About Jayne Cravens

Community Relations & Communications consulting for nonprofit organizations, NGOs, civil society organizations, charities, schools, public sector/government agencies & other mission-based agencies. I develop and update resources regarding marketing, public relations, social media, volunteer engagement and donor cultivation, all available on my web site. I also consult regarding program development and strategic planning, such as for government and nonprofit officials and members of the press from other countries who are in the USA through the State Department's International Visitor Leadership Program (IVLP). Most recently, I prepared and delivered several workshops and consultations for organizations rapidly transitioning into online service delivery, especially regarding volunteer engagement/virtual volunteering, per the COVID-19 pandemic - clients included University College Dublin Volunteers Overseas (UCDVO), Iowa Commission on Volunteer Service, and the Office of Healthcare Information and Counseling (USA federal agency), for its among many others (April – June 2020). I also regularly research and develop materials regarding how rumor and myth can derail development or relief efforts, and ways to address such and I authored and distribute for free Basic Fund-Raising for Small NGOs in the Developing World.



I began in August 2022 working part-time, managing the public relations and marketing part-time for this Habitat for Humanity International affiliate in Oregon and its ReStore. The affiliate serves a large, mostly rural area of less than 400 sq miles 940 km2, much of it unincorporated and outside the Portland Metro Urban Growth Boundary (UGB), which bisects Washington County. The overall population of the area is less than 50,000. The largest cities in the service area have populations of about 26,000 people, about 13,400 people and about 3500 people, respectively. More than 10 percent of the population identifies as Hispanic or Latino. My primary goal is to increase awareness about Habitat's local efforts to address affordable housing, about Habitat's efforts to help vulnerable home owners with critical home repairs that allow them to stay in their homes. I also have a focus on increasing sales of the Forest Grove ReStore, which is a vital funding component for the local affiliate, as well as increasing awareness of the ReStore regarding its connection to Habitat for Humanity and as a recycle and reuse option. I also want to greater diversity in who is volunteering with and donating to the affiliate. I manage the West Tuality Habitat web site and the Forest Grove ReStore web site, and you can see examples of my online outreach via the West Tuality Habitat for Humanity Facebook and Instagram pages, the Forest Grove ReStore Facebook and Instagram pages, and the affiliate's Twitter and Reddit accounts. 


 



I have been associated with TechSoup.org since the 1990s, when it was called CompuMentor. As a paid contractor over the years, I have provided online community (forum) management and strategy development, management of online volunteers, management of its microvolunteering initiative Donate Your Brain, and advised on volunteer engagement  (March 2011 to April 2014 and again in 2020). I've contributed to various TechSoup materials to support nonprofits in using computer and Internet technology, and when I'm not working as a contractor of TechSoup, I continue as an online volunteer to the TechSoup forum, contributing information regarding ICT4D, Tech4Good and Apps4Good initiatives, as well as to discussions about tech ethics. You can see a list of my contributions to the TechSoup forum, in date reverse order.


 




In July and August, I taught MGT 553 Using Technology to Build Community and Grow Your Organization for Gratz College. The course was a part of the college's MS in Nonprofit Management. The course, which I spent five months designing, examined online networking tools that can be used to foster connectivity, communication, and collaboration in order to strengthen nonprofit and religious-based organizations. I used two books, online readings, podcasts and my own audiovisual materials to explore how mission-based initiatives can use online tools to create a sense of community among donors, volunteers, clients, neighbors and partners, and how to attract new people to be a part of those communities. It’s a class about facilitation, trust-building, outreach, and working with humans - online. Here is the curriculum. You can see all university-level teaching and courses I can teach are listed here, as well as all of my previous teaching experience.
 
 
Manager, (consultant contract) Accessibility Internet Rally (AIR), a program Knowbility. September 2019 to February 2020. I have consulted with Knowbility over the years since its founding in 1998, most in relation to its Accessibility Internet Rally,  a pioneering virtual volunteering and corporate social responsibility initiative. I designed the original support materials and training for participating nonprofits when the event was onsite, and completely redesigned the support and training, and provided such, entirely online in 2018. In my last role, I managed both client participation (nonprofits and artists) and team (online volunteers - more than 150) support and participation for AIR, as well as managing onsite events in association with AIR in Austin, Texas. This involved using a variety of tools - YouTube videos (which I edited and captioned myself), Basecamp, Slack and, of course, email. I also helped upgrade Knowbility's processes to involve and support volunteers. This now-entirely online digital inclusion experience evolved from one of the first hackathon events anywhere, starting back in 1998, and I was also involved with its launch and the first three onsite rallies.

 
 
Fall 2015 Duvall Leader in Residence at the University of Kentucky’s Center for Leadership Development (CFLD), part of UK’s College of Agriculture, Food and Environment (October 2015).

My lectures, consultations and online activities at UK, onsite in Lexington, were focused on leadership development and community development and engagement as both relate to the use of online media. I guest lectured in five under graduate and graduate level classes, conducted five workshops for nonprofit and community representatives, and consultations for the CFLD for its future social media activities.
All university-level teaching and courses I can teach are listed here, and include all of my previous teaching experience.

 
 
The Last Virtual Volunteering Guidebook
by Jayne Cravens and Susan J. Ellis
available for purchase as a paperback & an ebook , published by Energize, Inc.
documenting best practices for working with online volunteers, based on the more than three decades that virtual volunteering has been happening. It covers every aspect of involving remote volunteers, including recruitment, on-boarding, orienting, training, supporting and recognizing volunteers. It also covers different ways to involve volunteers, including online mentoring, online counseling, microvolunteering, and high-responsibility roles, as well as ensuring safety of both online volunteers and those they work with. Whether your program is introducing online tasks for current volunteers or you are expanding your virtual volunteering engagement, this book can help - and is far cheaper than hiring me as a consultant! Associated with the book is the Virtual Volunteering Wiki, which has two sections that are frequently updated: the virtual volunteering news section and the research section. Buy now.  Read the reviews.

 
 
SURGE Communications Specialist, United Nations and UNDP Ukraine, onsite in Kyiv, (Aug. 3 - Oct. 3, 2014). Activities included drafting and re-drafting the revised strategy for the UN’s work in Ukraine (all UN agencies there), per the drastic changes in the country earlier in 2014; rapidly editing and rewriting document proposals, press releases, web pages, meeting and field reports, etc.; drafting a marketing plan for a UNDP project focused on getting Ukrainians to care about and take action regarding climate change (per the agreements from the UNCED Rio de Janeiro conference/Earth Summit); drafting a strategy to leverage most UN days in some way via social media and, in some cases, traditional means (onsite events, press tours, etc.); live-tweeting the UNDP Ukraine Social Good #inno4dev #2030now summit and blogging about how future events might be more interactive and produce something by the end of the day (more than knowledge-sharing); invented the #uatech4good tag; mapped all of the various UN agencies and programs in Ukraine regarding their online activities and created a page on the UN web site where anyone could find such; researching and drafting recommendations for how various UN agencies, particularly UNDP, could use social media to promote respect, tolerance and perhaps even reconciliation in Ukraine; and helping to develop simple ways to leverage the Humans of New York focus on Ukraine. Here is a list of all I did in Ukraine.

For another UNDP colleague based in the New York City office, I edited reports, primarily regarding clarity, for the Rule of Law, Justice & Security Unit, part of the Conflict Prevention & Recovery Team in UNDP's Bureau for Crisis Prevention and Recovery (Jan. 2011).
 
 
Virtual volunteering potential in the EU
Researching Internet-mediated volunteering (virtual volunteering, online volunteering, digital volunteering, microvolunteering, crowd-sourcing, etc.) in the countries of the European Union for the ICT4EMPL Future Work project, undertaken by the European Commission / Joint Research Centre / Institute for Prospective Technological Studies / Information Society Unit.
Included the compiling of case studies, highlighting efforts at NGOs through the EU.
An additional goal of the research was to explore how virtual volunteering might provide opportunities for entrepreneurship and employment, skills and social inclusion, and transition from education to employment for young people. The research culminated into a wiki, a presentation by me in Brussels, Belgium in June 2013, and a final paper.

On separate project, I provided expert advice, research and strategy development regarding the online volunteering component of the EU Aid Volunteers initiative, through People In Aid and France Volontaire (Nov. 2013–April 2014).

 

           
Short-term consultation clients have also included Greenpeace, e-wolontariat (Poland), Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife, VolunteerMatch, Mennonite Central Committee Thrift Shops, Friends of Family Farmers and Pro Bono Net, among many, many other local, regional, national and international organizations. You can see a complete list of these speaking engagements and short-term consultants here.



 
I have written press materials, promoted expert volunteering opportunities (for volunteers with specific professional skills) to recruit volunteers and developed a workshop on how to use Facebook for sales and customer service for Bpeace (Business Council for Peace), a UNIFEM (now UN Women) partner and non-profit organization that mobilizes business professionals as volunteers to help entrepreneurs in countries emerging from conflict and war to expand local businesses and create employment, especially for women (and thereby build a peaceful, prosperous future). Bpeace has worked in Rwanda, Afghanistan, Guatemala and El Salvador, and most recently Bpeace mobilized expert volunteers to mentor 17 young female Syrian refugees in Lebanon. Read more about this experience working with BPEACE. The Last Virtual Volunteering Guidebook, includes recommendations by Bpeace regarding working with online volunteers.

 
 
Researching and building a wiki that identified suggestions, resources and standard practices for communities of practice/knowledge networks for a joint project by the Corporation of National and Community Service and for TechSoup.org (March - September 2012). This included creating and delivering a webinar for CNCS staff that manage online communities (September 2012). The wiki is not longer available at its original host, but you can access an archived version by cutting and pasting knowledgenetworks.wikispaces.com into archirve.org. This was the latest in a long association I have had with CNCS and the Points of Light Foundation, including being an invited presenter at their National Service Annual Conference in Washington, D.C. (2005), Minneapolis, Minnesota (2001), Orlando, Florida (2000), and New York City (1997).

 
 
Various online consultations for the Ministry of Rural Rehabilitation and Development in Kabul, Afghanistan, including creating guidance on using social media and reviewing social media strategies, editing articles, reports for donors, program reports, scripts and other materials for the communications office at the Rural Water and Sanitation Programme (RuWatSan) (2009-2019) and revising and advising on the communications strategy for CARD-F, a joint initiative of three federal ministries in Afghanistan, including MRRD, to promote sustainable growth in legal rural incomes and employment and reduce poppy cultivation (November 2011).

 
 
I developed a strategy to cultivate greater activity on the forums and blogs of Active Learning Network for Accountability and Performance in Humanitarian Action (ALNAP), to better cultivate its online community of practice / knowledge network for humanitarian agencies, and I  trained ALNAP staff online to carry out this strategy (Oct. 2010 - Jan. 2011). ALNAP is based in London and works to improve humanitarian response worldwide.

 
 
EducationUSA is a global network supported by the U.S. Department of State, that works to help people in other countries explore studying at the university level in the USA. EducationUSA affiliates are often independent nonprofits, and provide a range of services, including an in-house library of university print material, English tests and workshops. I designed and lead an all-day intensive onsite workshop regarding business planning, monetizing services, and donor/client relations for education advising centers throughout Eastern and Western Europe, gathered in Budapest, Hungary (Jan. 2011). I also created a similar all-day workshop for and consulted with centers based throughout the Balkans regarding strategic planning and demonstrating program credibility and transparency, in Belgrade, Serbia (Dec. 2009).

 
 
For three weeks, I toured Australia, leading an advanced onsite retreat on volunteer management and designing and leading eight additional intensive, all-day trainings at volunteer centers throughout Southern Australia (Brisbane, Tasmania, Melbourne and Perth) on various subjects regarding the support and engagement of volunteers, at the invitation of fellow volunteer management consultants (March 2010).

Materials from these presentations and consultation, as well as interactions with people working with volunteers across Australia, lead to several blogs and materials on my web site, including No Complaints Means Success? and The volunteer as bully = the toxic volunteer (one of the most popular blogs on my web site).


Developed a customized strategy for the Virginia State Office of Rural Health on the effective use of free and low-cost online networking tools to improve business processes of the office staff, many of whom were new to the Internet except for email, and delivered an onsite training for staff (2009). 


Several projects for Energize, Inc's Everyone Ready, an intensive staff development plan for national organizations, including writing and recording portions of a curriculum regarding "Social Networking and Volunteer Involvement", authoring "Communication Is the Key: Keep Connected to Volunteers" conducted evaluations for national and international organizations (the American Red Cross, Catholic Charities, Planned Parenthood, the Humane Society US, American Lung Association, American Association of Retired Persons (AARP), National Kidney Foundation, and the US Army) regarding the effectiveness of their web sites per volunteer recruitment, involvement, advocacy, and support (2005 - 2009). I also continue to write guest blogs for Energize. 

 
For a full year, I served as the coordinator of volunteers (all online), editor and contributor for advice pages, and the online forum moderator for the Aid Workers Network (2008), an organization that was chartered in London, England as a charitable organization and launched entirely by online volunteers who were experienced humanitarian and aid workers. I also authored and implemented volunteer policies and a volunteer recruitment and support system for the network (2007 - 2008). This nonprofit organization is now defunct, but the Aid Workers Network web site, www.aidworkers.net, is archived at archirve.org. Prior to this role, I authored volunteer policies and procedures and recommendations for volunteer management for LINGOS / Learning for International NGOS (2007).

 
Advised the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) regarding business models for its Open Training Platform (2007) and created a module regarding effectively involving volunteers for UNESCO's Multimedia Training Kit, for trainers working in telecenters, community radio, and other ICT4D initiatives (2005). These materials covered fundraising, charging fees, creating activities for volunteers, recruiting volunteers and supporting those volunteers and were developed for use by small NGOs and initiatives in developing countries, including Africa, Asia, Arab states, South America and Eastern European countries.

Here's an interview I did for the Chronicle of Philanthropy that I have no memory of whatsoever, from 2002: regarding what the early days in theater public relations and marketing taught me that I still utilize in my current work.