Welcome to Participant Retention

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Welcome to Participant Retention

• Amy Thompson

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Agenda

• Foundation
• Introductions
• Set the Day
• Agenda
• Opening Activity
• Why Volunteers Leave
• Management Cycle and Principles
• Stages of Group Development

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Agenda

• Leadership Compass
• Each One, Teach One
• Closing

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2 of 3 volunteers stop volunteering because of
poor management. Volu
nteers, especially Baby Boomers, have high
expectations

• Good customer service
• Meaningful service activities
• Well organized experience

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Volunteer Management Cycle

• PLANNING obtaining buy-in designing member
  positions creating application forms developing
  applicable policies and procedures and educating
  others in the organization about involving
  members
• RECRUITMENT who, why, where, when and how. Who
  would be the ideal member? Why would they be
  interested in your member opportunity? Where and
  when can you reach these people? How can you
  create a recruitment message that encourages
  potential members to serve for your organization?
• Orientation and Training to give the general
  information about your organization and the
  specific information about the member position,
  provide year long training around position
  specific, leadership, and life after AmeriCorps.
• Supervision and Evaluation You need to know
  that the member is fulfilling their role
  effectively and the member needs affirmation too
  - assess how the member placement is going and
  if changes could be made to improve the members
  satisfaction or performance.
• Recognition happens in an informal way every
  time a thank you is said. Formally, members are
  thanked through celebrations and recognition
  events planned in their honor. It is important
  that the thank you fits the member you need to
  know your members so that they can be thanked in
  a way that leaves them feeling truly recognized.

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Planning

• Conduct a needs assessment that at a min.
  involves the community
• Get buy-in from all stakeholders in project
  planning and development
• Project vision, mission and goals that fit with
  those of the overall organization
• Organization budgets money

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Planning

• Other org. staff see volunteers as assets and
  understand their roles
• Organization implements strategies to promote
  positive staff/volunteer relationships
• Top management demonstrates support and
• Regularly assess project strengths and challenges

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Recruitment and Selection

• Written description of the qualities of an ideal
  candidate based on community needs and program
  activities
• Written list of benefits volunteers receive as a
  part of service
• Written position descriptions, developed in
  conjunction with stakeholders that detail
  essential and marginal functions, time
  commitment, workload, supervisor, etc.
• Written, strategic, innovative year-long
  recruitment and selection plan, developed in
  conjunction with stakeholders

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Recruitment and Selection

• Recruit and select a diverse pool of volunteers
  that reflect the communities in which they serve
• Actively recruit individuals with disabilities
• Application elicits enough information to
  determine whether the prospective volunteer is a
  potential fit
• Selection process thoroughly assesses volunteer
  background, skills, accomplishments, motivation,
  goals, and commitment

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Recruitment and Selection

• Selection process involves a diversity of
  participants that have a stake in program
• Program matches volunteers to appropriate
  positions and sites and
• Program gets feedback from partners on
  effectiveness of recruitment and selection
  process

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Support

• Agreement that outlines expectations, agreements,
  and consequences (signed by volunteer and
  organization)
• Written list of skills and knowledge volunteers
  need to serve
• Assess training needs with volunteers and sites
• Orientation is planned and developed with
  stakeholders and prepares volunteers for
  beginning of service
• Provide volunteers with information on community
  and agency
• Written, year-long training plan, developed in
  partnership with stakeholders
• Regularly assess training effectiveness and make
  needed modifications

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Support

• Yearly evaluations that provide performance
  feedback (2 times per year for AmeriCorps State
  and National)
• Yearly opportunities for volunteers to assess
  program impact and support
• Use evaluations to make yearly programmatic and
  volunteer improvements
• Written strategy to retain volunteers
• Provide each volunteer with a point of contact
  that provides support and supervision

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Recognition

• Written plan to internally and externally
  recognize volunteers for accomplishments and
  community impact
• Implement creative motivational strategies
• Allow for reflection opportunities to celebrate
  and document accomplishments and experiences
• Provide documentation to volunteers that
  demonstrate their impact

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Stages of Group Development Discussion

• How can we present this stage to the larger
  group?
• What is this stage talking about? What is going
  on at this time?
• What are the greatest challenges programs and
  volunteers face at this stage?
• Thinking about the different areas of the
  management cycle, what strategies can we
  implement to ensure retention?

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Stages of Group Development
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Leadership Compass

• East Purpose, Vision, Big Picture
• WHY?
• West Process, Details, Planning
• HOW?
• North Products, Results, Goals
• WHAT?
• South People, Relationships, Support
• WHO?

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North At Our Best.

• Assertive, active, decisive
• Like to be in control of professional
  relationships and determine course of events
• Quick to act, expresses sense of urgency for
  others to ACT NOW
• Enjoys challenges presented by difficult
  situations and people
• Thinks in terms of the bottom line
• Like a quick pace and a fast track
• Courageous
• Perseveres, not stopped by NO, probes and presses
  to get at hidden resistances
• Likes variety, novelty, new projects
• Comfortable being in front
• do it now, Ill do it, whats the bottom line?

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North Taken to Excess.

• Can be bogged down by need to press ahead,
  decide, seem not to care about process or people
• Can defensive quickly, argue, try to out-expert
  you
• Can lose patience, pushes for decisions before
  its time
• May get autocratic, want this their way, riding
  roughshod over people in decision making process
• See things in terms of black and white, little
  tolerance for ambiguity
• May go beyond limits, get impulsive and disregard
  practical issues
• Not heedful of others feelings, may be perceived
  as cold
• Have trouble relinquishing control find it hard
  to delegate if you want to do something right,
  do it yourself

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South At Our Best.

• Allows others to feel important in determining
  direction of whats happening
• Value driven regarding aspects of professional
  life
• Uses professional relationships to accomplish
  tasks, interaction is primary
• Supportive, nurturing to colleagues and peers
• Willingness to trust others statements at face
  value
• Feeling-based, trusts own emotions and intuition,
  intuition regarded as truth
• Team player, receptive to others ideas, builds
  on ideas of others, noncompetitive
• Able to focus on the present moment
• right, fair

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South Taken to Excess.

• Can be bogged down when believe relationships,
  needs of people are being compromised
• Has trouble saying no to requests
• Internalizes difficulty and assumes blame
• Takes criticism of task personally
• Prone to disappointment when relationship is seen
  as secondary to task
• Difficulty confronting and dealing with anger,
  may be manipulated by anger
• Easily taken advantage of
• Immersed in present, loses track of time
• Immersed in NOW, may not see long-range view

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East At Our Best.

• Visionary who sees the big picture
• Very idea oriented, focus on future thought
• Insight into mission and purpose
• Looks for overarching themes, ideas
• Likes to experiment, explore
• Appreciates generating a lot of information
• Inspiring, exciting, motivating
• options, possibilities

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East Taken to Excess.

• Can be bogged down by lack of vision or too much
  emphasis on vision
• Can lose focus or become bored with tasks,
  details
• May have poor follow through on projects drop
  the ball in someone elses lap
• May become easily over whelmed by too much detail
  or too many projects on the plate
• Not time-bound, may lose track of time
• Tends to be highly enthusiastic early on then
  burn out over the long haul
• Can develop a reputation for lack of dependability

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West At Our Best.

• Seen as practical, dependable, and thorough in
  task situation
• Helpful to others by providing planning and
  resources
• Likes lists, charts, tables, organizing ideas and
  tasks
• Moves carefully and follows procedures and
  guidelines
• Uses data analysis and logic to make decision
• Weighs all sides of an issue, balanced
• Introspective, analytical
• Careful, thoroughly examining needs in a
  situation
• Works well with existing resources get the most
  out of it
• Skilled at finding fatal flaws in an idea or
  project
• objective, benchmarks, steadfast

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West Taken to Excess.

• Can be bogged down by too much information
  analysis paralysis
• Can become stubborn and entrenched in position
• Can be indecisive, collect unnecessary data,
  mired in details
• May appear cold, withdrawn with respect to
  others working styles (focused on data, not
  people)
• Tendency towards watchfulness, observation
• Can remain withdrawn, distanced
• Resists emotional pleas and change

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Each One, Teach One

• What are the key points I pulled from this
  reading?
• How does this relate to retention?
• How can I implement this in my program?

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Thank You and Good Luck!

• Amy Thompson
• CAC Consulting
• 512.448.0401
• CACconsulting_at_hotmail.com