Volunteer Managers- Thoughtful on Thursdays.

A group of people involved in the management of volunteers have kicked off a movement called "Thoughtful Thursdays". These people are using Twitter to to share ideas on topics related to the  volunteer engagement.

Last week's theme was tools and ideas to measure impact with a blog post written by Emma_C_Shelter on measuring volunteer impact as the kick off..

Comments can be left on the blog or by adding the hashtag #ttvolmgrs, people can join the conversation viaTwitter.

To help measure Thoughtful Thursday, the organisers are asking if people to  spend a minute filling in what they hope is the world's shortest Survey Monkey as well.

See you at #ttvolmgrs!

Ten Questions about Volunteer Management

DJ Cronin on his blog has asked ten questions about volunteering to the sector:


1.In 20 words or less describe/define Volunteer Management

2.What are the 3 main differences between Volunteer Management and Human Resource Management?

3.Where is the current leadership evident in Volunteer Management?

4.Finish this sentence in less than 50 words… An association in Volunteer Management should…

5.There have been many debates on the definition of volunteering itself. How would you define volunteering?

6.If you weren’t doing this what other profession would you have been interested in?

7.Who do you believe has been the most inspiring volunteer in history?

8.Where do you think social media can take volunteerism and Volunteer Management?

9.Does Government "get" (understand) volunteering? If not why not?

10.What would you like to achieve personally in the volunteerism world?



Check out my answers on his blog. 

What do I need to have to manage volunteers?

There are several debates / discussions going on online right now regarding what the qualifications should be for those in charge of volunteers at a nonprofit, NGO, government program, etc. 

Jayne Cravens details her viewpoint in her blog. She says: "That's a hot topic right now, and there is a LOT of disagreement about it" 

She has links to all these various debates happening online right now. You can find her blog here.

Volunteer Management Skills

Sue Hine who writes the blog Management 4 Volunteers says: "Your excellent blogs of May 24 and June 6 have reminded me of the cartoon drawn up at the first Aus Retreat for Advanced Management, Canberra 2005 (see below).  Worth resurrecting I think"

Sue, you are right. Here is a volunteer manager top to toe:

• Close to sainthood
• visionary
• Big ears = good listener
• Ability to sniff out new opportunity
• Passion
• Hidden talents
• Conflict Resolution
• Dynamic
• Fast Action

Thanks Sue!

What skills does a 21st C Manager of Volunteers need?

In my workshop session today, we concluded that "volunteering" which has evolved and changed rapidly in the last ten years will again look very different in ten years. The way volunteers are coordinated and managed will change rapidly. For example:

• If "mandatory" volunteering continues to increase, this will change the way we recruit and screen volunteers.
• The increasingly sophisticated involvement by corporates in supporting volunteerism will impact structure of volunteer roles
• Social media will change the way we market volunteering, recruit and recognise volunteers
• The lifestyles of Boomers will change the way we offer roles
• The acceptance that many volunteers have very high level of skills will change the way we train volunteers.

We played with some quite radical scenarios for a volunteer program in 2021. For example:

• not calling volunteers "volunteers"
• not having managers of volunteers as we know them today
• using apps to recruit volunteers
• employing paid people to undertake "menial" or routine tasks and engaging volunteer skills to  undertake high level work eg establishing marketing strategies or fundraising campaigns

As a group, we dont know which ones of those will happen but we did identify the skills needed for a 21st Century volunteer manager. What do you think of the lists? How many of those are in the people managing your volunteers? How many are you developing in yourself?

The Power and the Passion in Volunteer Management

In the Global Volunteer Management Survey there were very few correlations for length of service of managers of voluntaries. We looked at degree, salary, size of programs- no consistent correlations. What then makes a person stay in volunteer management?

The one factor that I personally believe will guarantee the longevity of someone in the volunteerism field? Passion for volunteering.

Really understanding volunteering is like a religion. You can study religious texts and precepts but until you have a “conversion:” experience, the religion is simply formulaic and ritualistic.

To be successful manager of volunteers, to be a successful volunteer centre, you need to believe in volunteering. It may even be good to have volunteered or be volunteering yourself?

I will go further. Some of those who don't have a real passion for volunteering are to my eyes, some of the most  defensive, narrow minded and undermining people in the volunteering sector. Others who don't really "get" volunteering resort to motherhood statements and platitudes  to try and understand it.. I recently  reviewed a government document clearly written by a bureaucrat who didn't really get the power of volunteering and reverted instead to platitudes about volunteering such as "helping the community" and "Volunteering is the Hallmark of our society" 

Some people chose volunteer management because they thought it would be “an easy gig”. Volunteering is seen as easy therefore volunteer management is seen to be a job that could be akin to a holiday! What a sign that they don't really understand volunteer management.

Some who dont "get this field have fallen by the wayside- leaving for other roles. Some have stubbornly stayed and some have had their "conversion experience" and have become great advocates for the sector. 

That's my theory. Now, prove me wrong.  

Have we gone too far?

On Wednesday, I spoke with the Advanced Volunteer Managers Networking Group of the Northwest Volunteer Administrators Association in Portland, Oregon. 


I was looking at the question: "have we gone too far'. In the last decade volunteering has become more organized, more structured and more sophisticated. 

We now have a position where I believe 40% of agencies are way behind the game in terms of volunteer management. This is based on my work providing training and consultancy to agencies and undertaking Volunteer Program Assessments. One third are on the way to "getting it right", a very small number are indeed there.  Some are poised in the verge of taking steps "too far" and are in danger of creating volunteer programs that are too organized, too structured and too controlled. 


The question I posed was how do we balance professionalization & the spirit of volunteering?


I suggested four broad strategies to tackle this balance:

1. Becoming Wholistic Volunteer Managers
2. Identifying the Real Risks in our programs (ie not being too cautious or too complacent)
3. Viewing Volunteers as Customers giving us their most precious resource: time
4. Being real about the protections we need on our programs

The group identified ten actions that we could do to achieve these (notes will be added here soon regarding these).


I asked participants to identify which action(s) they were going to take and make a commitment to starting them in two months. I also asked them to pair up to find an "accountability buddy" to check in with their progress. (I have done this a few times and today, one of the participants fed back while they liked meeting another volunteer manager they did not having them check up on her.).


My average score for the training was 9.1 out of ten. One person gave me 30 out of ten which we rounded to 10 out of 10 (Thank you to that person).


Pictured here with me are Carie Bauer of Oregon Volunteers and Victoria Eggleston, Volunteer Coordinator for the City of Tualation, Oregon

What you can Expect

Welcome to The Cowling Report. As someone who works extensively to support the community sector I want this blog to be of maximum assistance to yourself not just an entertaining diversion or therapy for me!

There are seven things that will appear in The Cowling Report:

1. Commentary on Key issues impacting the Community sector and the Board members, volunteers and employees who work in the sector
2. Guest Bloggers from around the globe
3. Conference Reports:-I will take you to key Conferences and see whats going on
4. Tuesday Resource Report-frank reviews and comments on Community Sector resources from around the world
5. Wednesday- An Inspirational post to get you over "Hump Day"
6. Ideas for helping with the work of those working  in the community/not for profit sectors
7. Friday Facts- useful and timely facts and info released that week

What do you think? Comments below please! Thank you

So hop in, strap up and lets take the Blogging journey together! Thanks for being a part of this!

Welcome to The Cowling Report

I speak to about 10 000 people a year in Workshops and Seminars globally and write for our monthly People First E-News which goes to 6000 readers monthly. Got the Facebook but I have resisted having my own blog for ages. I am now entering the Blog World thanks to encouragement from three other bloggers:-

 Jayne Cravens (author of the Coyote Communications Blog)





DJ Cronin (author of the Blog: A musing on Volunteer Management)






Sue Hine (author of:  Management4Volunteers Blog)


I also want to acknowledge the urging of  three of the world's leading experts in Volunteer Management to get writing

Betty Stallings of Building Better Skills. Yes, Betty, the book is coming!

Susan J Ellis,  Energize Inc, Everyone Ready and E-Volunteerism

 

and Andy Fryar of OzVPM, 

My hope is that this will be a  no holds barred full and frank discussion about working in the community sector for or with Volunteers, and/or Boards and/or Management. Please do communicate your feedback as we move ahead!