Making Sure Volunteers and Staff Get Along

So you’ve decided to enlist leadership-level older adult volunteers to extend your organization’s services. Congratulations!

Now, a quick question: Is your organization ready for this?

Integrating volunteers into staff roles can be a challenge, so the National Council on Aging brought to its sold-out Webinar series a session called “Changing Organizational Culture: Getting Your Nonprofit Ready for Professional and Leadership Volunteers.”

In it, Phil McCallion of the Center for Excellence in Aging Services, School of Social Welfare, SUNY at Albany and Gajtana Simonovski, of the Community Service Society, Retired & Senior Volunteer Program, New York, New York, shared their experiences in integrating the two. Here’s what they had to say.

First, Simonovski debunked the myths of what staff think about high-skill volunteers.

Myth: They will take staff jobs.
Reality: Most are not looking for another job. But they can free staff to do more strategic planning.

Myth: It takes more time than it’s worth to manage and train them.
Reality: Sometimes training takes more time in the beginning, said Simonovski, “but really there’s a big payout at the end, more than you put in.”

Myth: They agency hop, not staying long in one position, and won’t commit to regular hours.
Reality: They want flexibility and variety in their assignments, but are willing to make a commitment.

Myth: They will criticize staff.
Reality: They want to share their expertise and knowledge and enable nonprofits to involve skilled professionals in their planning process. “Rather than be afraid of their expertise, welcome it,” she said.

Phil McCallion thinks of leadership-level volunteers as consultants. He suggested that to get buy-in, be explicit that you are not replacing staff. Instead, convey that they bring experience and can help staff. Simonovski said they held a meeting for staff in the beginning to alleviate fears, and made the business case as to why volunteers would help staff do their jobs. McCallion also recommended doing and sharing a cost-benefits analysis. “If we start to see what the benefit is, absolutely we’ll see more buy-in.”

Taking care of basic logistics is important, too, such as giving them office space, a desk, phone, mailbox, even business cards. Asking volunteers to share desks and computers concurrently rarely works, said McCallion. For the Center for Excellence in Aging Services project, the office space usually reserved for volunteers and interns was reorganized to meet these volunteers’ specific needs. Creating the sense that volunteers had their own space and equipment was an important part of engaging people and making them feel committed, he said. And it signaled to everyone that the volunteers are making an important contribution.

Treating volunteers as staff in other ways is helpful as well, said Simonovski. For example, involve them in regular program planning meetings so that they become part of the team. Share project evaluation reporting with them so that they can see how the program is doing, and how they are doing. Offer professional development training. Correspond regularly through e-mail and phone calls and speak frankly with them, encouraging them to come up with solutions to project challenges.

The key, said McCallion, is building a sense of team, a sense of communication, and a sense that everyone’s opinion is valued.

This shift in thinking changes the traditional relationship between volunteers and staff. Whereas previously the roles were of boss and staff, now it’s a lateral or parallel approach that provides equality, said Simonovski. Instead of supervision, it’s about support. “In many cases, these volunteers have more experience than we do,” she said. As a result, staff members try not to squelch the volunteers’ creativity and experience.

And a leadership-level volunteer is less likely to hold a single position indefinitely. Short-term assignments and flexible long-term assignments are the new way. This change away from a single track makes sense, because “most of our organizations would never permit that for staff,” said McCallion. Volunteers feel invisible within organizations when playing that one role. A parallel approach is a big departure from tradition, and one that volunteers welcome, he said.

These factors feed into culture change, McCallion said.

An organization has to be open to fully involving volunteers to change its culture, he said. In fact, an openness to change is one of the most critical elements of a successful project with leadership volunteers. How else can you achieve change? Commit to using those volunteers to improve the organization. Prepare staff for culture change, ensure that management is open to feedback, and keep communication open.

How might you know when that transformation has taken place? Said McCallion, when there is no difference in terms of how people are seen in the hall.

What about in your organization? How have you brought together volunteers and staff? And how do you know when culture change has happened?

High-Level Tasks That Volunteers Can Ace

If you’ve been reading Leading by Example for a while, you’ve no doubt sensed a theme: that leadership-level older adult volunteers can be highly valuable to a nonprofit.

But what does leadership level really mean? What kinds of jobs do these volunteers handle?

In a Nov. 19 Webinar, part of the National Council on Aging sold-out series Engaging Older Volunteers as Leaders in Your Organization, Ken Murray gave some examples. Together with Paddy Clark, both of Southern Maine Agency on Aging, he shares this information as part of the RSVP Capacity Corps Replication Guide talk.

RSVP Capacity Corps was developed to explore the possibility of recruiting older volunteers with high-level skills to serve in leadership roles to help nonprofit organizations meet their missions in the community.

“The skills these volunteers have developed over a lifetime, often in the corporate sector, are transferable and valuable within the nonprofit sector,” said Murray. Many have been managers themselves. They are used to working with goals and objectives and want to see that something concrete comes from their efforts, he said.

The kinds of skills that volunteers might share with nonprofits encompass a broad range and include these:

–Strategic Planning
–Financial Planning
–Marketing
–Public Relations
–Business Planning
–Information Technology
–Emergency Planning
–Development and Fundraising

RSVP Capacity Corps had 12 volunteers, and Murray outlined their skills and contributions.

Market Research: Volunteers A and B had backgrounds in long-term care administration and corporate marketing and sales, respectively. They performed market research to find out what the people who refer clients to the agency’s nutrition program wanted to see them do differently. They used the results to form a new design and marketing strategy for the program. Volunteer A also conducted surveys that helped the adult day center plan new services.

Strategic Planning: Volunteer C, with business planning experience, helped the Board of Directors and senior staff develop a new five-year strategic plan for the agency.

Business Continuity Planning: Volunteer D, who had a long career in public service and had recently retired from a position in emergency management, helped develop a business continuity plan for the agency. This plan, said Murray, had been on the back burner for a long time.

Fundraising: Volunteer E, with a strong interest in fundraising, helped the development director work on a planned giving program.

Accounting: Volunteer F, who was transitioning from one professional accounting position to another, used the interim period to design an accounting manual to explain the many funding sources that support Southern Maine Agency on Aging. This manual used terms that the Board of Directors and general public could easily understand.

Expanding Social Workers’ Capacity: Volunteers G and H, with backgrounds in social work and local community services, are helping expand the capacity of the social workers in the agency’s Information and Advocacy Program to link clients to resources that can assist them.

Outreach: Volunteer I has both ministerial and paralegal experience. She has trained to be an Agency Ambassador, speaking to groups and representing the agency at meetings in her community.

Writing: Volunteer J, with a background in marketing and community relations, is interviewing subjects and writing articles for the agency’s bi-monthly newspaper, Senior News. Volunteer K, who has a background in writing, is also writing for the Senior News. In addition, he is helping write pieces for the Agency’s Development Program.

Identifying Potential Partners: Volunteer L, a former director of a nonprofit organization, is working with the agency’s Healthy Aging Programs to identify possible new institutional partners for outreach to seniors.

Murray found that because of the volunteers, important work was done that may not have been done without them. And NCOA’s SMART tool, which calculates the value in dollars of a volunteer’s work, found a six to one return on investment over five quarters.

“They did make a difference,” he said.

How to Achieve a 355% Return on Investment with Volunteers

It’s not often you hear of a project that produces a 355 percent return on investment. But that’s what happened at Big Brothers Big Sisters of Puget Sound, in Port Townsend, Wash., when it started using volunteers aged 55+.

When the organization began its program, which included creating a Partnership Council of these volunteers, it had two goals:

–To grow the number of mentors to match the community’s need.
–To increase funding.

After two years, the organization saw compelling results — a 33 percent increase in children served and a 69 percent increase in dollars raised.

Program Coordinator Bill James, himself an age 55+ volunteer who helped assemble the council, joined Branch Manager Liesl Slabaugh on Nov. 12 to explain their model in a National Council on Aging Webinar, How to Grow Your Programs by Engaging Older Professional Leadership Volunteers.

To fill this council with approximately a dozen people, James led efforts to recruit volunteers from within the community. They held an open house, networked through existing contacts, made presentations to service clubs, contacted the local chamber, and “talked to just about everybody who would listen,” he said. Initially, they had some difficulty finding people, but they reached into different areas to get different strengths.

They created job descriptions, held job interviews for the positions, and required a two-year commitment. They didn’t take all applicants. These actions helped them to bring on the right people. Ultimately, they formed a council primarily of retired people. “Each of those people brings something unique to the board,” James said.

In addition, the organization gave stipends to leadership volunteers at the start of the project, which professionalized the experience and added value symbolically. “To some, it made no difference; to others, it did,” said Slabaugh. “I think it’s helpful in forming your initial board,” said James. “But in the long term, phased out, it hasn’t affected our activities at all.”

Slabaugh also offered these tips for starting a successful program. Get support from the organization’s leadership, design attractive opportunities for boomer volunteers, and trust your volunteers. Then you can get ready to see results.

Initially, the project’s concept “seemed like pie in the sky to me,” said Slabaugh. But now she contends that “a partnership council is this ongoing organizational structure that’s got huge potential.” For Big Brothers Big Sisters, it added three new management functions — development, marketing, recruitment.

It’s no coincidence that the number of volunteers aged 55 and older in her program increased by 145 percent. Baby boomers “are a huge resource, and we’re wanting to use that resource,” Slabaugh said. “Nationwide, there is a huge possibility in that.”

I agree, and I hope you’ll check back soon for news of the next session in our sold-out Webinar series, the RSVP Capacity Corps Replication Guide.

Engaging Older Volunteers as Leaders in Your Organization

In my time working with programs for volunteers aged 55+, I’ve found many common elements that lead to a program’s success. One of the most basic is an understanding of the volunteers themselves, and what they want to get out of the time they spend.

Organizations that get to know their volunteers often have the strongest volunteer programs, and together with the volunteers achieve the greatest results for their organizations.

On Thursday, Nov. 5, the National Council on Aging held a Webinar — Engaging Older Volunteers as Leaders in Your Organization! — that shared some insight on volunteers’ differing needs and wants.

Gajtana Simonovski and Kay Oppenheimer, from Community Service Society of New York RSVP, presented their first-hand experience working with volunteers in this age group and said most fall into one of two categories: Boomers or old-school volunteers. Each group has its own distinct needs and motivations, and reactions to volunteer programs.

Boomers are individualistic, used to creating social upheavals, focused on careers, happy with responsibility and challenge, comfortable with uncertainty, and interested in being an equal partner with the organization. Boomers seek flexibility in their projects.

They see themselves as forever young and not limited by age. They enjoy lifelong learning and wish to improve society, as well as change the face of volunteering, and are critical of ideas.

Old-school volunteers typically are interested in having a job and income rather than a career. They are focused on play rather than work. They are conservative and accepting, they fear failure, and they view themselves as old. Women in this group may not have worked before.

These volunteers like to come weekly to work on long-term projects, and they will adjust their schedules around their volunteer commitments. The number of hours they volunteer is a source of pride, and they will do a job just because it needs doing. They like direct service roles such as tutoring and clerical work.

They are comfortable with limited responsibility, top-down management approaches and change within the confines of the organization. They do not seek out challenge in their volunteer roles.

As Simonovski said, “There’s a lot of competition out there.” So align your volunteer opportunities with your potential volunteers, and you’ll have cleared the first hurdle to success.

Stay tuned next week for news of the next Webinar in our sold-out series, How to Grow Your Programs by Engaging Older Professional Leadership Volunteers.

How to Support Volunteer Leaders – Today

Volunteer leader positions give back much to the community, involved organizations, and the volunteers themselves. Now, legislation is underway that can help support efforts to create these positions.

While the Serve America Act that sets the stage for increased civic engagement has passed, it is not yet funded. To assist in meeting the goals it outlines, Congress must approve $1.157 billion for the Corporation for National and Community Service.

The National Council on Aging (NCOA) believes strongly in this effort. Only by putting the power of funding behind the Serve America Act can it achieve its goals.

So, in conjunction with Voices for National Service, NCOA is encouraging all House members to join this effort and to add their names to a sign-on letter that supports the funding. The Co-Chairs of the House National Service Caucus — Representatives Doris Matsui (D-CA), Todd Platts (R-PA), Vernon Ehlers (R-MI), and David Price (D-NC) — are circulating this letter.

While some representatives have signed it already, others have not. Now, NCOA is asking for people who believe in service and the value of volunteer leadership to ask their congressional representatives to sign the letter, too.

If you would like to join the effort to create more of these positions, please learn more and contact your representative.

The deadline for signatures is Friday, October 16.

Lessons Learned: Overcoming Challenges

I was on one of my morning walks the other day and while enjoying the cool fall breezes, I started thinking about the changes that I have seen this past year as a volunteer leader.

It gave me pause to ponder the challenges I have encountered. When looking back, I also reflected on the situation from other perspectives. I asked myself, “Would I do things differently if I knew then what I know now? Or would I make the same decisions?”

Looking back, it has been an interesting year, where the introduction of a volunteer leader in the non-profit organization I work in was more challenging and difficult than anyone had anticipated.

I thought that it would be a no-brainer for an organization to put the skills of an experienced businessperson in a role that would take advantage of that person’s knowledge and abilities. Instead I came face to face with several hurdles.

The first challenge was for the organization to recognize and adopt a model in which capable and skilled volunteers led other volunteers and, in some situations, staff personnel.

The next hurdle was communicating the changes so that they were clear and non-threatening, and included tools that encouraged volunteers and staff to accept the change and implement ways to “make it their own.”

Finally, overcoming the implementation hurdle was the turning point to our success. This was the most difficult challenge and also the most rewarding. We had several starts and restarts trying to understand and develop a fit for what would work and what wouldn’t.

We soon learned that while we were trying to develop a new level of volunteering (volunteer leadership), there were others that wanted to continue in traditional volunteer roles, and others that wanted to do more, but were not ready to be volunteer leaders.

It opened our eyes to the realization that we had several levels of volunteers: Traditional volunteers, volunteer leaders, and dynamic volunteers. We needed to recognize all three levels and develop a culture that honored, embraced, and supported all of them. Now that was a challenge!!!

We continue to work on this part, and I could use your help. Please share with us what challenges you have faced either as a volunteer leader, or as a volunteer working with volunteer leaders. How did you handle the situation, what lessons did you learn? If you could do it over again, what would you do differently?

How Older Adults Marketed the City Museums

At the National Council on Aging (NCOA), we are working hard on ways to help organizations develop leadership-level volunteer opportunities. In that way, older adults can contribute their skills, advance the organization’s mission in a meaningful way, and serve the community.

In June 2007, NCOA launched the Models of Significant Service project by awarding the first wave of two-year $40,000 grants to 12 local nonprofits; the second wave of grants went to 10 nonprofits. Grantees were to develop entrepreneurial approaches to attract and support adults age 55+ to fill important leadership roles.

Those projects are now concluded, and all involved are benefiting from the learnings.

Over the next several weeks, I’d like to share with you an overview of each project, and how it helped develop opportunities for older adults to donate not just their time, but their skills and talent.

This time, I’d like to highlight The Ubuntu Project, which took place at the City of Mesa Arts and Cultural Department, Mesa, Ariz. In this project, three leadership volunteers provided free marketing services that the city, in a budget crunch, could not afford to buy.

Called “Ability Experts,” these volunteers did such things as improve websites and evaluate programs and sharpen marketing plans for three City museums.

This project is a strong example, because it clearly shows how three entities can benefit from these arrangements–the volunteer, the nonprofit and the community.

And it produced one nonprofit leader who has favorable things to say about her experience with leadership-level volunteers. Said Sunnee Spencer, Museum Director for the Arizona Museum for Youth, “Our Ability Experts have had an incredible impact upon all three of the Mesa arts and cultural organizations as part of the Ubuntu project. The Arizona Museum of Youth now has a new website, the Arizona Museum of Natural History has a team of trained volunteers conducting program surveys and the Mesa Arts Center understands the steps it needs to take to garner a Gen Y audience.”

What do you think about this project? Do you have any similar experiences to share?

How to Inspire Others

In my last blog, I talked about inspiring others. This got me thinking about what “inspiration and inspiring others” means. I started thinking about what inspires me. I volunteer to give back to my community, and I lead to inspire others.

Show Personal Leadership:

In my younger days, I looked at leadership as a command post that only came when you achieved a management title. As I matured, I realized that leadership comes from within.

What we do with the talents we are given and the skills that we learn is a key part of our success as leaders. Inspiring others gives us the opportunity to share that knowledge. It is a big part of the leadership responsibility and accountability I take in performing my volunteer roles.

It begins with a simple, cheery “Good Morning,” which sets a positive tone to begin the day. Throughout the day, I do what I can to enable and encourage open and friendly communications between paid staff and other volunteers to strengthen their relationships and build working teams.

More often than not, inspiring others means encouraging them to say what they are thinking, share their ideas, or speak up when they can improve a process or see that something is not working well. Their voices and contributions often positively influence the outcome of a situation.

Listen:

Another way that I inspire volunteers is to hear their stories and help them aspire to roles that raise their interest and potential, help them grow, and provide a bigger contribution to the organization.

I was surprised to hear that many volunteers were not aware of the full scope of roles that are available to them, and that they felt limited in their current role. After learning about their backgrounds and diversity of skills, as well as their leadership abilities, it opened an opportunity to explore new ways of capturing information about volunteer skills, and linking that to the needs of the organization’s departments.

From time to time, I ask myself, what is the legacy that I want to leave behind? Lately, I hear people measuring themselves by their carbon footprint; I talk about what my volunteer leadership print will be. Do you want to be remembered by how many hours you put into your role, or the difference you made through effective leadership decisions and contributions?

If you are a volunteer leader who has inspired others, or have been inspired by a volunteer (after all, we are all leaders), please share your stories with us.

Empowering Volunteers

It has been an interesting experience for me as I navigate as a leader in the world of volunteerism. In many ways my volunteer leadership experiences have been the same as in the business world, and in other situations, I find myself navigating through what seems like uncharted waters.

In one of my first assignments, I put together teams and looked for the same characteristics in volunteer members as I would have when I managed paid staff. I was delighted to find that volunteers, particularly older ones, are very committed, have a solid work ethic, and are enthusiastic about their volunteer assignments.

What I found that was different was that many volunteers did not feel empowered or inspired by their organizations. They were good at following processes and procedures, but would be hesitant to deviate from the process or think outside the box.

I am trying to influence others and model positive behaviors for others to follow, but how do I inspire others when they do not feel like a part of the organization? This is an interesting finding.

As a volunteer leader, do you run across these situations? How are you working through them? What works? What should I be watching out for or avoiding? Are there obstacles or potential roadblocks I should be aware of?

Thank you for sharing your ideas with me.

Volunteer Leaders as Mentors

In addition to leading, for me, leadership has always meant mentoring others. As leaders we know that our true strength comes in not what we ourselves do, but in how we inspire others.

As a volunteer leader, what are you doing to inspire others in your non-profit organization? How has this differed from what you may have done in your business career, or is it the same for both?

In my business life, I regularly mentored members of my staff and other staffers in the organization, and as a business volunteer I mentored young people just starting out in their careers. I did not begin mentoring other volunteers until recently, and I am finding this to be a new and different scenario than what I had previously experienced.

Mentoring other volunteers is a rewarding experience. Some have felt that hearing about how they can use their work experiences and knowledge to expand their volunteer roles has opened new vistas and opportunities for them. Many have told me that when they started being a volunteer leader instead of a traditional volunteer, they found it liberating and in some ways gave them “permission” to expand the way they contributed and be part of the growth of the organization.

This empowerment is in contrast to the supporting role they had played in more traditional volunteer assignments in which they followed procedures and performed designated tasks. Now they feel like they are participating in the changes taking place in the organization and positively contributing to their success.

I get so much out of volunteering, and as a volunteer leader and mentor, I have found another way to continue giving back to my community and other volunteers.

Have you mentored other volunteers? If so, what has been your experience?