The merged organisation would be known as the National Council for Voluntary Organisations but with an additional "strapline". It will retain the brands for Volunteering England and Institute for Volunteering Research.
I believe NCVO are a great organisation and a very, very logical merger choice. There will be some things that will go, I suspect. Eventually, Institute for Volunteering Research will be integrated into the wider NCVO Research area. Policy issues around Volunteering will need to compete for space amongst the many good issues NCVO tackle. The voice of managers of volunteers will be less heard. Advocacy for volunteers needs to be considered amongst the backdrop that NCVO focuses on organisational issues. Funding applications for NCVO will need to consider a number of issues including volunteerism. If there is not strong advocacy internally for volunteering, the issue may have less impact than it currently does in the UK.
On the other hand, it could mean that something survives in a bleak economic environment.
I have been predicting for three years now, we will see wholesale consolidation of the Volunteering infrastructure" sector. We have seen:
- the almost complete disappearance of Volunteering Australia this month.
- the 2007 merger with Hands On/Points of Light in the USA
- Volunteer Canada's major funding challenge following the change of government there
- the merger of Volunteering Ireland/Volunteer Centres Ireland.
These mergers show us that volunteer infrastructure development is still not "sexy". We have not sold it well at any level. I wonder if Reimagining Service will help over in the USA. Otherwise, we are going backwards globally and the loss of VE will be felt widely.
Always an interesting and difficult decision, balancing ensuring there is someone representing volunteering, volunteers and volunteer managers vs going it alone and risking collapse and no voice. Some thought-provoking articles have come out recently about how real the benefits of merging or sharing back-office functions are. It's never advisable in the long-term to merge just to stay alive, is it better to dilute and merge or restructure, rethink, reassess, regroup and come back leaner and stronger?
ReplyDeleteHurrah - someone else is pointing out the huge change rearing in front of the Volunteer Sector, globally and locally. Thanks Martin. In my crystal ball I see increasing intervention from government and business sectors, and philanthropists controlling who gets what funding (they have been doing that for a while). All under the rubric of 'social enterprise', as though this is going to save the world economy. I blogged on this recently: http://management4volunteers.wordpress.com/2012/06/10/the-changing-volunteer-world/, and there will be more to come. The big one, as you have noted, is the absence of a voice on management of volunteers, as though they will no longer count in the brave new world of the future. I am all for collaboration and cooperation, and even a merger or two, but please, not at the expense of the role of Civil Society, that Third Leg of the stool that can keep Government and Business grounded.
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