ALL staff - not just the volunteer manager - should involve volunteers
19:49, 5 May 2009
.. Posted in Volunteerism and Volunteer Management.. Link
A discussion on UKVPMs had me thinking yet again about how hard it can be to encourage staff to create volunteering activities in support of their own work.
There's only one way for volunteers to be seen as essential within an organization, and that's for more than one staff person to be working with volunteers. A variety of staff members should be creating assignments, supporting volunteers in those assignments, and acknowledging the impact of volunteers in their work. Yes, a single volunteer coordinator is critically important, either to undertake or to track volunteer recruiting, as well as to develop volunteer policies and procedures, track all volunteers and their contributions, ensure volunteers are supported and recognized, train staff in working with volunteers, and even to involve volunteers him or herself. But volunteers won't be seen as essential within an organization if the only person working with them is the designated volunteer manager or coordinator. Volunteers will be "nice", but not necessary -- and the same will hold true for how much the volunteer coordinator is valued by the organization as well.
Involving volunteers in a variety of tasks so that they work with a variety of staff members not only makes volunteers essential to an organization; it also shows that organization welcomes the public to participate in its activities, to observe, to comment, even to criticize. It also creates financial donors; volunteers are much more likely to become financial contributors if they see the excellent work of an organization firsthand and feel a part of it.
Getting staff to identify tasks that can involve volunteers is often difficult. Asking, "how could volunteers help you?" often leads to blank stares or the answer, "I don't need *volunteers*." Different questions that don't start off talking about volunteers immediately can be more effective. For instance:
- What job activities do you feel would benefit the organization but that you cannot take on now because of lack of time or lack of resources?
- What do you wish people could see about this organization that would help them realize how valuable this organization is to the community/the mission we serve?
- If you could get a grant to hire a consultant with a particular area of expertise to help you with a part of your job for two months, what kind of consultant would you hire/what project would this consultant work on?
- What expertise or skill do you not have but that you feel, if you or another staff member had it and could help you, would benefit the community/misson we serve?
- What tasks are your responsibility that you wish you could delegate so you could spend more time on other essential responsibilities?
- What do our clients wish our organization was doing now, but isn't, because we lack the funds and resources to do so?
Ask these questions in a variety of settings; casually, over lunch or coffee. Formally, in a one-on-one meeting and/or via a written survey. The more conversational you can be in asking these questions, the more likely you are to get honest answers. Be ready with answers to common arguments against involving volunteers, such as, "This task is too important for a volunteer" or "This task involves confidentiality and, therefore, volunteers can't be involved." If the task can be done by a human, it can be done by a volunteer.
Also, if you are the volunteer coordinator, lead by example: how do you involve volunteers in high-responsibility roles? As advisers? As short-term project managers? As managers of other volunteers? How many of your volunteers are highly-skilled and highly-trained, and using these skills as a part of volunteering to support you?
