But I can't keep volunteers

I had a conversation with someone recently and their lament was they couldn't keep volunteers and certainly not "those Millennials."  Of course I disagree, as I usually do
First if you are a volunteer manager, what are you doing to take care of your volunteers; remember a volunteer is not coming to do things with you for a check. 
So what keeps them coming back? 
Are you doing things to make their time comfortable? Like this Fire Department in Virginia?
Are you providing them with training ? 
Are you providing them with time to connect with other volunteers?
Are you giving them meaningful experiences/ things to do that matter?

If you can't answer yes to these questions , then the next question is why do you have them?

Go take care of your volunteers
DisasterDave

Ahhh my nightmare is true!

If I have one thing that wakes me in the middle of the night it is having 100’s, no thousands of spontaneous volunteers showing up after a catastrophic event! But that would never happen, right? Read this then come back, lets talk!

In April there was an earthquake near Longmen Township China that killed 160 and injured over 1,600.  But that is not the story I want to highlight here.  What we want to consider is what happened after.

Consider the words of Luo Ming the team leader with the Sichuan Emergency Response Volunteer Group “The volunteers have created a certain kind of disaster themselves,” he says, speaking with the rapid speech of someone who has not slept in 48 hours. “It seems like there are more volunteers than there are earthquake victims. They have no place to sleep, and nothing to eat, and most of them have no experience or training.”

There were so many people streaming into the area that the government had to block the area off and restrict access.

While I believe there are places for spontaneous volunteers; the ones who are there when it happens and pitch in the save their neighbors and secure the area.  But having people just show up with no training and no support is just adding to the problem. 

One of the things that a catastrophic disaster has is lack of everything, food, water, bathrooms, places to sleep; why would someone insert himself or herself into that?  Because they don’t understand the problem!

First we need to know who you are?

What skills do you have?

Are you committed or just a disaster tourist?

What support do you have (or do we as an organization provide)?

Can we utilize your skills (or lack of) outside the disaster area in support?

Your local emergency manager is going to busy trying to help the community; lets not give them another thing to worry about. So please pick one:

1.    If you really desire to be part of the solution, please go register for an organized group:

http://www.redcross.org/support/volunteer       

https://www.medicalreservecorps.gov/HomePage     

http://www.fema.gov/community-emergency-response-teams

http://www.volunteermatch.org/ 

 

2.    Or stay home

PS: I vote you pick # 1, you'll be proud of yourself

Disaster_Dave

Opportunities to serve or how not to sit on a database

Want your volunteers to be there when you really need them (disasters)? 

Then find ways to engage them today. I often repeat, "Volunteers don't join an organization to sit in a database".  Yet that is one of the most common complaints I here from volunteers. "I did all this training, paperwork and now what..."

So again I don't have all the answers, but you might.
I began by looking at my organizations mission and seeing what wasn't getting done, or who needed help. And low and behold there was work for my volunteers to do.  

• Our volunteers currently hold medical clinics for the homeless once per month in two separate locations.

• Our volunteers (Hams) are currently working on identifying rally locations in our county that have good communications paths.  It will be a place we roll out to all of our volunteers (400+) this summer and test.  After we have proven the viability we will offer this site to our employee network.

• We support Red Cross shelters during times of need (Nurses & EMTs).

• We have used support volunteers to help us repackage some critical supplies in our warehouse.

All of this takes time and project management , yes and weekends on my part. But I believe in my program and my volunteers and they want to be useful now, they want to do now, so I continue to look for opportunities to put them to work.

After all that's why they joined, not to sit on a database !

Disaster_Dave

So you found them, now what?

You have done the work to find your new volunteer(s), what do you do next?

 Have them read a rule book (yawn), talk on the phone (not personal enough); have them watch an online orientation from home (seriously). Now I know there may be good reasons to use one of these methods; but I can't think of any!

Your volunteers came to you because of two things: 
1. They want to do, to be, to make a difference
 and/or 2. In a small way depending on your recruiting system, they came because of you and want to meet you
!

I am a firm believer in looking my new folks in the eye and telling them what I expect of them and what they can expect of me/my program. I want to see them and they want to see me.

And yes we have a lot to do as volunteer managers, so I am going to outline what I do and then some riffs you can use to help if you think its too much. 
My program has no advertising budget, and virtually no support from our internal public affairs group. Yet with a group of over 400 volunteers we still orient 10-20 new volunteers every month. The important distinction is orient; only about 75% of those who attend orientation finish the process and I'm okay with that (more later). Once a month (Thursday night twice per quarter and Saturday mid morning for the other) we hold an orientation beginning at 530 and ending around 700 PM (Saturday 1000-1130). 
What my PowerPoint orientation looks like:

• ·      Where the MRC came from

• ·      What it is

• ·      What it isn't

• ·      How our unit functions and fits into the big picture

• ·      Why its important they register now - not after something happens
• ·      What we expect from them
• ·      What they can expect from us (Our promise)
• ·      
Protection under the laws (Very important for licensed volunteers)
• ·      Personal & Family preparedness
• ·      What our unit does (activities so far this year & planned)
• ·      Reoccurring medical missions

• ·      Training and exercise
• ·      
What kind of equipment we have to serve
• ·      Partnerships for deployments - Red Cross and City disaster sheltering (Last year our volunteers served over 1,200 hours touching people that needed help- not training)
• ·      Questions
• ·      My last ask is join us on Face book - talks to us (ideas, complaints)
• ·      If you like what you hear tell your friends and co workers about us (My advertising is here)

I feel like this gives my potential volunteers enough information to know what they are getting into.

So now to the 25% drop rate; they must go home and complete IS 100 and IS 700 before they can become active. Once that is completed, we do the background check and issue a badge with an EW # on it (and a cool fleece MRC Vest). I remind them a couple of times, if no response I transfer them to the ESAR VHP and let them know they can rejoin at any time. It is better to know I have a smaller number of committed volunteers than think I have 4,000 volunteers. 
(More later about how I am sure I really have 400+ volunteers)

Riffs:

• My area is too big for me to go to all the volunteers- then how can you provide supervision? Oh you use a senior volunteer in that county, area, cool. Let them do the Face-to-Face orientation- great connection point.
• The volunteer is too busy - Then I submit if they can't give up a couple of hours, they won't show up for a real disaster.
• I'm too busy- Suck it up, this is what we do, some days are longer than others, take an extra hour for lunch. Sorry, don't mean to be harsh, but I consider this 1.5 hours a month the best part of my job!

I don't have all the answers, but this works for me and my organization, how do I know? When I call them to serve I have to turn people away. I also am constantly looking for ways to give them a chance to serve while we wait (another blog)

Want to see my orientation? - Connect with me

Disaster_dave

Quitters?

 I have been too busy volunteering to write about volunteering last month!

 But upon my return I dug into a project that had been hanging over my head, which is the topic today.  

In January we moved our volunteer group from an Access Database (we did all the work) to an online State Database (volunteer has to do work).  And my Corps dropped from 470 to 300.  This didn't happen quickly, but the change required my volunteers to go online and build their profile, most did, many didn't.  We used a multi-pronged attack to get people to move; email, Facebook, Phone calls and a little cajoling.  

But in the end, some folks opted out.  For me this was sad on several levels:

·      The work they did to qualify (online IS 100 & 700)

·      The work we did to get them on board (Background checks, lots of paperwork)

·      The loss of their skills for little things and the “big one”

Yesterday I went into the cabinets and pulled the files of those people who left. (We color code the files based on type of volunteer – Red = Medical, Blue = EMT, Green = Behavioral Health and Yellow = support). Man, when I got done the stacks of colors was very depressing, and I moved between wanting to go knock on their doors and try to explain why they were making a mistake to a little bit of anger.

So what now? Well I am going to send them an invite to join ESAR VHP a lesser level of commitment, but a win for us if there is a big one. 

And I just have to move on, but take a few minutes to make sure I am doing everything in power to keep my volunteers involved and happy.

PS: I'm back up to 375!

What to do without disasters

 So you have a great program, great volunteers, they are all background checked and NIMS compliant, now what?
If you run a disaster volunteer (the title of this blog) program, you know that often you are left waiting, waiting, waiting for something to happen.  I know its a bit of perverse thing to do; but thats a different blog post.
My co-workers and volunteers often hear me say "volunteers don't join us to sit on a database, they volunteer to do!"
 There are some certainties that having active volunteers will fulfill.The WHY!

• Active volunteers are happier and stay with programs longer
• Active volunteers tell their friend what they do (think free advertising)
• Active volunteers get noticed when they are doing (Think free advertising)
• Active volunteers can help move your mission/program forward

Another certainty is you will have to work more to keep volunteers busy; it takes work to find, schedule, supervise and get things for them to do.  So now for some ideas:

MRC (Medical Reserve Corps)

• Providing health checks at community fairs (tailor what you check to the audience)
• Augmenting the Public Health mission - whatever you can do to help
• Preparedness training for vulnerable populations in your area
• Training
• Red Cross shelter training
• First Aid training
• AED training
• Cultural competency training
• Radiological training/briefing
• HAM radio (for warning and notifications)

CERT (Community Emergency Response Team)

• Teaching Preparedness training for the community (vulnerable pops, kids, etc.)
• First Aid
• Shelter Training
•  Community education (excuse me, did you know you live in a flood plain?)
• Other ideas - Here
• Pet sheltering training

Volunteer Fire Fighters

• Teach Fire education in schools
• Teach Fire education with vulnerable populations
• Inspection and education (while they may not be able to do official inspections, they can augment your current program)

I know that some of these suggestions may not work (cost, law/rules/unions, interest, etc.)
I know I missed some ideas (please give me input and I'll add to the list allowing everyone to benefit from our collective wisdom)
And most of all I listed only three types of disaster volunteers, you are welcome to add to my list.

Thanks for reading
Disaster_Dave

KEEP THE BAR HIGH

There are two things I want to say about the title of this article.   

1. If you have done everything right there may come a time when you think “If we weren’t so picky maybe we would have more volunteers”.  DON’T do it.  Remember back in “turnaround” you sat down with leadership and made decisions about what you needed to require to take in volunteers?

You needed Background checks so you were sure you had good people – a background check is cheaper than a lawsuit for not checking. 

You required IS100 & IS700 so everyone had a common operating language and understanding.

Stay the course, if you start cutting corners, you will end up with a mish-mash of folks with different qualifications, and once they talk and find out there is no standard, the good ones will be gone.

2. Work with your volunteers to figure out what parts of your mission they are excited about, and go there first.  You need to build excitement and satisfaction among your volunteers, this will lead to them talking about the great things they are doing. This will bring in more volunteers.  At this point you may get request to do things that are not your mission or that you may not have volunteers interested in doing. Don’t do it.  Many of us have a wide range of skills and tasks in our groups, but again if it’s too far out of your main mission say no.

These two steps will keep your volunteer group focused and on track to succeed.

disaster_dave

Care for volunteers AFTER the initial disaster

As time moves forward we learn from the past; the important question is are we learning from other's lessons?

Following the 3-11 disaster in Japan last year, there has been a sharp drop in volunteer firefighters. In the article Keiichi Sasaki, 56, head of the division, said: "Some members have been begged by their families to quit because this job is dangerous. There may be more members who want to leave because of this."
There may be other reasons, but the thing that jumps out to me from the article; is there is no plan for mental health and counseling for the volunteers? Is there a plan for the employees?
So the question for you as a volunteer manager is what is your plan?  Do you have plans to provide for mental health care of your volunteers? What about their families?

I want to be clear I am not giving advice on which type of counseling to provide or the medium or time after the event to conduct it; that is someone else's specialty, not mine.

What I am saying is plan for it; engage the experts; put it in your plan.

If you utilize volunteers for disaster response no matter how small the event, you owe it to them to offer this care after the event. They might even stay around for the next disaster...

disaster_dave

How to make volunteering more relevant

Making Volunteering More Popular By Making It More Relevant

The article imbedded in the above link ran this week in one of my LinkedIn groups.  It along with some conversations I had with several folks around the country about how this works brought up the fact that some disaster volunteer programs get it backwards.  They go get volunteers then try to make their experience relevant!  Huh? What?

If you haven't thought through what you are going to do with your disaster volunteers until the disaster happens, don't place that advertisement.  First do a few things:

• What are they being recruited to do in a disaster situation?
• Until then how will you help them become trained for that situation?
• Job descriptions
• Job Cards (on the job refresher training)
• Safety steps (protect them)
• Scheduling
• processing on and off the job
• Training to keep them interested and excited
• Real world missions that give them the satisfaction of helping NOW

But seriously until then don't recruit unless you can keep them moving forward.

disaster dave