segregated, with people choosing to live and socialize with people they perceive as like them in terms of culture and values, and choosing to stay away from festivals, neighborhoods, even restaurants where they believe a different culture prevails.

Can volunteering help bridge divides, increase understanding, reduce hostilities and nurture respect and social cohesion? Certainly there are organizations and researchers that think so:

Habitat for Humanity, on its web site, says that, in Ohio, “The Holy Toledo Build” by a local affiliate “brought together Christians, Jews and Muslims to build a home. The event broke down many barriers and led to new friendships. During a similar project in Winston-Salem, North Carolina, participants used the event as an opportunity for honest dialogue.”
On Christmas Day in 2015, approximately 1,000 Muslims and Jews in Michigan came together for a day of community service. The Jewish Community Relations Council in Detroit has been organizing Mitzvah Day for over 20 years, and the Michigan Muslim Community Council (MMCC) has participated since 2007, recruiting under the banner of Muslim Volunteer Day. Volunteers work side by side on over 20 volunteer projects across the Metro Detroit area.
In the 1990s, the Virtual Volunteering Project published testimonials from people with disabilities regarding their experience as online volunteers, with many citing a feeling of greater inclusion as a benefit of their service.
In “Immigrants as active citizens: exploring the volunteering experience of Chinese immigrants in Vancouver,” Shibao Guo found that, through volunteering, Chinese immigrants in this study “learned language, skills and knowledge needed by new citizens for their integration into Canadian society. Volunteering also helped immigrants build a community and a sense of belonging. Furthermore, the study demonstrates that voluntary organisations can be important sites for immigrants to draw on in navigating complex paths to full citizenship and full participation in their new society.”

What’s lacking is research showing that these efforts have, indeed, lead to multi-cultural understanding, a lessening of hostilities, etc.

In my paper about Internet-mediated volunteering in EU countries, I identified challenges to promoting online volunteering as a pathway to social inclusion, and I believe it is, in fact, the biggest challenge for ANY volunteering as a pathway to social inclusion: resistance to including social inclusion goals into current volunteer engagement at an organization. In other words, most managers of volunteers don’t want to make social inclusion a part of their goals for volunteer engagement. Most organizations that involve volunteers have no stated reason relating to contributing to greater social inclusion for volunteers. They may not see the benefits of adapting their volunteer engagement to contribute to such. They may not have the expertise in how to do this. And they may not have the resources needed to build their expertise to do this. Agencies may resist adapting volunteer engagement schemes to include a social inclusion element, for fear of it draining resources or focus from their primary missions which may have nothing to do with social inclusion. In short: any effort to leverage volunteering as a path to greater social cohesion has to include money to pay for training of those in charge of volunteering engagement at various agencies. Otherwise, such efforts will, every likely, be doomed to failure.

Also see:

Managers of volunteers & resistance to diversity – my blog about comments that are generated when a discussion breaks out about diversifying volunteering ranks.

This lesson plan from the University of Nebraska Extension office, “Engaging Intergenerational Volunteers“, offers practical tips on having volunteers from a variety of age groups working together, as does this how-to guide from Bridges Together.

The Victoria Volunteering Portal (Australia) offers an excellent free guide on encouraging diversity among volunteer ranks.

I also offer my own free guide on Recruiting Local Volunteers To Increase Diversity Among the Ranks.

Song of frustration re: volunteering

Leave a reply

Dave Carroll became famous for writing a song and making a video about United Airlines smashing his guitar and not taking responsibility for it. The video went viral, Mr. Carroll not only appeared on various media outlets as a result, including CNN and The View, not only did United give him the financial settlement and apology he’d been demanding for months, he also became a paid speaker for various conferences and retreats, talking about “inhuman customer-service policies” and their unseen costs: loss of customer trust (and, therefore, customers), brand destruction, and more.

In February of this year, after he tried to volunteer at his son’s school, Mr. Carroll produced another song and video, this one about his frustration at trying to volunteer at his son’s school. It’s called “There’s Got to Be a Better Way.” You can watch the entire video, where Mr. Carroll makes fun of the volunteer screening at length, or just jump to the song about the experience at the 5:56 mark.

IMO, the video and song are a PERFECT example of thoughtless volunteer screening, where nonprofit and public sector organizations are interested just in checking a box rather than doing MEANINGFUL, effective screening of someone to work with kids.

I am so tired of seeing the question on discussion groups for managers of volunteers: “Where can I get a cheap criminal background check for potential volunteers?” or “How do I get a discount at the police station for police to do background checks of potential volunteers.” These people are looking for a box to check, rather than creating a culture that keeps everyone safe. Instead, read Screening Volunteers to Prevent Child Sexual Abuse: A Community Guide for Youth Organizations (it’s free to download) and use its very effective ways for screening out inappropriate candidates and creating a culture of safety. Combine it with Beyond Police Checks: The Definitive Volunteer & Employee Screening Guidebook by Linda Graff, available from Energize, Inc. (but not for free), and you’ve got a solid, more-than-basic understanding of risk management in volunteer engagement activities, and know how to better assure safety without driving away quality volunteering candidates. You also will understand how mindlessly enforcing protocols, without thinking about their purpose, doesn’t keep anyone safe.

Also see these related blogs:

Screening applicants by reviewing their online activities

Safety in virtual volunteering

Keeping volunteers safe – & keeping everyone safe with volunteers

Nonprofits can learn from motorcycle manufacturers? Yes!

Leave a reply

This blog was originally written and published by me back in August 2010.

In the last week, I’ve attended two events by motorcycle manufacturers, and there was so much — SO MUCH — that nonprofits could learn from how these motorcycle events were handled.

One event was a women’s-only event by Harley Davidson. It’s called a Garage Party. I went to the one in Gladstone, Oregon. These events are held at dealerships all over the USA.

The other event was by Triumph in Canby, Oregon. They had about 20 motorcycles you could sign up to ride, on group rides every 30 minutes. The Triumph truck travels all over the USA to bring these events to cities all over.

What I learned from these events that’s applicable to nonprofits:

There were notices in local newspapers about these events, but the Internet also played a huge role in marketing these events, specifically viral marketing. I found out about both events because different people posted the details to online communities I’m a part of. Two of our friends went because we posted about one of the events ourselves on an online group. Text-only messages are easy to forward, and were essential in getting the word out to so many people so quickly about these events. How likely are your volunteers, clients and financial supporters likely to forward your organization’s events via email to family and friends, or to put info about it on their Facebook or MySpace status updates? They are not going to do it for every event, but they will for the ones that feel special to them, that really speak to their heart or that they think others will find fun or especially interesting. Also, do you reach out to specific online communities to market an event? In fact, have you ever considered reaching out specifically to motorcycle communities as event attendees?
Both events were very well attended. The Triumph event had the attendance organizers were hoping for but not really expecting, because of the economy and because of the somewhat remote location. The Harley event attendance in Gladstone far exceeded expectations. I think this excellent attendance at both events came not only from good marketing, but also, because of how people are thinking right now: with the beating we’re all taking in this economy, people are revisiting their priorities and lifestyles, and not just cutting back financially, but also thinking about how they are going to live. Riding a motorcycle is surprisingly affordable, not to mention the sense of control it gives you, a sense of control a lot of people feel they don’t have now in other aspects of their life. These events spoke to people’s hearts and, maybe, even their fears.How might volunteering at your organization or experiencing your organization’s program in an event give someone a sense of stability, control, escape or fun? Could you create a one-day volunteering or program event that could invite new people into your organization with the sole purpose of getting as many people into your organization as possible and getting them in one-on-one conversations with volunteers, particularly in a fun, shared activity?
The garage party was focused on a specific group: women. Harley knows that, to sell motorcycles in this economy, it’s got to create more motorcycle riders. And one of the best target audiences is women. So they have created an event that could not be more female friendly: it’s staffed entirely by women (all male staff leave), because new women riders tend to be very self-conscious and self-deprecating, and there’s nothing like watching a woman smaller than you pick up an 800 pound bike (362.87 kilos) and then tell you, “YOU can do this.” There’s great food, short demonstration stations, gift bags, and free t-shirts with I am not a back rest on the back. What could have made the Garage event better? More hands-on activities, and more interactions with actual women riders (see next bullet). And a lesson for the Triumph demo rides: have at least one woman Triumph rider (even more would be better) out talking to the women at these events, whether they look like they ride their own or not, and recruit more women motorcyclists to attend these events by posting about them on local online communities for women motorcyclists.How could your nonprofit create an event that’s targeted at a specific under-represented group? Are there people who are intimidated to come to your events currently, who would need to be catered to specifically in order to attend? What could you do to make an event more welcoming to a specific group that is currently under-represented among your volunteers, clients or supporters?
The Triumph event was staffed primarily by VOLUNTEERS. Yes, a for-profit company was using volunteers! Because they were “free”? Nope. It was for all the right reasons: Because an event attendee talking to a volunteer — someone who owns at least one of the motorcycles in the line up, and owned at least one other probably at some point, who can speak passionately about the product, who wants you to get to have the experience they have been having, and who won’t get any commission from a sale and doesn’t rely on this activity for their financial livelihood — is in such contrast to talking to a salesperson or paid staff person. The volunteers got to spend two days talking about something they love, a free t-shirt, supper each night, and the opportunity to ride any motorcycle not booked for a ride. The few paid staff there stayed in the background, there to fill in blanks and maybe, must maybe, to make a sale, but volunteers were the official spokespeople.Do you value your organization’s volunteers as unique, important spokespeople on behalf of your organization? Do you encourage them to talk and blog about their experience? Do you have a speaker’s bureau of volunteers available to go onsite and talk to a group about your organization? Do you give volunteers a role at all or most public events? And have you ever considered reaching out specifically to motorcycle communities to recruit volunteers?

A LOT to think about!

Update: Here’s me on a Triumph Scrambler at the aforementioned event back in 2011. And here’s me on the motorcycle I have now (a Kawasaki KLR 650), wearing the t-shirt I got from that Harley event I talk about above (“I am not a backrest”).

Promises & Pitfalls of Global Health Volunteering

Leave a reply

Dr. Judith Lasker, a professor at Lehigh University, published Hoping to Help: The Promises and Pitfalls of Global Health Volunteering” in January 2016. I have not read it. According to The New York Times review of the book, Dr. Lasker presents data from a few hundred programs that coordinate mostly short-term assignments (lasting weeks rather than months), gleaned from several surveys, dozens of interviews and some brief trips of her own. She did not look at large organizations like Doctors Without Borders , which are organized differently and generally do not use unpaid volunteers or, if they do, require much longer commitments for assignments.

“There is little evidence that short-term volunteer trips produce the kinds of transformational changes that are often promised,” Dr. Lasker finds. Of course, not all short-term volunteering is the same, but Dr. Lasker says the criticisms must be taken seriously, and that the most frequently published critiques have appeared in medical journals, which address the ethical problem of allowing medical students to work far beyond their training in communities with few resources. I would love to see some of these academic articles!

Sadly, few of these programs have been evaluated in terms of their impact on the communities where they serve. While the impact of surgical programs can be obvious and dramatic, efforts at screening for disease and disease prevention are often far less so. A representative of one program memorably told Dr. Lasker that they “just know” their work makes a difference, while a sizable minority of programs attempt no formal analysis of their achievements. Lasker asked for such and was in for a shock: “I did not expect how often the evaluation question seems to take people by surprise.” According to the Times, more than one of Dr. Lasker’s sources mused that the most beneficial aspect of the volunteer effort might be the cash infused into a community from the fees volunteers usually pay.

In addition, this short-term volunteering can lead to LESS understanding by volunteers of poverty. In an interview about the book, she notes that some participants come back with what she calls “bad learning,” and saying: “Poor people are so happy; they smiled, and sang and danced, and they don’t mind being poor”, stereotypes about poverty “based on spending a week where you don’t understand the language and where you only talk to people through translators.” (Also see: Extreme poverty is not beautiful)

“The developing world has become a playground for the redemption of privileged souls looking to atone for global injustices by escaping the vacuity of modernity and globalization.”

Dr. Lasker says, “Ultimately, my goal is not to advocate for all volunteering or to call for its dismantling. Rather, I hope to contribute to making it more effective and valuable to all concerned.” I feel exactly the same when I write about such.

Also see this story about lessons from the book Dr. Lasker teachers in one of her classes. And this blog by Dr. Lasker, “Orphanage visits–are they ever okay?”

And also see my own blogs on similar subjects:

Humanitarian stories & photos – use with caution
Extreme poverty is not beautiful – That there can be any confusion between living off-the-grid, simply, and living in extreme poverty is astounding to me. Yet, I’ve heard oh-so-privileged aid workers wax poetic about the “beauty” of poverty.
Vanity Volunteering: all about the volunteer – one of the most popular blogs I’ve ever written
Isn’t my good heart & desire enough to help abroad?
Voluntourism: use with caution
How to take photos in a culturally-sensitive manner, particularly with regard to respect for local customs regarding women, and to meet various needs, e.g. to show female participation. This resource was developed in 2007, for Afghan staff working out of an Afghanistan government agency, and is adaptable for various cultural settings. Obviously, it needs updating.
*Another* Afghanistan Handicraft program? Really?
Problems in countries far from home can seem easy to solve

Research needs re: virtual volunteering

1 Reply

I get contacted regularly by university students doing a Master’s degree research project that relates to virtual volunteering and, unfortunately, their research subject is almost always the same: the motivations of people to be online volunteers.

I’m blunt in my response to them: please don’t. This subject is not one that nonprofits or NGOs are asking for. In fact, it has become a joke among managers of volunteers: oh, look, *another* paper about people’s motivations for volunteering… ARGH!

This article by Susan Ellis and Rob Jackson well explains why the idea of yet another survey project about volunteer motivations is not something most nonprofits or NGOs are interested in. Read in particular the part called “A Preoccupation with the Motivations to Volunteer.”

What would NGOs and nonprofits love to know about virtual volunteering? What would be great, even ground-breaking research regarding virtual volunteering? Here are some digital volunteering research topics in dire need of exploration (and that really need to be undertaken by people that are NOT me):

factors for success in keeping online volunteers productive and engaged long-term at an organization or within a program
how online volunteers and/or those that involve them define a successful virtual volunteering experience, and exploring if these are in conflict
if online microvolunteering really does lead to longer-term virtual volunteering/higher responsibility roles at an organization, and/or if it leads to greater numbers of donors
expectations of people that sign up for online volunteer assignments before they begin versus the reality of the assignments/relationships/benefits
are the advantages that are promoted regarding virtual volunteering – that it allows for people to be more involved in an organization they already volunteer with onsite, that it allows for the participation of people as volunteers who might not be able to otherwise, that it can be a form of accommodation for people who have disabilities, that it frees up staff to undertake other activities, etc. – realized most of the time? some of the time? what factors are necessary for those benefits to be realized – or preventing them from becoming realities?
what causes people to quit volunteering online, and are the reasons similar or different than what causes people to quit traditional, onsite volunteering?
comparative case studies of online volunteer engagement and support for such at a variety of organizations, looking at factors for successful management, budgets for such, number of people working directly with the online volunteers, etc.
comparative case studies of screening of people that want to volunteer online at a variety of organizations, looking for factors that may lead to greater completion of tasks and longer-term commitments by online volunteers or may lead to greater drop out rates of accepted volunteers that receive assignments.
comparative case studies of organizations involving online volunteers, regarding what percentage of volunteers are using a laptop or desktop computer for completing assignments, versus those using smart phones and tablets. And is there a difference in the kinds of assignments being done on laptops and desktops versus smart phones and tablets? Is there a difference in the kinds of volunteers using laptops and desktops versus smart phones and tablets?
comparative case studies of online mentoring programs that involve online volunteers as mentors, regarding why some last more than two years and why others end early, or immediately after the pilot phase
comparative case of online mentoring programs that involve online volunteers as mentors, regarding their meeting of stated education, self-esteem, career exploration or other goals
comparative case of online mentoring programsthat involve online volunteers as mentors, on mentors or on participants five years after participation
how much does involving online volunteers cost for the host organization – a comparison of at least 20 organizations in the USA (or any one country, for that matter)
are there management needs that are different for online volunteers representing different groups (by age, by geographic region, by profession, by education level, etc.) to complete assignments and to be inspired to continue supporting an organization over months rather than just days or weeks
what differences are there in the success of involving online volunteers in non-English-speaking countries in Europe or elsewhere in comparison with North America?
what differences are there in the success of involving online volunteers in developing or transitional countries where Internet access is available to large portions of the population (India, Nigeria, South Africa, Pakistan, Poland, etc.) in comparison with North America?
how does satisfaction with volunteering among online volunteers compare to satisfaction with volunteering undertaking onsite administrative roles that do NOT involve interactions with clients (onsite volunteers that help with mailings, help with inventory, help prepare a room for an event later, file papers, provide IT support to staff, etc.). Do these two groups of volunteers feel similar isolation? Do any feelings of isolation or support relate to being online or is it because of lack of regular staff interaction, online or face-to-face? Or lack of access to seeing the impact of direct service with clients?

Tackle any of those research projects and I will promote your research everywhere online I possibly can. I may even dance in the streets.

Four cautions for researchers of virtual volunteering:

During your literature review, you will need to look at research articles and case studies that never use the word volunteers. or the term virtual volunteering. For instance, people that contribute their time and talent, online, to nonprofit open source projects may never be called volunteers. Those that contribute their time and knowledge to Wikipedia online are usually called Wikipedians rather than volunteers. Yet, research literature on these subjects is vital for informing any researcher wanting to do an academic study regarding virtual volunteering.
If you interview people, you will also not be able to use the phrase virtual volunteering without fully explaining it and ensuring people understand your definition; otherwise, you will find people saying they don’t volunteer online or do not involve volunteers online when, in fact, they do – they just didn’t understand the meaning so they said no.
Read this list of myths regarding virtual volunteering before you begin. If you start your research from an assumption that online volunteers are more isolated and less supported than onsite volunteers, for instance, or that virtual volunteering is great for people that don’t have time for onsite volunteering, or that people that volunteer online don’t do so onsite, face-to-face, then you are starting from a false premise that is not supported by any research to date. And if you want your research to test one of these myths, by all means, go for it!
You will be hard pressed to find anyone volunteering exclusively online; the vast majority of people that volunteer online ALSO volunteer onsite (and if you have research that says otherwise, let’s hear about it!). That’s why it’s impossible to measure things like if the health benefits associated with volunteering are exclusive for onsite volunteering.

All of the research I know related to virtual volunteering, by the way, is listed here on the virtual volunteering wiki. I try to update this list at least once a year. Note that, as of a few years ago, most of it is NOT by me! Hurrah!

Other blogs I’ve written on the subject of research and volunteering, including virtual volunteering, that should be helpful to anyone researching any aspect of virtual volunteering:

Why don’t I do at least some of the aforementioned research? Three reasons: One: I’m burnt out regarding virtual volunteering research. I poured so many years and effort into researching and writing The LAST Virtual Volunteering Guidebook, as well as managing various virtual volunteering initiatives since the 1990s, and I need a break. Two: I would really like to read research by OTHER PEOPLE. I think fresh eyes and fresh minds could bring to light things all of my many years researching this subject has made me blind to. I’m so ready to be enlightened on this subject by other people! Three: I don’t have the resources. I would need funding and I would want my research associated with a university, preferably in association with my obtaining a PhD.

So, those are the research needs regarding virtual volunteering, at least as far as I can see. What are YOUR ideas?

My consulting services

Virtual volunteering: it’s oh-so-personal

2 Replies

The 20th anniversary of the launch of the Virtual Volunteering Project is approaching! I count it as December 1, 1996, actually, though I could be off by a few days. It was probably summertime 20 years ago that the project was funded, actually.

All that was on my mind when I read that World Pulse, a global nonprofit organization, put out a call for stories that explore the role of technology in our lives and its potential to bring positive change:

At World Pulse, we see so many signs of the good. Every day, women and men creatively embrace tech tools to solve the pressing problems facing our communities and our world. From mobile apps designed to track incidents of violence against women to crowdfunding platforms that put money in the hands of social entrepreneurs, technology is making so much possible for women everywhere.

What technologies have the most potential to make a difference in your community? Do you have a story about using communication technology to form meaningful relationships or bridge a geographical divide? Maybe you are part of a group using technology to mobilize for change.

I submitted my own story for this challenge, noting:

I’ve been researching virtual volunteering for more than 20 years now, and the biggest shock for most people that aren’t familiar with the practice and hear me talk about it at length is just how close I feel to so many of the volunteers and volunteer-involving agencies all over the world. They are my friends and colleagues, just as real as people I work with onsite, face-to-face. These are all real people with hopes and fears and challenging ideas and humor and talents. So many of these online relationships, established through email and Twitter and online communities, are so very, very personal to me.

I mean that from the bottom of my heart.

By the time I left the Virtual Volunteering Project, I had worked with more than 300 online volunteers. I could tell you so many things about many of them: their career goals, their music tastes, what they enjoyed doing as online volunteers, what they DIDN’T enjoy, and on and on. No, I didn’t know them all that intimately – not all of them wanted to be known that intimately, and there just isn’t enough time in the day to get to know 300 people that well, online or off. At least one of my online volunteers had mental disabilities, and his doctor was one of his references; I got to talk with that doctor once on the phone, and he told me what a huge impact virtual volunteering had had on this particular volunteer. I hung up the phone and cried – I’d had no idea.

I kept working with online volunteers when I took over the UN’s Online Volunteering service, then also a part of NetAid, in February 2001, and a year later, one of the online volunteers died that I had been working with since joining the UN Volunteers program headquarters. She was very young, killed in an accident. I was shattered. We had often IM’d each other, just chatting over this and that. She’d formed a nonprofit with other online volunteers she met through volunteering online with UNV. I was also heartened that, when I sent an email to the entire UNV organization announcing her death, something any program manager did for a volunteer killed in the field, the head of the organization then, Sharon Capeling-Alakija, immediately directed her staff to write the online volunteer’s parents a letter of condolence, just as UNV does when a UN Volunteer dies.

That’s why I get so weary of explaining over and over to people new to virtual volunteering, or skeptical of the practice without reading anything about it, that this volunteering is not impersonal. As I said in an email to someone that blogged disparagingly about virtual volunteering, saying that, as a result of it, “volunteering has the potential to lose its social and community-building benefits”:

Your blog assumes onsite volunteers work in groups and have lots of interaction. This is often not the case. MANY onsite volunteers work in isolation: they arrive, they receive an orientation and training, and then spend their time alone in a room stuffing envelopes, or sorting in-kind donations, or checking inventory, or cleaning something, etc. You cannot assume that onsite volunteering automatically means lots of personal interactions.

I’ve studied virtual volunteering since the mid 1990s, and what I’ve found is just as much or as little social and community-building benefits as any other volunteering. It all depends on the culture of management: is the manager of online volunteers one who provides lots of personal interactions, or one that gives a task and then interacts only at the request of the volunteer? Whether or not any kind of volunteering has social or community-building benefits depends on the manager and the culture of the organization, not necessarily the task being done onsite or online.

Working with virtual volunteering? It’s personal. At least it is for me.

There is lots more information about what it’s like to work with online volunteers in The LAST Virtual Volunteering Guidebook, available both as a traditional printed book and as a digital book. The advice is based on both extensive research of virtual volunteering practices at a variety of organizations all over the world and my own experience working with online volunteers – I’ve now worked with more than 1000, some of whom I’m still friends with online, some of whom have become friends offline as well. And if you are about to write about virtual volunteering, but you don’t want to read the guidebook, then PLEASE, at least, first read these Myths About Virtual Volunteering.

assigning law breakers to community service: worthwhile?

12 Replies

As I’ve mentioned before, I regularly get hate email for my ongoing campaign against companies selling letters saying someone did court-ordered community service, claiming it is virtual volunteering when, in fact, no volunteering is actually done. None of the haters have changed my mind: I think these companies are unethical and, at times, illegal and harmful to all volunteering and I dream of them all being shut down. But a recent exchange in the comments section of one of the blogs has made me finally address something on my blog I’ve been meaning to for a while: the appropriateness of assigning law breakers to community service.

According to volunteerism expert Susan Ellis, courts in the USA have given some criminal offenders the option of completing a set number of hours of unpaid work in a nonprofit organization or government community initiative in lieu of a fine or spending time in prison, or as an adjunct to probation or parole, for at least three decades. Here’s an example here in Washington County, Oregon.

Reviewing various literature online and hearing about programs over the years through my work, I’ve surmised that governments like alternative sentencing, in the form of community service, for five reasons:

it can greatly reduce the costs of incarceration and supervision of nonviolent offenders.
governments see community service as restitution or restorative justice – through service, people are “repaying” the community for the societal costs of their crimes.
governments envision nonprofit employees lamenting, “We have all this work to do – if only lots of people willing to work for free would show up and offer to do it.” In other words, these people assigned community service are free labor that nonprofits need.
governments think it might teach the offender about ethical behavior and, at least indirectly, how their criminal/negative/illegal behavior affects the community overall, and how it would be better if they would eschew such behavior and be a positive, trusted part of the community instead.
it could be an opportunity for an offender the opportunity to learn a new skill, explore a career, and perhaps improve their employment prospects

Courts can order a person to do community service, but they cannot order a nonprofit to accept an offender as a volunteer, and that means many people struggle to find community service. Per all of the frustration about this on various online community fora, like Quora, I created a resource to help people assigned community service by the courts. It’s packed with advice, more than you will find anywhere else, on how to get into community service quickly. The advice is realistic and it’s free.

I’ve never before questioned the appropriateness of involving court-ordered volunteers, from my perspective as a host of volunteers, because I’ve been lucky enough to write my own mission statements regarding volunteer engagement at whatever program I’m working in, I have always made volunteer involvement about creating evangelists for my program rather than getting people to work for free, and I have always made part of that mission to involve a diversity of volunteers and for all volunteering to have a primary goal of teaching volunteers about the cause at hand, not of getting lots of work done. It has been a luxury to have that kind management freedom, and it’s a luxury that most managers of volunteers do not have. I think a diversity of volunteers, from different backgrounds, made the programs I was involved with stronger, for a variety of reasons I explore on my web site. So, yes, I have been able to involve people who have been assigned community service as volunteers, onsite and online, and my experience with them has been quite good. I’ve never been opposed to involving someone as a volunteer who is doing the work because the court demands it, so long as that person meets the requirements of the task. That means I don’t take every person who applies to volunteer – I have a high bar for participation, to screen out people who won’t take the commitment seriously, who don’t communicate well online, or really don’t understand what they are applying for. I have never had the time to take on absolutely anyone who applies to volunteer and hope it works out. That said, volunteers that have been assigned community service kept volunteering with me even after the required number of hours were completed, which I’ve heard from other managers of volunteers is not unusual.

So, I’m not opposed to the idea of involving people compelled by a court to volunteer. But I do think it’s overdue to have a conversation about the value of this community service for the offender, for the nonprofit, and for the community. It’s overdue to ask some tough questions about it, because there are assumptions about the benefits that I think are unproven.

Looking at the reasons governments like alternative service, let’s consider if the reasons are valid:

it can greatly reduce the costs of incarceration and supervision of nonviolent offenders.

I don’t have any stats that say this is true, but I can’t imagine it’s not. It is very expensive to put someone in jail. By contrast, governments don’t pay anything for offenders to do community service with nonprofits – most or all of the costs are shouldered entirely by the nonprofit. As volunteers are NOT free, these costs can be substantial – but not for the government. Even programs run entirely by the government specifically for offenders to do community service (work crews to pick up trash, clean up parks, restore a playground, etc.) are far cheaper than jail.

governments see community service as restitution or restorative justice – through service, people are repaying the community for their crimes.

I am not sure I really know what this means. In this sense, it’s a purely symbolic act. And I get that symbolic acts can be powerful, but is there any way at all to measure this benefit?

governments envision nonprofit employees lamenting, “We have all this work to do – if only lots of people willing to work for free would show up and offer to do it.”

Anyone who works with nonprofits knows this isn’t the case. Nonprofits are NOT saying this. Again, volunteers are not free; it costs a lot of time and resources to involve and support volunteers. Most organizations that are struggling to find volunteers need people that will make at least a year-long commitment and give a few hours every week – that’s not something court-ordered community service seekers want at all. Most organizations also want particularly-skilled volunteers, even if they don’t require commitments of several months – rarely can an organization take absolutely anyone as a volunteer, regardless of their skill level. Plus, I can’t find any studies where nonprofits say, “Yes, because we involve court-ordered community service people among our volunteers, we are a better organization, we’ve had greater impact, we’ve saved money, etc. And here’s the data that shows it…” So the government is not fulfilling a need of MOST nonprofits by requiring offenders to give a certain number of hours of community service.

Even more than that, here are the two reasons given for community service for people that commit crimes that I really, really question:

governments think it might teach the offender about ethical behavior and, at least indirectly, how their crime affects the community overall, and how it would be better if they would eschew such behavior and be a positive part of the community instead.
it could be an opportunity for an offender the opportunity to learn a new skill, explore a career, and perhaps improve their employment prospects

Yes, sure, community service COULD teach these things. But does it, usually? And what does it take on the part of the nonprofit in terms of knowledge, resources and activities for court-assigned community service to have this kind of transformation for the volunteer?

In Giving Back: Introducing Community Service Learning, Improving Mandated Community Service for Juvenile Offenders, An Action Guide for Youth Court Programs and the Juvenile-Justice System, published by the Constitutional Rights Foundation, is this assertion:

“Community service, as mandated by the courts, plays a prominent role in our juvenile-justice system as well. Today, many juvenile-justice professionals regard it as an opportunity for rehabilitation. They believe that mandated community service can help juvenile-justice respondents understand the impact of their actions on others; give back to the communities they have harmed; learn critical-thinking, citizenship, and problem-solving skills; develop a personal stake in the well-being of their communities; and raise awareness of their own self worth.“

So, does it? I can’t find any resource saying it does. Apparently, neither can this guide, as it never cites any sources that affirm this. But what the guide DOES say about the transformational power of community service confirms just how much work it takes to make volunteering more than getting work done. And it takes a LOT in terms of resources, time and expertise – three things many managers of volunteers do NOT have. The exercises in the guide are meant to go along with youth performing community service, in order to take the service to a new level, something way beyond “let’s get work done.” And I believe the activities could really do that – but I also know that the vast majority of nonprofits do not have the time nor expertise to do these exercises with court-ordered community service folks.

Where are the studies that show that community service teaches offenders about ethical behavior or citizenship or community responsibilities and/or that it affects their future actions for the better?
Where are the studies that show community service reduces recidivism rates?
Where are the studies that show that offenders benefit from doing community service, in terms of learning a new skill, exploring a career, and even improving their employment prospects?

If you have names of or links to these studies, please note such in the comments below. I’m not looking for feelings about this, from the point of view of the court – I’m looking for hard data.

If you are a nonprofit that can say that, as a result of involving court-ordered community service people, specifically, among your volunteers, your are a better organization, had greater impact on the community, saved money, etc., and have the data that shows it, let’s hear from you.

I’m not looking for feelings about this, from the point of view of the court or government – I’m looking for hard data.

If you have been assigned community service because of an offense and want to comment, please limit your comment to answers to these questions:

do you believe your community service taught you anything about ethical behavior, how your crime affects the community overall, how it would be better if would eschew such behavior and be a positive part of the community instead, citizenship, etc.? If yes, please say how. If no, please say if you think it is possible at all.
do you see your community service as restitution or restorative justice – through service, you are symbolically repaying the community for your offense?
do you believe that, through your community service, you received the opportunity to learn a new skill, explore a career, and perhaps improve your employment prospects? If yes, please say how. If no, please say if you think it is possible at all.

If you want to be anonymous in your comment, that’s fine – just fake your email address when you comment on the blog, and I won’t show your IP address online.

Please, no debates on whether or not you should have been arrested, if what you did was really a crime, etc. – that’s not a conversation this blog is seeking.

On a related note: I found a guide online, Community Service Restitution Programs for Alcohol Related Traffic Offenders, published by the US Department of Transportation, National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, in 1985 or 1986. It was prepared by International Business Services (IBS) under a contract with NHTSA. Volume One is The 5 As of Community Service is a manual to aid state and local jurisdictions in the design and implementation of community service programs. Volume Two is Case Studies and Resource Materials. Volume one notes, on page 22: “A program representative from the Community Service Program in Boulder, Colorado, stressed the importance of carefully preparing agencies at the outset by precisely defining program expectations. Some programs provide agencies with written agreements clearly delineating the responsibilities inherent in participation.” Is this a best practice in court-ordered community service? I don’t know about you, but I have NEVER gotten guidance from a court or a probation officer about working with a court-ordered community service person. NEVER.

On page 31, is this: “The underlying premise of community service, that offenders are more valuable to the community when engaged in voluntary service than when incarcerated, rests upon the assumption that those offenders will be responsibly monitored.” I admit I laughed out loud at this. It’s a nice assumption, but given how many people are getting away with paying for a letter saying they did community service when they really didn’t, I think it’s a misplaced assumption.

One final note: the publication Giving Back: Introducing Community Service Learning, Improving Mandated Community Service for Juvenile Offenders, An Action Guide for Youth Court Programs and the Juvenile-Justice System is OUTSTANDING. I think any manager of volunteers should read it, regardless of the volunteers’ ages, particularly the parts about how to make the community service transformative. It’s a great way to make volunteering at your organization more than just getting lots of volunteer hours to brag about.

Also see:

Requiring jobless to volunteer – reality check
Kentucky politicians think volunteers are free
Yes, I love court-ordered community service folks
Supervising online volunteers in court-ordered settings
Proud to fool courts re: community service
Selling community service leads to arrest, conviction
Haters gonna hate, November 2014 update on Community Service Help and other similar, unethical companies
Community Service Help Cons Another Person – a first-person account by someone who paid for online community service and had it rejected by the court.
Online community service company tries to seem legit, a November 2013 update about efforts these companies are making to seem legitimate
Update on a virtual volunteering scam, from November 2012.
What online community service is – and is not – the very first blog I wrote exposing this company, back in January 2011, that resulted in the founder of the company calling me at home to beg me to take the blog down
Online volunteer scam goes global, a July 2011 update with links to TV stories trying to expose these scam companies
Courts being fooled by online community service scams, an update from November 2011 that is the most popular blog I’ve ever published

Volunteer management is community engagement

14 Replies

All these years that I’ve been a manager of volunteers and a consultant regarding the management of volunteers, I have felt quite alone in how I approach the value of volunteer engagement.

I believe that volunteer engagement should live under “program” at an organization, not under “human resources” or the fundraising/fund development department. Here’s why:

I believe in creating tasks specifically for volunteers because, sometimes, volunteers are the best people to do a task, even if it’s not the most efficient way to get something done, even if it means the tasks take twice as long as they would if completed by an employee. That may be because the organization needs to emphasize transparency to the community in its operations, and therefore wants to give community members a first-hand view. That may be because it wants to give the community a sense of ownership in the organization, through volunteering. That may be because clients prefer interacting with volunteers in certain activities rather than paid staff.
I believe in sometimes defining tasks in such a way so that certain people – a specific type of person – could do them as volunteers – a group, youth, people with disabilities, online micro volunteers, etc. That may because such volunteering gives the organization access to audiences they may never reach otherwise. That may be because the organization has a mission to serve specific audiences or engage in certain activities, and this kind of volunteering is a manifestation of this.
I believe volunteer engagement can help to address youth unemployment, cultural conflicts, intergenerational misunderstandings, integration, community cohesion, social integration, and on and on. Volunteer engagement can play a vital role in building social cohesion and intercultural understanding.
I’m passionate about a big tent approach in talking about volunteer engagement, including anyone who is donating their unpaid time at a nonprofit, school, government program or other mission-based entity – that means I include people volunteering in order to fulfill a community service obligation or people in an unpaid internship. I don’t believe in motivation purity tests when it comes to who gets called a volunteer (only those volunteering out of the goodness of their heart get to be called volunteers? No.).
Volunteers are not free, and often do not save money. Plus, no one says, “Wow, I really want to work for free for such-and-such organization!”

I believe volunteer engagement is so much more than just finding people with supposedly good hearts to do work for free. I believe volunteers aren’t just people that want to donate time out of the goodness of their heart, but also people that want to gain job skills, people who want to apply what they are learning in a classroom, people who feel anger about a particular issue and want to do something about it, people who think the volunteering activity looks fun, people who are skeptical about an organization and wants to see first hand what they do, people who are new to a community and want to meet locals, and on and on.

So I’ve spent copious amounts of time deriding the monetary value of volunteer hours. I talk instead about measuring success for volunteer engagement in terms of impact and transformation and community connection, not hours donated and number of volunteers involved.

I’m not entirely alone in this way of thinking: Sharon Capeling-Alakija, then head of the United Nations Volunteers programme, talked about why UNV was committed to its online volunteering program, she never said it was because NGOs or UNVs have so much work to do and need people to undertake some of that work for free. She said it was because “this is a way for people to be involved in the work of UNV, first hand. Before the OV service, the only way to do that was to be a UN Volunteer – and most people don’t get to do that.”

Not that I believe that an organization has an obligation to involve absolutely every person that wants to volunteer as a volunteer. Some organizations, because of their mission, may not be appropriate places for children as volunteers, for instance. Nonprofits and schools have every right to say no to an offer of group volunteers from a corporation if the proposed volunteering activity offers little return of investment for the organization. And I don’t think every volunteer is worth the effort – volunteers aren’t automatically “good guys.”

But all of my ideas about volunteering, along with my promotion of virtual volunteering, has made me the odd gal out at most conferences and in most conversations regarding volunteerism and volunteer management. In fact, my point of view about the value of volunteerism has made many people angry, people that want volunteering to be talked about only in the most basic, old-fashioned terms: people donating their time purely out of the goodness of their hearts, never for any other impure reason, like because they have been compelled by a court. They want to value volunteers based on number of volunteers, how many hours those volunteers give and a dollar value for those hours.

In January 2016, I decided to say all this and more via my keynote speech to the South Carolina Association for Volunteer Administration (SCAVA). My speech was to managers of volunteers, and it was about what we are versus what we should be, what we COULD be, touching on all the aforementioned points. If managers of volunteers are merely in charge of creating assignments for people with good hearts, and measuring the success of such with the number of hours contributed and a monetary value for those hours, then we deserve to be thought of as low-level administrators, and we deserve the anger we get from labor unions. If we want a seat at the senior staff table, it’s time to approach volunteer engagement as community engagement, as something much more than bodies doing work for free. We don’t just coordinate, we manage, we facilitate, we direct. I thought my speech would very likely cause people to storm out of the room – and instead, I got a standing ovation, complete with yelps and tears. It was a stunning reception. People said they had never heard volunteer engagement talked about that way.

But I found out that I’m late to this evangelizing, per recently finding this outstanding blog from 2008, Volunteer Management: Once More with Meaning, by Jennifer Woodill of Ontario, Canada. She developed these ideas while working at St. Christopher House (now West Neighbourhood House). Woodill seems to have been as frustrated as me regarding how nonprofits and corporate folks talk about volunteering. Like me, when she started out as a manager of volunteers, she joined the Association for Volunteer Administration (AVA) – now defunct – and attended various conferences and meetings, hoping to find kindred spirits and inspiration. But what she found instead was a big disconnect, as she notes in her blog:

My big-picture questions about how voluntarism connects to community development, civic engagement, and social inclusion were never discussed in these resources, however, or in meetings with other volunteer managers.

She continues later:

The principle of resource development views volunteers—much like money—as resources or assets. You can see this principle at work by identifying where volunteer management lives within an organizational structure. Often volunteer management is housed with administrative and fundraising functions. This principle underlies the trend to measure volunteering and calculate hours worked, people employed, and placing dollar values on the value of a resource. Again, quantity rules over quality, because a numerical value cannot express relationships developed or the ability to cultivate passion in another’s work. This principle of resource development allows an organization to deem a prospective volunteer “not worth the effort” after conducting a quick cost-benefit analysis. But if a volunteer is poorly educated or he has a disability, traditional management principles don’t view him as a valuable resource.

And this:

I propose an alternate way of approaching volunteer work and management, where the emphasis is on social inclusion and community development. With this alternate way of thinking, planning for volunteer involvement, practices, and management structure starts with these central questions: “How can we find creative ways for community members to get involved in and engaged by our work? How can we develop an organizational culture where volunteer engagement and involvement is central to all our programs? How can we develop a culture in which volunteers are completely integrated into the organization?” These questions move us in new and creative directions… in this model, an organization also makes a commitment to think creatively about ways to create opportunities for newcomers to volunteer. Instead of finding the “best” person for the “job,” an organization makes a commitment not to exclude newcomers from participation in a community and to create meaningful space for their engagement.

I don’t agree with all of what she says in the blog, like the statement “social exclusion is an inevitable result of conducting volunteer management based on the principles of efficiency, resource development, and control.” I don’t think the emphasis on quality standards in volunteer management is what is excluding a diversity of volunteers – I think it’s the emphasis on how to value volunteer engagement perpetuated by various groups like the Corporation for National and Community Service, various UN entities, and the Independent Sector is what is driving the oh-so-narrow view of what volunteering is. Still, you MUST read Jennifer’s blog!

Of course, I had to track Jennifer down and tell her how much I loved her 2008 blog! I found her on Twitter, and she seemed genuinely flattered at my fawning. But then she said this in our public online conversation:

I decided to leave my work with #volunteers cause I couldn’t move forward. I needed to make a difference.

My jaw dropped. We lost her. She needed to make a difference, and traditional management of volunteers did not allow her to do that.

I’m not surprised though. After all, most organizations worldwide, not just in the USA, want to measure volunteerism with a monetary value for service hours. Most volunteer management conferences focus on talking about the basics – how to recruit large numbers of volunteers, how to retain volunteers for years and years, etc. – but avoid more advanced topics, like how to recognize unconscious bias that might drive our exclusion of certain volunteers and how and why to create volunteering opportunities for people struggling with unemployment. These conferences and workshops also segregate technology use in volunteer management to one catch-all workshop on the last day, rather than integrating it into all workshops. There are no workshops on how volunteer engagement can, and SHOULD, support the goals of the marketing department, or the goals of a specific program.

The European Volunteer Centre (CEV) feels that unpaid internships are “mistakenly perceived to be or even presented as volunteering,” yet also says that

Volunteering is an outstanding source of learning and a contributor to personal and professional development. CEV considers it important to recognize volunteering as a source of non-formal and informal learning, while keeping a balance in order not to move the focus from the benefit to others to the benefit of the individual in the form of qualifications or recognition of skills.

So, apparently, volunteering can have all the goals of an unpaid internships, but can never be called an unpaid internship, because then it’s not volunteering? A European conference in April of this year in Romania supported by CEV and focused on managers of volunteers emphasizes that managers of volunteers should “be able to explain the definition of volunteering and differentiate it from other concepts such as civic engagement, internship, traineeship, etc.” – yes, that’s right, don’t you dare confuse pure volunteerism with impure and completely unrelated practices, like executives on loan, pro bono consultants, unpaid internships, etc., and it’s most certainly NOT community / civic engagement…

As a manager of volunteers, I don’t want to be just an HR assistant. There’s nothing wrong with HR assistants – I was one, actually, a long time ago, and it was an excellent work experience. But as a manager of volunteers, I want to be talking about how the organization will use volunteer engagement to better connect to the community and help meet our program goals. I want to see managers of volunteers invited to speak at conferences by the American Planning Association and or conferences for online community managers or conferences on building community.

In my speech to the South Carolina group earlier this year, I lamented that managers of volunteers are obsessed at being labeled “nice,” that we like to be thought of reliable, sweet and over-worked. And that thinking makes us expendable. What’s the first position to be cut in bad economic times? The manager of volunteers. Why? Because most people do NOT know what we do. They think anyone can do what we do. We contribute to this thinking ourselves, because of the old-fashioned approach to volunteer management and volunteer value:

To get other people to think of you differently, YOU have to start thinking of yourself differently… here are some words I’d like to hear about managers of volunteers in addition to nice:

daring
innovative
pioneering
unpredictable
instigator
radical
audacious
feisty
gutsy
cutting edge

How much longer are managers of volunteers going to marginalize themselves by having such a limited view of who volunteers are and why volunteers should be involved? Volunteering is community engagement, and such engagement is vital to any organization serving a cause or a community. It’s overdue to demand more from conferences and workshops about volunteerism. It’s overdue to reject limited views of the value of volunteerism. It’s overdue to demand more of ourselves.

humanitarian stories & photos – use with caution

Leave a reply

If you are going abroad, particularly to developing countries, even just for vacation rather than a humanitarian mission, be really careful and respectful in what you write for the public about your travels, including your use of social media – blogs, Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, etc. -, and what photos you take and post. Think about a post or photo carefully before you publish: is it accurate? Is it enlightening? Could it be seen as patronizing? What would the people I’m talking about say if they read what I said/saw my photos? Would it be acceptable for a stranger to talk about your community, and share photos of your children, on their blog in the way you are about to?

Earlier this month, National Public Radio did a story about how Zambians, other Africans and aid workers are using social media to show factual errors and condescending remarks in a memoir by British actress Louise Linton about her gap year. The hashtag being used is #LintonLies.

An excerpt from Linton’s book:

I still sometimes feel out of place. Whenever that happens, though, I try to remember a smiling gap-toothed child with HIV whose greatest joy was to sit on my lap and drink from a bottle of Coca-Cola.

Really? THAT moment was that child’s GREATEST JOY?! And that is the kind of circumstance that makes you feel not out of place? She also talks in her memoir about child soldiers in Zambia – something that is not actually an issue in Zambia. Throughout her book, she confuses Zambia with Congo and Rwanda. The Zambian embassy in London has even called her out.

And then there’s actress Debra Messing, who seems similarly confused about Africa being a country, and posted photos online recently that gave people the impression that her message was more about “look where I am!” than the people she was supposed to be there FOR on behalf of two NGOs, as dissected by a commentator at Jezebel.

It all looks like ‘White Savior Barbie’ come to life – White Savior Barbie is an Instagram account that hilariously parodies volunteer selfies in developing countries, as highlighted in this article on the Huffington Post. There’s also an article in the satirical magazine The Onion that mocks voluntourism , joking that a 6-day visit to a rural African village can “completely change a woman’s facebook profile picture.”

I actually have a little bit of sympathy for Messing. I know that they had good intentions. And we’ve all done things out of ignorance that we later, often quickly, regret. We all make cultural missteps. We all make communications missteps. And aid workers can get quite carried away in an ongoing and very smug game of more-in-tune-with-people-and-not-acting-privileged-than-thou when they mock volunteer humanitarians and others, and that can be just as bad as the missteps they mock. I’ve been called out a few times for things I’ve written my blogs from developing countries – sometimes I haven’t agreed with those criticisms, sometimes I have. But I hope I’ve never come from a place of “look at me going to save all these poor people!”

I also hope these missteps don’t stop people from sharing their adventures online, including photos:

UNICEF recognizes the enormous power of visual imagery such as this to engage, inform and inspire audiences – and to advocate for children’s rights. Photographs or film footage that depict real life situations of children, and UNICEF programmes supporting them, are one of the most effective ways to communicate these issues. — UNICEF Guidelines: Protecting children’s rights in corporate partner image use, viewed online in July 2016. More UNICEF photo guidelines here

I learn so much reading various posts on social media from people working in developing countries. It’s brave to put yourself and your thoughts and opinions out there, for public consumption. But be ready to revisit what you’ve said and thought online when it comes under public criticism.

And aid agencies, PLEASE train your workers, including volunteers and celebrity representatives, on how to use social media – and what not to do – before they start their work abroad or go on a field visit.

Check out this code of conduct resource from Child Rights International Network regarding taking photos of children in developing countries (really, anywhere).

Update October 21, 2016: “a hot mess” of “neo-colonialism, racism, hypocrisy and privilege.” A Christian ministry feels the backlash of a very ill-thought video of their impressions of Uganda. Another story about the video from NPR’s Goats & Soda.

Update May 10, 2017: A photo of a young girl being raped, used by the magazine LensCulture to promote a for-profit competition by Magnum, a prestigious photo agency, violated UNICEF’s ethical guidelines on reporting on children by showing the victim’s face, which makes her identifiable, and lacked any explanation regarding the enslavement and abuse of the girl. The incident also brought attention to a broader issue in photojournalism: how the Western media depicts — and often demeans — young women and girls in poor countries. More about the incident here (the photo is NOT shown on this page).

Update March 26, 2018: This story was originally published on November 26, 2017 and has been updated. An Instagram user who goes by the name of Jossa Johansson came under fire for the caption of a post with a photo of herself embracing a little girl from Kibera, Kenya. It began, “One of the happiest moment in your life was probably when you met me and my friends,” wrote Johansson. And from there, it gets even worse. The uproar reinforces the message of a joint campaign aimed at volunteers in developing countries: Think before you snap that photo (and write that caption). The campaign offers guidelines and a cheeky video to first-time travelers or young volunteers eager to capture every moment of their vacation or mission on Facebook or Instagram. It was created by Radi-Aid, a project of the Norwegian Students’ and Academics’ International Assistance Fund (SAIH) that fights stereotypes in aid and development, and by Barbie Savior, an Instagram parody account. A seemingly innocent selfie with African kids, for example, can perpetuate the idea that only Western aid, charity and intervention can “save the world,” says Beathe Ogard, president of SAIH in Norway. These children are portrayed as helpless and pitiful, Ogard says, while the volunteer is made out to be the superhero who will rescue them from their misery.

Also see:

Being emotionally ready to volunteer – or to continue volunteering
Extreme poverty is not beautiful – That there can be any confusion between living off-the-grid, simply, and living in extreme poverty is astounding to me. Yet, I’ve heard oh-so-privileged aid workers wax poetic about the “beauty” of poverty.
Vanity Volunteering: all about the volunteer – one of the most popular blogs I’ve ever written
Isn’t my good heart & desire enough to help abroad?
Voluntourism: use with caution
How to take photos in a culturally-sensitive manner, particularly with regard to respect for local customs regarding women, and to meet various needs, e.g. to show female participation. This resource was developed in 2007, for Afghan staff working out of an Afghanistan government agency, and is adaptable for various cultural settings. Obviously, it needs updating.
Photos & videos by & of volunteers online – privacy issues?
*Another* Afghanistan Handicraft program? Really?

Wikipedia needs improvement re: volunteerism-related topics

2 Replies

I’ve been updating Wikipedia again. I do that from time-to-time. This time, specifically, I’ve been updating information regarding days, weeks and months that have been designated for volunteers or about volunteerism by a major organization, a country or the United Nations, as well as updating information about organizations and associations for those that manage volunteers. You can see all my updates on Wikipedia, ever, here.

It’s unfortunate that there is no program or organization – not one – that sees what I’m doing on my own, when I have time, as an independent, lonely volunteer, as part of its own mission. The result of this lack of an official champion to mobilize contributors is that Wikipedia is severely lacking in accurate information related to volunteerism, and the volunteerism field is losing a lot of its history. For instance, many major events related to volunteerism aren’t mentioned on Wikipedia or are barely mentioned, like the Presidents’ Summit for America’s Future, a major event in 1997 in Philadelphia headed by then President Bill Clinton and former President George H. Bush.

But I’m getting tired. Cleaning up Wikipedia and making it an accurate, content-rich resource regarding volunteerism should be a group effort – it shouldn’t just be me. Because I don’t have time and I don’t have all the knowledge! And it shouldn’t be ad hoc, because what’s happening is that people are going on to Wikipedia and changing content on pages related on volunteerism based on how they feel, not based on facts and cited sources, and they know that no one is going to find their edits, because no one is really watching.

There should be an official edit-a-thon to make Wikipedia an accurate, content-rich resource regarding volunteerism. And I just do not have the resources, on my own, to organize an edit-a-thon. I would love to be a part of such an effort – and with funding, I would be happy to organize it, to ensure a range of people and organizations are involved. An edit-a-thon would get a lot of pages created, updated, and linked together, as appropriate, in a two days. It would be a concentration of forces to get the bulk of the work done quickly. It would help people after the hack-a-thon keep contributing accurate, appropriate information. It would create benefits long after the edit-a-thon ended.

Oh, well… in the meantime, below is what I’ve outlined as needing to be done on Wikipedia regarding volunteerism, in case anyone out there wants to help.

Pages that need to be created on Wikipedia:

International Association for Volunteer Effort (IAVE) – and once this page is created, it needs links from the Points of Light Foundation Wikipedia page (and vice versa), from the ICVA page (which still needs to be created), from the Association for Leaders in Volunteer Engagement (AL!VE) page (and vice versa), from the HandsOn Network page (and vice versa), and from the European Volunteer Centre (CEV) page (and vice versa)
International Council of Voluntary Agencies (ICVA) – and once this page is created, it needs all the same links as the aforementioned
Make A Difference Day (there is a very brief description of this day on the USA Weekend page – it should be its own page)
United We Serve (page does not exist). Once created, it should link to the Points of Light, the Corporation for National and Community Service, America’s Promise, Office of Social Innovation and Civic Participation, etc., and those pages should link to it.
Connect America (volunteerism-related page does not exist). This was an initiative of the March of Dimes and the Points of Light Foundation.
Association of Fundraising Professionals (page does not exist).
The entry for EU Aid Volunteers is a subsection on the Directorate-General for European Civil Protection and Humanitarian Aid Operations page. It should have its own page!

Pages related to volunteering that need updating, preferably from people intensely familiar with the organizations that are in charge of them (I created some of these pages, FYI, hence why they lack full info – much of what I wrote I had to track down on old web sites on archive.org because the associated web sites aren’t up-to-date for 2016):

June 20, 2017 update: I’ve created a Wikipedia page for National Philanthropy Day, November 15. It’s an observance designated by the Association of Fundraising Professionals – and AFP still doesn’t have a page, and I’ve done enough, someone else needs to create it.

Aug. 3, 2016 update: There is now an International Year of Volunteers – there is a Wikipedia page for IVY+10, and I’ve put on its “talk” page that it should be deleted, and remain a subsection of this main IYV page. I also note this on the IYV talk page. The IYV page needs much more information about national conferences that were held, publications that were made, and big events and activities that were organized in conjunction with IYV all over the world. It’s going to be a challenge, because all IYV web sites are long gone; if you remember the URL for an IYV-related initiative, you can type it into archive.org and review the old information. But do NOT cut and paste information from those sources onto the IYV page! You have to rewrite things and cite every source for every sentence or paragraph! Otherwise, the page will get deleted.

Pages that I consider a hot mess and in dire need of content improvement:

America’s Promise
Volunteering
Volunteer centers
Community service
International volunteerism (which is equated with Voluntourism – and those terms are NOT interchangeable!)
National service
National service USA

August 1, 2017 update: The Presidents’ Summit for America’s Future is currently a subsection of America’s Promise on Wikipedia. It should be its own page, with much more information.

Three pages that I’m not allowed to update anymore because other Wikipedia volunteers feel that my expertise gives me too much of a bias (oh, yeah, you read that right), but really need a cleanup:

There are Wikipedia pages regarding human resources management, but nothing on that page regarding how the management of volunteers is different, and there’s no page on the management of volunteers. There’s a page on virtual management but, again, no page on the management of volunteers. What I’m trying to say is that there needs to be a page about the management of volunteers!

One page that is decent, but needs to be reviewed to make sure it’s up-to-date: list of volunteer awards. Maybe there needs to be one page of days, weeks and years regarding volunteerism, like there is for this page for volunteer awards.

And then all of these pages need to be linked together appropriately and then be linked to and from other pages I haven’t mentioned here.

And all of that is just a START. My outline above isn’t comprehensive, and it is quite USA-centric. Volunteerism is a global phenomenon, yet you might not suspect such reading the aforementioned pages. And what are the Wikipedia pages like on these subjects in Spanish, German, French, Polish, Russian, and on and on?

Will anyone out there take up the call to host an edit-a-thon? Or will others with expertise in volunteerism join me in trying to improve these pages, without waiting for an edit-a-thon?

(Update July 21, 2016): If you decide to start helping with this effort, some advice:

Make sure the page you want to create doesn’t already exist under a different name.
Read carefully this official Wikipedia page: Wikipedia is not here to tell the world about your noble cause.
Make sure you keep information neutral. Write for an encyclopedia, not a brochure.
Use LOTS of citations for what you write, and don’t just use the official web site as your source material.
Look at similar pages as a template for the page you want to create or improve. For instance, I used existing pages regarding designated volunteering pages as a template to create new ones. A page on volunteer management should follow the style of the existing pages for human resources management and virtual management.
Once you create a page, make sure every Wikipedia page that mentions that organization or phrase links to it. For instance, whoever creates the United We Serve page needs to do a search on United We Serve on Wikipedia and make those phrases on other pages link back to the new page. Also, create links to the page under “See Also” on other pages, as appropriate. If you create a new page and don’t immediately create lots of links to it, it will be deleted.
This Wikipedia Cheatsheet is amazing.

If you decide to have an edit-a-thon to address these many problems on Wikipedia regarding its lack of accurate, complete information related to volunteering and national service, please carefully read these official Wikipedia guidelines on how to hold such.

Wikipedia has a guideline on conflict of interest that states, “You are discouraged from writing articles about yourself or organizations (including their campaigns, clients, products and services) in which you hold a vested interest.” If you represent the organization being talked about on a Wikipedia page, you are supposed to make any editing suggestions on the article’s talk page, using the template {{Request edit}}; supposedly, this will help draw attention to your request and some Wikipedian somewhere will make the edit. The reality is that this rarely happens, and your edit request may languish forever (mine do on the pages Wikipedia has decided I can’t edit anymore). By all means, use the Talk pages as recommended by Wikipedia, but once you do that, it’s best to mobilize your own volunteers that are familiar with Wikipedia and your organization to actually get these edits done. Make sure those volunteers have user talk pages that provides full details on who they are, and their entirely volunteer, unpaid status with your organization.

(Update March 7, 2019): As many of you know, Susan J. Ellis has passed away. I have been working on a Wikipedia page for her for three years – yes, THREE years – and in conjunction with #WIKI4WOMEN, a virtual volunteering initiative led by UNESCO and Wikimedia celebrating International Women’s Day 2019, I’ve published it today. Will it last, or will an over-zealous and probably male Wikipedian delete it, deeming it as not really noteworthy? I hope that I have enough citations and justification on the Talk page so that it will last. You could help by adding a link to Susan’s Wikipedia page somewhere appropriate on the Wikipedia page regarding virtual volunteering – a page I’m not allowed to edit because Wikipedians have deemed me “too close” to the subject matter – and adding anything to her page about her or her work that comes from a source other than her own books or web site – a book review, a commentary on her work, etc. I don’t know how to add a photograph and prove that I have permission to do so, so if you can do that, awesome.

(Update April 9, 2021): I continue to tweet and otherwise post about this idea for an edit-a-thon to improve the information on Wikipedia regarding volunteerism. Still no interest from anyone. No one. Another page that needs to be created in Wikipedia: one regarding Ivan H. Scheier, one of the true American pioneers of the field of volunteerism. I just cannot do this by myself, friends.

Jayne Cravens / CoyoteBroad Blog

Commentary, resources & discussion re: nonprofits/ngos, communications, community engagement, volunteerism, effective humanitarian aid & development, ethics, women's empowerment & management ethics. Posts 1st & 3rd Mondays of each month..

Tag Archives: volunteers

Song of frustration re: volunteering

Nonprofits can learn from motorcycle manufacturers? Yes!

Promises & Pitfalls of Global Health Volunteering

Research needs re: virtual volunteering

assigning law breakers to community service: worthwhile?

Volunteer management is community engagement

Wikipedia needs improvement re: volunteerism-related topics