A free resource for nonprofit
organizations, NGOs, civil society organizations,
charities, schools, public sector agencies & other mission-based
agencies
by Jayne Cravens
via coyotecommunications.com
& coyoteboard.com (same
web site)
Effective Volunteer Engagement:
Creating Roles & Tasks for Volunteers
Before you start recruiting volunteers, you need to have defined roles
and tasks, in writing. How can you recruit for roles and tasks that you
don't have yet? Having written roles and tasks will better ensure everyone
has the same expectations about the assignment. It will also force you,
the manager, to better ensure you aren't setting up volunteers for
failure, aren't asking too much of volunteers, etc. If you don't have time
to put assignments in writing, you don't have time to involve volunteers.
Each volunteer role should say, in writing:
- What skills or experience a volunteer should have before applying.
- What training will be provided.
- If there is a requirement of a reference check and/or a criminal
background check.
- If an orientation for new volunteers is provided and what it's like
(how long it takes).
- How many hours a day, a week or a month you expect a volunteer to give
in this role, and for how long (a week? a month? three months? a year?).
- Who this role benefits, why this role matters, the difference the
volunteer in this role will make.
- What does success look like in this role, for the volunteer and the
organization?
- If some or all of this role can be done online, remotely.
But creating assignments is a challenge for a lot of nonprofits,
schools, NGOs and others. Here's a way you can approach it:
- What tasks need to be undertaken for a particular event, a particular
program activity, a particular task that is the responsibility of an
employee or volunteer?
- What parts of that task could be assigned to someone helping that is
NOT full time (helping just an hour a day, or four hours every Friday,
or 20 hours over the course of a month, or helping at a particular
event, etc.).
- How much do I or another supervising employee or volunteer need to be
involved with someone who undertakes this task? What would our
involvement look like, in terms of supervision and support?
And then answer all the same questions asked earlier regarding what
should be in a written volunteer role or task description.
If you don't have time to do this, then you don't have time to involve
volunteers.
Here are more resources on how to create specific types of assignments:
Creating Assignments
- How Volunteers Can Support the Person
In Charge of Volunteer Engagement
The person in charge of volunteer engagement at a nonprofit, NGO,
charity, school or other civil society organization or mission-based
program primarily recruits and manages volunteers that are supporting
other staff: the program staff, for instance, may need mentors for
clients or people to clean up a public space or to foster animals. The
fundraising staff may need volunteers to staff a donor event.
But the person in charge of volunteer engagement should also be
thinking about how volunteers can help with volunteer engagement -
with recruitment, onboarding, training, support and recognition of
volunteers.
This resource provides information on how and why to do that .
- Short-term Assignments for Tech
Volunteers
There are a variety of ways for mission-based organizations to involve
volunteers to help with short-term projects relating to
computers and the Internet, and short-term assignments are what are
sought after most by potential "tech" volunteers. But there is a
disconnect: most organizations have trouble identifying such short-term
projects. This is a list of short-term projects for "tech" volunteers --
assignments that might takes days, weeks or just a couple of months to
complete.
- One(-ish) Day "Tech" Activities for
Volunteers
Volunteers are getting together for intense, one-day events, or events
of just a few days, to build web pages, to write code, to edit Wikipedia
pages, and more. These are gatherings of onsite volunteers, where
everyone is in one location, together, to do an online-related project
in one day, or a few days. It's a form of episodic volunteering, because
volunteers don't have to make an ongoing commitment - they can come to
the event, contribute their services, and then leave and never volunteer
again. Because computers are involved, these events are sometimes called
hackathons, even if coding isn't involved. This page provides advice on
how to put together a one-day event, or just-a-few-days-of activity, for
a group of tech volunteers onsite, working together, for a nonprofit,
non-governmental organization (NGO), community-focused government
program, school or other mission-based organization - or association of
such.
- Creating One-Time, Short-Term Group
Volunteering Activities
Details on not just what groups of volunteers can do in a two-hour,
half-day or all-day event, but also just how much an organization or
program will need to do to prepare a site for group volunteering. It's
an expensive, time-consuming endeavor - are you ready? Is it worth it?
- How
to Immediately Introduce Virtual Volunteering at Your Program (How
to Involve Online Volunteers Right Away)
There are so many things volunteers could be doing RIGHT NOW, from their
home or from work, for your nonprofit, NGO, school, government agency or
other community program or cause-based initiative, that could help your
program and clients, immediate roles and activities that don't require
any new investment in new systems or equipment, and don't require any
time to alter volunteer policies and procedures (provided you already
have at least SOME policies and procedures for volunteers regarding
confidentiality, safety, respect, etc.). This is a list of more than 20
virtual volunteering roles and tasks your program could launch RIGHT
AWAY.
- Examples of Virtual
Volunteering
The most comprehensive list of virtual volunteering tasks you will find
anywhere. Hosted on the Virtual
Volunteering Wiki. It's a huge range, from short-term, micro tasks
(micro volunteering online) to high-responsibility, high-profile roles.
- Myths About Virtual Volunteering
A list of common myths about virtual volunteering - engaging and
supporting volunteers online - and my attempt to counter them.
- Micro Volunteering and
Crowdsourcing: Not-So-New Trends in Virtual Volunteering
Back in the 1990s, I called it byte-sized volunteering: online
volunteering tasks that take just a few minutes, hours or a few days to
complete, like translating some text into another language, gathering
information on one topic, tagging photos with certain keywords, etc.,
but require no ongoing commitment. Now, the hot-new term for this is microvolunteering.
It's no different than offline, onsite episodic
volunteering; just as volunteers who come to a beach cleanup or
participate in a Habitat for Humanity work day don't undergo a criminal
background check, don't receive a long pre-service orientation, don't
fill out a lengthy volunteer application form and may never volunteer
with the organization again, online volunteers that participate in a
micro volunteering task may get started on their assignment just a few
minutes after expressing interest. But just as offline episodic
volunteering like beach cleanups are more about building relationships,
creating more awareness and cultivating more supporters that getting
things done, microvolunteering needs
to have the same goals in order to be worth doing, to have more
than micro impact.
- The
best assignments for online volunteers
An online workshop I did years ago, hosted by TechSoup. This video is
FREE online, viewable at any time via YouTube. It's under an hour.
- Promoting your volunteering program
internally
Too often, the first position cut at an organization facing financial
difficulties is the volunteer coordinator. Most people in these
positions, I'm sorry to say, do a poor job of making sure that every
staff member at their organization knows the time and expertise they
bring to the position, and the essential nature of their role in
recruiting and supporting volunteers. The volunteer coordinator should
make sure he or she is seen as also absolutely essential to the
organization. This page talks about how a volunteer coordinator can make
sure the board, all paid staff and all volunteers at an organization
know the essential value of not only volunteers, but also the volunteer
coordinator.
- Make All Volunteering as Accessible
as Possible
Tips for creating an accommodating and welcoming environment for ALL
volunteers, including those with disabilities. You are missing out on
fantastic talent and resources by NOT focusing on accessibility!
- Resources
Regarding USA Labor Laws and Volunteering
How should you determine who is a volunteer and who should be paid for
the hours they work at your organization? Your method should NOT be Who
can we pay and who can't we pay? In the USA, there are laws and rulings
from the Department of Justice that guide what tasks may and may not be
done by volunteers (as opposed to paying someone to do the work),
whether paid staff can be asked to volunteer (work unpaid) at the
nonprofit where they work and more. This is a blog, rather than a
resource page on my web site, and is therefore more about linking to
other sources and quoting other sources than me actually writing the
guidance. Although this is US-centric, some of the criteria is
applicable in any country in trying to determine what is ethnically
appropriate regarding volunteer tasks, including internships.
- Advice for those assigning or
supervising court-ordered community service
Mandatory community service or a "Court Referral Program" is an
alternate sentencing option for Superior, Municipal, Traffic and
Juvenile Courts in the USA. Community service is considered restitution
by an offender through helping his or her community. The service
means actions, activity, engagement -- doing
something that needs to be done and that helps the community or a cause.
Too often, the goals of court-ordered community service aren't
happening, and instead, people who need the service cannot find a place
to do their service hours, and nonprofits expected to host these
volunteers cannot do so. This new resource is for judges, probation
officers, prosecutors, defense attorneys, and other criminal justice
practitioners that are involved in assigning and supervising
court-ordered community service.
- Hosting
International Volunteers
More and more local organizations in developing countries are turning to
local expertise, rather than international volunteers, to support their
efforts. However, the need for international volunteers remains, and
will for many, many years to come. This resource provides tips for local
organization in a developing countries interested in gaining access to
international volunteers.
- Pro Bono / In-Kind / Donated Services for
Mission-Based Organizations:
When, Why & How?
There are all sorts of professionals who want to donate their services
-- web design, graphic design, human resources expertise, legal advice,
editing, research, and so forth -- to mission-based organizations. And
there are all sorts of nonprofits and NGOs who would like to attract
such donated services. But often, there's a disconnect --
misunderstandings and miscommunications and unrealistic expectations
that lead to missed opportunities and frustrating experiences. This
resource, prompted by the topic coming up at the same time on a few
online discussion groups I read, is designed to help both those who want
to donate professional services and those who want to work with such
volunteers. It's applicable to a variety of situations, not just those
involving computer and Internet-related projects.
- Blog: If
humans can do it, so can volunteers (who are, BTW, also humans).
An editorial about breaking down the boundaries that are keeping you
from allowing volunteers to undertake certain roles and tasks.
- Blog: Letting
Fear Prevent Volunteer Involvement is Too Risky. An
editorial about how too many nonprofits think volunteers should be
barred from certain roles and tasks because the tasks involve risk.
- Blog: When
to NOT pay interns. One of several commentaries about the
ethics of involving unpaid interns (not paying them makes them
volunteers).
But before you do any of the above, have you done the
FIRST steps in volunteer engagement? And have you created
policies and procedures for safety?
Return to this web
site's index of volunteer engagement-related
resources
And also time to have a look at:
The Last Virtual Volunteering Guidebook:
Fully Integrating Online Service Into Volunteer Involvement.
A comprehensive guide to using online tools for supporting
& engaging ALL volunteers, & for creating online roles &
online tasks for volunteers.
The Ultimate Guide to Setting Up Virtual Volunteering At Any Organization.
Here's how to order
(includes table of contents and reviews).
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this
web page, or comment on it, here.
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