OLD Jayne Blog on nonprofits/ngos, communications, community engagement, volunteerism, aid & development, women's empowerment, & random thoughts

gas crisis as opportunity for volunteers?

12:50, 5 June 2008

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Susan Ellis of Energize has written yet another great "Hot Topic of the Month" regarding volunteer involvement, this time asking, Is the Rising Cost of Gas a Crisis or an Opportuity for Volunteering? She then reviews ways this crisis can be addressed, including using online tools to hold audio and video conferences (my favorite video tool continues to be iVisit, which is free.

The only caution, in my own opinion, is that online meetings require organizations to be much more organized and focused; it's interesting how easy organizations find it to invite volunteers and others to an onsite meeting that doesn't really have a focus or set agenda -- for some, it feels "nice" just to get together. However, participants want online meetings to be much more focused; they don't tolerate online time wasters (unless it involves, say, shooting a virtual basketball into a virtual net). I've fallen in love with online meetings, because I feel like my time is much more valued as a participant: start and end times are adhered to, staying on-topic is encouraged, I always get an agenda before the meeting, etc.

Also, the gas crisis is presenting an opportunity for organizations and volunteers to be greener! Gas prices or not, it's long-overdue for nonprofits to:

• add information on their web sites about what bus stops are nearest to their offices/venues, arrival and departure times for those bus stops, and links to the city's mass transit department web site for more information (what a great task for an online volunteer!)
• create a safe place for volunteers and staff to park their bicycles (this is something that can be done in cooperation with nearby businesses and other organizations)
• encourage car pooling (which is easy to coordinate if you already have an online discussion group, either email-based or web-based, for your volunteers)

Here in Germany, I see volunteers escorting elderly clients to and from the grocery, and its usually via a bus rather than a car. I know that mass transit in the USA is rather dreadful in terms of being conveniently available, but all too often, I see people ignoring the bus stop just a few blocks away that would take them very near their ultimate destination.

Check out Susan's thoughts and start thinking for yourself about how you can use the gas crisis as a prompt to work with volunteers in new ways, and to encourage your organization to be greener!