400 people attended the Volunteering Australia conference on the Gold Coast. The number was down from their original 600 target. Whether the numbers were down because of the high cost, change of date and venue, the recession or the program we will never know.
We do know that about 1000 people read my blog post on the high cost of the Conference and not one person disagreed with my comments. Volunteering Australia sadly ignored the blog post which is I would suggest a poor response to such a large group of their constituents and poor social media strategy.
We do know that Conference keynote speaker Michael Kirby was his usual brilliant self and that The Hon Tanya Plibersek MP launched the long awaited national volunteer strategy for Australia. I will comment on the strategy next week.
We also know that the hashtag #VolAus11 has over 800 twitter comments from over 130 participants. They included:
RT @neridagill: RT @creativewire: Recruiting volunteers is not about 'asking for a favour', it's about giving yr volunteers something meaningful #volaus11
Congrats to Cary and the team at Volunteering Australia on a very successful and beneficial conference. You should be very proud! #volaus11
RT @CreativeWire: The not-for-profit market is 7 times larger than the mining sector in Australia #volaus11
Awesome->RT @ProBonoNews: 'Many of the leaders in volunteering are corporate groups' says Vol Aust of their research #volaus11
Conference attendees, my readers and I would love your feedback. Please leave some comments. You can be anonymous or open.
We do know that about 1000 people read my blog post on the high cost of the Conference and not one person disagreed with my comments. Volunteering Australia sadly ignored the blog post which is I would suggest a poor response to such a large group of their constituents and poor social media strategy.
We also know that the hashtag #VolAus11 has over 800 twitter comments from over 130 participants. They included:
RT @neridagill: RT @creativewire: Recruiting volunteers is not about 'asking for a favour', it's about giving yr volunteers something meaningful #volaus11
Congrats to Cary and the team at Volunteering Australia on a very successful and beneficial conference. You should be very proud! #volaus11
RT @CreativeWire: The not-for-profit market is 7 times larger than the mining sector in Australia #volaus11
Awesome->RT @ProBonoNews: 'Many of the leaders in volunteering are corporate groups' says Vol Aust of their research #volaus11
Conference attendees, my readers and I would love your feedback. Please leave some comments. You can be anonymous or open.
If VA say 400 attended or around 400 you can divide that by 4 then multiply by 3 and add some more 'perhaps' to equal 300plus...However, 400 sounds better than just 300plus;doesn't it?
ReplyDeleteFor if it was well in excess of 400 you would want to state the exact numbers, say 411,425,455,because they all sound better than 400 or around 400 doesn't it? If it was 490 they could have rightly claimed almost 500 attended!Better still!!
Seems to me they have an integrity as well as a Pr, leadership, communication and vision problem too!
I wonder when the brochure for the next National Conference will be out; before Christmas or January 2012?
Other comments? Any attendees comment on the numbers?
ReplyDeleteAs a conference attendee I was relatively pleasantly surprised. I was aware of the politics and the discussions over the cost of the conference (which I have to say i agree with)I enjoyed most of the conference and came away enthused and inspired to be involved in volunteer management. The Plenary speakers I thought were very good - and as is normal of any conference I found some of the sessions a little average. I do still feel a little disappointed at the cost of the conference. As someone who works for a large organisation I am able to justify the cost of the ticket, however for the small NFPs they are unable to do the same - and unfortunately a number of the larger organisations actually miss out on learning about all the innovative volunteer ideas and projects these smaller NFPs have to put in place. At the conference there was some discussion around social inclusion - in some ways the cost of this conference is making is somewhat elitest and is now moving towards isolating those that cannot afford to go. Food for thought.
ReplyDeleteHere is a link to a report by Anna Maio who represented Volunteering Victoria: http://www.volunteeringvictoria.com.au/media-releases/volunteering-victoria-quotes/601-reflections-on-the-national-conference-2011
ReplyDelete