Hot
Topic Archive
June
2004
Exploring
the social side of volunteer involvement
by
Andy Fryar
A
recent feature in my local Sunday paper got me thinking.
The
article, titled “How all work and a little play
pays” (Sunday Mail 23.5.04) examined
a growing trend in the business world, where the creation
and promotion of staff social clubs are becoming an
increasing popular method of maintaining staff morale
and ultimately retention rates.
Now
at the outset, let me acknowledge that there is nothing
new about staff social clubs. In fact if we were to
turn the clock back just a few decades, we would find
a proliferation of similar social groups in organisations
of all sizes.
Most
of these were operated and funded by employees through
membership fees and/or fundraising activities. They
offered staff (and often their families) the opportunity
to participate in a range of recreational and social
activities that helped build rapport in a work team
and recognised the importance of the workplace as
being more than simply a location where employees
spent eight hours a day in return for monetary reward.
The
reality however is that over the past 25 years there
has been a steady decline in the number of workplace
social outlets for a variety of reasons. These may
include an increase in working hours for many and
the plethora of other avenues now available for networking,
especially through mediums such as the internet.
Regardless
of the reasons, there appears to be a new push to
develop and support workplace social clubs and other
group activities in order to bond staff groups together
as part of the workplace agenda – but this time
it is being driven (and often subsidised) significantly
by the employer.
A
survey of clients by South Australian human resources
company Hender Consulting reported that workplace
social clubs do in fact increase staff productivity
and produce a happier workplace environment. It is
also recognised that this type of workplace bonding
offers a great environment in which to foster staff
loyalty and retention.
So
why discuss this in a hot topic about volunteer management?
There
are two reasons.
Firstly,
I wonder how many volunteer agencies effectively use
social clubs and other recreational activities as
a means to involving their volunteers more fully in
the life of their organisation? Involvement of this
kind may be by way of a stand alone volunteer social
group run exclusively for volunteers, or it may facilitated
by inviting volunteer staff to become involved in
existing social activities being operated by &/or
for paid staff of the agency.
Volunteer
social clubs can:
-
provide a great opportunity for volunteers to share
their workplace and experiences with families and
friends (which may in turn lead some of these individuals
to become a volunteer with your agency)
-
offer the chance for volunteers to get to know one
another outside of their regular volunteer routine
-
allow a medium for volunteers from different areas
to meet one another
-
enable volunteers to meet new people and experience
new things
When
we consider that the Australian Bureau of Statistics
found that 17.9% of all people volunteered because
they wanted increased ‘social contact’
** maybe we really should be focusing more
on these types of outlets for our teams.
On
a personal note, my own experience in helping to establish
a volunteer social club at the Lyell McEwin Regional
Volunteer Association has been very positive. Not
only has it proved to be an increasingly popular and
accepted social outlet (a river boar cruise at the
end of the year is currently filling its fourth bus
full of participants!), it has also created a valuable
and meaningful volunteer role for the group’s
coordinator. (Read more at the Lyell McEwin website)
The
second reason I believe this to be a topic of interest
lies in the fact that workplace social activities,
as already stated, are seen to be a means of creating
happier and more productive places of employment –
where amongst other things, existing staff members
are more readily retained because they share enjoyment
in the workplace.
Now
I don’t know about you, but I tend to think
that as a profession, we may actually have something
we can teach the ‘for profit’ world in
all of this!
After
all, aren’t we the experts?
Day
in and day out we:
- create
enjoyable places of work for our volunteers, where
they choose to come and contribute their time free
of charge
-
achieve amazing results by leading and retaining
teams of individuals who have the choice to walk
out the door at a moments notice - never to be seen
again
-
create work environments which are enjoyable –
and often even fun!
-
do all of the above so well, that our existing team
actually tell others to come and join in (…yes
you too can come and do all this work for free.
You’ll have a great time!)
Are
these not many of the same qualities that the business
world is looking for by creating greater social interaction
opportunities for their employees?
Maybe
we should be doing more as a profession to promote
the amazing range of management skills that are unique
to our sector – the very management skills that
may just give both the government and the ‘for
profit’ sector the answers they are looking
for in developing these new social initiatives.
So
what do you think?
-
Share your experiences (good and bad) about the
development of volunteer social groups
-
If you don’t have any social outlets for your
volunteer teams, what are the barriers?
-
Do you think that the skills we develop in volunteer
management are easily transferable to other sectors?
-
Do you know of any examples where this has occurred?
-
Do you have ideas about how we might do that as
a movement?
*From
Sunday Mail article “How all work and a little
play pays’ ( 23rd May 2004 )
**Australian
Bureau of Statistics, 2001, Voluntary Work, Australia
2000, Catalogue 4441.0
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