Engaging Volunteers

Want to Help Our Troops? Help Them Volunteer

Robert Rosenthal — Thu, 12 Nov 2009 21:15:02 +0000

The traditional approach to volunteering and our veterans has been to encourage Americans to get involved at local organizations as a way to support the troops — by partnering with organizations that deliver services and programs to vets, active military personnel, or military families, Americans can do their part to salute the men and women who protect and defend our nation.

But there’s another way volunteering can help troops: by providing our active and veteran forces with ways to find meaning and purpose in our local communities after they return home.

On Veterans Day yesterday, VolunteerMatch and Target Corporation announced a new partnership to make it easier for veterans to find service opportunities, for citizens to support the military through community service, and for service organizations to more effectively recruit volunteers in local communities.

The partnership is a response to a new report written by Civic Enterprises and underwritten by Target and the Case Foundation that found that veterans who had participated in service opportunities since arriving home from Iraq and Afghanistan had smoother transitions than those who had not. Two findings in particular stood out: just 13% of service people reported that their transitions home were going well, and 92% report that serving the community is important to them.

So the opportunity to help military and vets by connecting them to service opportunities is clear. That’s why we just added a new Interest Area, “Military Families & Veterans,” to the VolunteerMatch system.

By choosing “Veterans & Military Families” for their listings, organizations make it possible for visitors to the VolunteerMatch Advanced Search page or any of our hundreds of network partner sites will be able to quickly find ways to get involved at thousands of local organizations.

Want to help our troops? Help them volunteer.

Making Room for Families in Your Volunteer Program

Jennifer Bennett — Wed, 11 Nov 2009 22:11:07 +0000

The season for giving is upon us. On November 21, families all across the nation will observe Family Volunteer Day, a day to kick off the season of giving back.

In theory, combining family time with community service is a great idea. Yet often for volunteer managers it’s a logistical nightmare. Creating opportunities for a group can be challenging and made only more daunting if that group has mixed ages and interests.

Before you decide to turn families away from your program this holiday season, here are a few tips to make room for them:

Create projects that can be done by those with a variety of skill levels, especially kids.
Want to identify your current friends on MySpace or your Twitter followers? This is a great opportunity for teens to use their social networking skills, and for parents to better understand your mission and maybe even learn something from their children.

Remember, jobs that are intuitive for adults might not be for children or teens. Office work isn’t something children are familiar with and what’s obvious to adults might be foreign and confusing to kids. To help with this, make sure project steps are well defined. I often talk about the outcome being more important than the process, but youth volunteers may need a little more help with the process.

Consider providing additional training for parents and guardians.
Remember the key to good volunteer job development is creating work that’s meaningful for the volunteer and the organization.

To successfully achieve this balance, and avoid becoming just a babysitter, provide some additional training for the adults. This is a great opportunity to give parents a more in depth understanding of what you do, how you do it, and most importantly, how it impacts the community. And, by elevating parents to a leadership position, you reinforce the idea that the work is important and that the whole family is here to make an impact.

Update your volunteer agreement.
Even volunteers coming in for a one-day opportunity should be given some type of volunteer agreement outlining the roles and responsibilities of both the volunteers and the organization. This should be a short list of “Dos and Don’ts”.

Update the agreement to include a framework for younger volunteers. For example, include something like “All volunteers under the age of 16 will be supervised and within reach of a parent or guardian.” Also, update the form to include a double signature for parents of your underage volunteers.

Don’t forget the communication plan.
If your volunteer program has always been adults-only and now there will teens or children in the office, make sure everyone knows about it. A communication plan that starts early and regularly informs existing volunteers and paid staff about the changes, and the reasons for the changes, is important. Outline what your coworkers should expect and what they should do if they have concerns about the program or the volunteers.

Lastly, be sure to report a job well done. Communicate about your successes both internally to staff, and externally to the community, your donors, and other volunteers who may want to participate in the program.

What it means to volunteer, and who volunteers, is evolving right now. I think that the volunteer programs that are the most flexible and the most creative about engaging all types of volunteers are going to be the most successful. Challenge yourself. Just because you’ve never engaged families in your volunteer program before doesn’t mean it’s not possible. Think creatively, and if you have success stories please share them with me.

New Feature: Share Your Opportunities on Facebook, Twitter, and Dozens of Other Sites With a Click

Victoria Pacchiana — Tue, 10 Nov 2009 22:38:16 +0000

Next time you post a volunteer opportunity on VolunteerMatch.org, you’ll find a new tool: an easy way to spread the news about your volunteer opportunity on social media sites.

The new feature is available within the VolunteerMatch Listing Manager, and allows you to share your volunteer opportunities with your friends on Facebook or MySpace, your followers on Twitter, your bookmark buddies on Delicious, and hundreds of other sites across the web. The feature is powered by AddThis, a popular social sharing and bookmarking tool.

How Do I Share?

Sharing is easy. After you post your volunteer opportunity on VolunteerMatch.org, a confirmation page will give you several options, one of which is sharing.

(click to enlarge)

Click on the icon of the network you want to share with.

And follow the steps to complete your share.

Voilà. You’re done. You can share your opportunity on as many networks as you want.

What Are the Benefits of Sharing?

Many of you are no strangers to social media, and you’ve seen the power it can have to connect you with new audiences, raise money, and spread awareness about your cause. A few months ago, I wrote about trends in sharing on the volunteer side. The data revealed that while many volunteers were e-mailing opportunities to their friends the numbers were rising on social media sharing, particularly on Facebook.

Spreading your volunteer opportunities across the Web:

Increases the likelihood that the right volunteer will come along
Increases your organization’s visibility to potential donors
Spreads the word about the important work your organization is doing
Invites people to connect with your cause on social media sites — further extending the dialogue

We’ve seen what social media can do for fundraising, let’s see what it can do for volunteer engagement.

To start sharing your opportunities with AddThis, log in to your VolunteerMatch account and visit the Listing Manager.

Reviewed: Actions Speak Loudest, Keeping Our Promise for a Better World

Hilary Lawson — Tue, 10 Nov 2009 19:10:25 +0000

Occasionally we receive advance copies of new releases on volunteering, volunteer recruitment and management, and making a difference. See them all in our Reviews section. Got a book, magazine, DVD, or Web site you’d like us to review? Send it to us at news@volunteermatch.org or Editors, VolunteerMatch Reviews, 717 California St., 2nd Floor, San Francisco, CA 94108.

Being a new parent during a time of severe economic depression, worldwide violence and war, and environmental crisis is a daunting role. For the first time, Americans are not sure that the lives of their children will be better than their own, which makes the need for volunteerism greater than ever before.

For Robert McKinnon, writer, editor and new parent himself, the answer lies in depoliticizing the issues our children will inherit in order to take action that will benefit future generations. His newest book, Actions Speak Loudest, Keeping Our Promise for a Better World, collects essays from 32 prominent figures in politics, science, health, athletics and entertainment, covering themes from education and climate change to childhood obesity and domestic violence.

Each essay is perfectly tailored to the individual’s expertise, with Jimmy Carter writing about peace and tolerance, quarterback Donovan McNabb writing about physical inactivity, and Rachel Ray addressing food and nutrition in American society.

What sets this collection apart is McKinnon’s multi-faceted approach to presenting these grim circumstances we find ourselves in and what we can do to change them. The photographs that accompany each essay pull at the heart strings and arouse motivational emotion, while the “Actions Speak Loudest” sections at the end of each piece provide practical ways that we can implement these ideas in our homes, communities and across the country.

This collection is an inspiring and useful read for any parent or individual hoping to leave this world a better place than they found it. Visit www.actionsspeakloudest.org to share your ideas for taking action and to find out more ways to create positive change in your own community.

A New Way to Honor Our Troops at VolunteerMatch

Robert Rosenthal — Tue, 10 Nov 2009 00:11:15 +0000

In time for Veterans Day, we’re pleased to announce an improvement to our system in order to better support active military personnel, veterans and their families.

Now when you post your opportunities at VolunteerMatch, you can select a new category, “Veterans & Military Families,” to make it easy for volunteers to find your listings.

Who should use “Veterans & Military Families”?

By choosing “Veterans & Military Families” for your listings, visitors to our Advanced Search page or any of our hundreds of network partner sites will be able to quickly find your listings.

Use this category if:

Your mission involves helping troops, veterans, or their families.
You have special programs to involve troops, veterans, or their families as volunteers.

With nearly three million active and reserve personnel serving in the Armed Forces today, the new category is a reminder of all the ways that military service and community service can work together to meet the critical needs of our nation.

Need to update your listings? Log in here.

Live Stream: DoSomething.org Social Action Boot Camp

Robert Rosenthal — Fri, 06 Nov 2009 18:36:24 +0000

Thanks to help from BusinessBoomer, this weekend we’re live streaming coverage of DoSomething.org’s Social Action Boot Camp, which takes place Saturday, 11/7 in NYC.

The Social Action Boot Camps bring together a diverse group of young community leaders, activists and social entrepreneurs for a day of networking and training dedicated to giving each attendee the tools to grow and sustain their community action ideas, projects and organizations.

Streaming Schedule: (all times Eastern)

9:00-9:30: Keynote from Do Something BR!CK Winner Divine Bradley
9:40-10:35: Starting Your Own Not-for-Profit 101
10:45-11:40: Managing and Recruiting Volunteers
11:40-12:50: Interviews with industry experts and young social leaders
12:50-1:20: Keynote Address
1:30-2:25: Online Communications
2:35-3:30: Public Relations
3:40-4:00: Speed Pitching Introduction
4:00-4:30: Speed Pitching Practice
4:30-5:00: Interviews with industry experts and young social leaders

Reviewed: Spirit of Service – Your Daily Stimulus for Making a Difference

Robert Rosenthal — Fri, 06 Nov 2009 01:44:25 +0000

Spirit of Service, an intriguing and well-written new offering from HarperOne, is a terrific addition to the bookshelf or desk of anyone who cares about our communities.

Inspired by President Obama’s call to action, the book contains 365 readings about lending a hand in some service capacity – often as a volunteer with an organization.

That’s a lot of ways to make a difference, so to help make sense of all the opportunities in the book, Spirit of Service is organized as a “devotional,” which means it’s ideally meant to be read one short passage at a time.

Inside, the opportunities have been grouped into seven key themes: Money, Energy, Focus, Influence, Compassion, Support, and Passage. Echoing the daily devotional format, each theme is represented by a different day of the week. Tuesday is about Energy, for example (”Energy translates into action….), and Thursday is about Influence (”Each of us has much more influence than we think we do….).

The devotional format works perfectly. Given the subject matter, which is so different from page to page, and often touching for varying emotional reasons, this format works great – and the length of each piece is just right for a daily reminder about the amazing array of ways of making a difference. (You can browse inside it here.)

Within the book’s theme areas, the causes it touches upon represent the entire range of conscious service, including the environment, human rights, elder care, youth services, hunger relief, animal conservation, troop support, green living, the arts, literacy, historic preservation, civic participation, and more. Many of America’s most recognized organizations are present, but again so are many other regional and grassroots groups. And why not: with 365 days of reading, there’s room enough to cover a great cross section of the service community.

Some examples:

Interview a veteran (Veterans History Project)
Calculate your family’s carbon footprint (Save The Manatee Club)
Volunteer as an archeologist on your next vacation (Passport in Time Clearinghouse)
Start a socially-conscious investment club (Green Money Journal)

Like many of the recent publications related to service, the book helps solve two of the more persistent issues that potential volunteers and activists face. One, that they might want to contribute to improving the world but don’t think they have enough time, money, or energy. And two, that some folks want to give back but aren’t sure how. This is a book that really can help folks get started on the journey.

Also great: The publisher has put up a terrific Web site with essays, inspiration, and cool extras like ecards and stickers. They’ve also installed VolunteerMatch’s SearchLite widget, making it possible for visitors to search for volunteer opportunities directly from the book’s promotional site.

Learn more about Spirit of Service.

Open Letter from the President Regarding iParticipate.org

Greg Baldwin — Thu, 29 Oct 2009 00:38:50 +0000

An open letter to our nonprofit members from Greg Baldwin, President of VolunteerMatch.

First the good news and a thank you. To all the actors, script-writers, production people and executives who put their talent and time to work last week to join the Entertainment Industry Foundation’s iParticipate TV campaign to celebrate volunteering — thank you. Keep it coming.

It was an extraordinary moment that put the voice of volunteers at the center of an emerging national conversation. The high-profile campaign embraced ideas that have been reshaping volunteering for over a decade and is an important tipping-point in the effort to help millions of local nonprofits, schools and civic institutions, like you, unlock the possibilities of volunteer service.

Now the bad news. The campaign didn’t work as planned, and as many of you reported to us, unresolved system bugs related to the Entertainment Industry Foundation’s implementation of the new All for Good APIs left thousands of interested volunteers on iParticipate.org browsing through an aggregation of incomplete, incorrect, duplicate, out-of-date and out-of-place volunteer opportunities — many of them your VolunteerMatch listings.

We have reported the problems to the Entertainment Industry Foundation, ServiceNation and All for Good, but regret that as of today the issues have not been resolved.

No one knows better than Hollywood that you never get a second chance to make a first impression. This was not the first impression we had hoped the bright lights of Hollywood would help you to make and we are sorry.

As an example of some of the issues that have emerged, a default search on the San Francisco ZIP code 94108 returns only three listings and two of them are expired — one for a walk-a-thon on Treasure Island a couple weekends ago and one for the World Veg Festival that ended October 4th.

Searches in New York City invite interested volunteers to serve at a local soup kitchen — in Washington, D.C.; to become a volunteer firefighter in Dare County, NC.; and to join the Kidney Awareness Run in Sacramento, CA.

And searches all across the county included listings from nonprofits recruiting volunteers from January 01, 2000 to January 01, 1971 — really? That might be confusing unless of course you happen to be a UNIX programmer and recognized 01/01/1971 as the instant before computer time began.

How bad was it? It was like a telethon with the wrong phone number.

How did it impact the results? Over the course of the week this historic TV campaign produced an average of only 775 new visits a day or 2.6% of our weekly total of 208,400 visits. This amounts to perhaps 100 new volunteers.

These were not the results we expected, or the results you deserve.

We will continue to work to resolve these issues and to ensure that they don’t happen again. We can do better and we will.

I’d like to hear from you. Let us know what you think by leaving a comment below.

Yours,

Greg Baldwin
President
VolunteerMatch

My Journey to the CVA Credential

Jennifer Bennett — Tue, 27 Oct 2009 20:37:06 +0000

Back in 2008, after spending several years in program management, I began working with volunteers again. While reacquainting myself with the profession, one thing caught my eye: a professional credentialing program sponsored by the Council for Certification in Volunteer Administration (CCVA).

The CVA credential is based on a set of core competencies in volunteer management including Professional Principles, Leadership, Organizational Management, Planning, and Human Resources Management. To become a CVA you need to pass a multiple choice test, and create a written portfolio comprised of a personal philosophy statement and a program management narrative. The process takes about a year to complete.

This year, I decided to pursue my CVA. I completed the first part in May by taking the exam, which, I have to admit I was a little worried about. I hadn’t taken a test in a very long time. I did all of my reading early, giving myself plenty of time to go back and revisit the materials before the test. I also made a point of taking the online practice test multiple times. When I was in school (ahem — a while ago) we didn’t have online exams. In fact, I was more nervous about the testing process than I was about the content. So, every Friday for six weeks before the exam I logged into the practice test and answered the questions. The questions never changed, but I felt much more familiar with the online testing process.

And it paid off because, I’m proud to report, I passed! Congratulations to all of the other candidates that passed this year, too.

Now I’m in the middle of completing the second part of the certification process — the portfolio. I’ve found writing this to be rewarding, and actually really fun. My final drafts for both pieces are about ready, and I’m hoping to submit it later this month – well before the December 31 deadline.

So what are the pros of going through the process? For me there are three reasons to earn a CVA:

•   It validates the commitment I’ve made to the effective involvement of volunteers
•   It demonstrates my knowledge, skills, and experience managing volunteers.
•   It increases my organization’s commitment to the profession of volunteer management.

And what about the cons?

Well, for volunteer managers who’ve been working with volunteers for less than three years (the minimum experience required for certification), the CVA is not a course of study — it’s a credentialing program. Getting the certification won’t teach you how to manage volunteers more effectively, but it will measure your ability to do so and reward you with a credential to prove it.

To pursue a CVA yourself you’ll need to have the equivalent of three years of full-time volunteer resource management experience (it can be paid or unpaid). You also need to be currently working in the field, with no less than 30% of your time being spent working with volunteer programs.

Here are important details:

Early Bird Registration, 10/1/09 to 12/31/09, $200
Regular Registration, 1/1/10 to 3/1/10, $250

(Visit the CVA website for information about available discounts.)

If you’ve considered pursuing a CVA, I encourage you to do so. The entire process has been gratifying, and I’m glad to know that I’m contributing to the development of the field.

– Jennifer

P.S. — It’s still a ways off, but you can also join VolunteerMatch for a Webinar about the CVA on January 13.
To register, visit: https://www1.gotomeeting.com/register/119269265

Turning Good Intentions into Action: Hollywood vs Google

Greg Baldwin — Fri, 23 Oct 2009 18:33:46 +0000

How New Media has Changed the Landscape of Volunteer Engagement

Thursday night was a big night for the Entertainment Industry Foundation’s iParticipate campaign. With unprecedented support from the industry, volunteering themes were written into some of America’s favorite prime-time shows.

It is an extraordinary example of what amounts to product placement for the greater good, so why isn’t it working?

This is a difficult and awkward conversation to have in a nonprofit world which often measures success by an organization’s appearances, not its impact. Nonprofits tend to operate in a place a bit like Garrison Keillor’s fictional Lake Wobegon where all the organizations are above average – particularly if you ask them.

iParticipate is new to Lake Wobegon, but it should come as no surprise that they too have quickly established themselves as an above average neighbor. In many ways they deserve that reputation.

If five years ago someone promised to organize a project that would write volunteering into the storylines of major TV shows, most would have considered it a well intentioned but impractical endeavor.

Last night the impractical became the possible as script writers put their spin on a changing social landscape.

Participating shows included:

Private Practice ABC – The practice brings their experts to a teen shelter to provide free check-ups for all the homeless teenagers.

30 Rock NBC – Kenneth volunteers at an animal shelter. He was never allowed to have a pet growing up so he decides to adopt all of the dogs.

Parks & Recreation NBC – The Parks team volunteers with Kaboom! to refurbish a playground.

The Office NBC – The group discusses volunteering.

This new reality is a reflection of how much the world has changed and how conversations about making a bundle have thankfully given way to conversations about making a difference.

But despite the best of intentions and millions of dollars worth of promotion and PSAs yesterday’s star-studded TV event didn’t work as planned.

How do we know? Well we’ve been waiting and preparing for what was promised by organizers from Entertainment Industry Foundation and Service Nation to be a massive spike in volunteering activity flowing from the campaign’s online home iParticipte.org. The plan was to use the unique star power of Hollywood to convince viewers of the importance of volunteering and drive millions of people to the new website iParticipate.org where they could find thousands of local volunteer opportunities pulled from sites like VolunteerSolutions, Craiglist, 1-800-Volunteer.org, Idealist and VolunteerMatch.

But the wave of new energy and excitement didn’t quite make it to shore.
Last night VolunteerMatch received a total of 874 new visits as a result of the campaign or what will likely translate into between 15 to 20 new volunteers.

Many will say as a nonprofit we ought to be grateful for whatever new volunteers we can find or explain away the results as just another example of how hard it is to convince people to volunteer, but we see it differently.

Part of the reason we do is that yesterday was an otherwise busy day at VolunteerMatch. As is pretty typical of a Thursday, we had a total of 33,250 visits, which if you are doing the math, means that about 98% of visits came from someplace other than the TV. Really? So where are they coming from?

The answer of course is Google and the long-tail of the internet. That is how much the word has changed, but not everyone is ready to believe it.

Without promotion or convincing or celebrity appeals, 14,376 people were on Google yesterday looking for volunteer opportunities and found VolunteerMatch. You might say, sure, but how many of them went to Google because they saw the campaign on TV? That’s tough to know exactly, but last Thursday we had 13,787 visits from Google.

That means that without any expensive PSAs, or TV production, or powerful sponsors, or celebrities, or any real extra effort at all, Google out performed Hollywood on Thursday 16 to 1.

That’s the world we live in. So what’s the lesson here? Should celebrities stop talking about volunteering? Is Google taking over the world?

No I don’t think so. I think the real lesson here is simple. The world has changed, and we need to catch up. New media, not old, is the future of volunteer engagement and if TV campaigns aren’t the secret-sauce of expanding volunteer engagement, let’s spend some time together looking at the facts to figure out what is.

But to do that we’ll need to move out of Lake Wobegon first — preferably to a place with lots of web engineers and where everybody has an above average appreciation of measurement and impact.

See you there.