Archive for the ‘Tools You Can Use’ Category

How Holiday Volunteering Can Be Like Black Friday Shopping

Friday, November 25th, 2011

Reading this title you may ask yourself “Why would I ever want to volunteer over the holidays if it will be like Black Friday shopping?”

We know Black Friday shopping can be extremely chaotic stressful for most people with the large crowds, circus of holiday decoration, and battles over the year’s most prized toys.

How does this have anything to do with volunteering?

Holiday volunteering can be just as stressful and overwhelming with the hundreds of volunteer opportunities, overcrowding of people wanting to fulfill the New Years resolution, and trying to fit it in to your already hectic holiday schedule.

How will you ever be able to give back to the community if your volunteering experience becomes as crazy as planning for Black Friday shopping? By following your general protocol for holiday shopping plans, your volunteer experience can go smoothly and actually be enjoyable.

You may even want to make it an actual habit unlike the one time a year holiday shopping event. Follow these tips to make volunteering an option this holiday season.

  • Define your goals. Like holiday shopping planning where you must figure out what you need to buy and who to buy for, holiday volunteering requires you to ask yourself these same questions like who do you want to serve and what do you want to do? You should consider what the scope of your project is, what you want to see happen in your community as a result of your project, how your goal choice will affect how you select and plan the project based on all your resources.
  • Creating a group project team. Holiday shopping requires a team of other people who can help with gift ideas and sometimes shopping with others can make it seem less overwhelming. Holiday volunteering also can be more enjoyable with a team of volunteers that donate various skills and ideas to the project. When planning a volunteering project consider who has participated in past volunteering experiences, who has expressed an interest, and who has demonstrated good leadership.
  • Selecting a project. Holiday shopping has a very important goal selecting the perfect gift that will bring cheer in the hearts of your loved ones. Holiday volunteering is exactly that selecting a project that will best help the issues that affect your community. You consider what issues concern community members, what charities are supported, what skills can be of benefit, understand  your project, and what types of activities would be most successful.
  • Planning the project. Black Friday shopping will be most effective with careful planning. Holiday volunteering also requires lots of planning before putting it into effect. Before starting your project organize the work, define your timeline, and share your success!
  • Recruiting volunteers. The most important task in planning holiday volunteering projects is recruiting other volunteers to participate. Consider whether you will recruit members from an organization or your friends and family, what age group you wish to engage, how will you reach volunteers, and whether or not you will recruit outside your community.
  • Budget and resource development. A well-organized budget is critical to a successful shopping trip, as well as a successful service project. You should consider what tasks need to be completed and financial resources you need.
  • Implementing the big day. After all this planning no matter if you’re shopping or volunteering, you want the day to run smoothly and according to plan. Some things that you should consider to guarantee this will happen include designating decision makers and team leaders, providing training and orientation, taking time for reflection, and celebrating your success.

While the holidays can be the most overwhelming and stressful time of the year, they can also be quite rewarding and fun at the same time. Volunteering your time and skills during the holidays will allow you time to reflect about how truly rewarding helping others in the community can be.

Hope these tips help and good luck with your holiday shopping!

5 Tips for Communicating Your Mission

Friday, October 28th, 2011

nonprofit communicationsYou know that publicity is important for spreading your organizations message to the world, but how exactly do you do it? The most important step in your communication plan should be start early, before the demands from your organization start pulling you in too many different directions. Here is a to-do-list that can make contacting the media about your projects less daunting:

Review your program and its goals. Go over your program’s focus points and problem areas to ensure that everyone is clear about the central mission of the organization. Be proactive and answer any questions that may not have been answered already.

nonprofit audienceIdentify your audience and set your organization’s priorities. Brainstorm a list of people that can help you accomplish your organization’s goals. Spend most of your time with the people who can help spread your organization’s message and diversify your audience more.

Develop what you want to say. This step is very important because this is how you will get people to actually participate. These points should be developed for the audience you intend to reach. Your points can be adapted into different formats including fliers, brochures, press releases, and speeches. These points should be simple and logical, answering the following four questions:

  • What issue is your community is facing?
  • What needs to happen for change?
  • Why does your organization work for this issue?
  • What can your organization accomplish through its unique mission?

Plan and develop communication tools. Develop a few basic tools to keep yourself from getting overwhelmed. Focus your efforts on a few simple tasks at a time such as designing a brochure that can be used in more than one way. Understand your communication template to effectively use it and tailor it to the intended audience.

Work with the mass media. Take a breath… you do not need to be an expert to complete your final step. Begin your work by writing a plan about your course of action. This plan should include strategies for getting media attention, a to-do list, and deadlines. This plan will keep your project focused on the intended mission. This plan can be used as a reference to help your team stay on task.

Although getting media attention can be a daunting task, by staying organized the job can seem more manageable. The most important thing to remember is that your organization has an important mission to fulfill and with the help of media outlets that mission can be accomplished more quickly and efficiently.

Seven Useful New Social Media Tools

Wednesday, June 22nd, 2011

Did you blink and suddenly realize everything around you is digital? The technology train is taking off! Here’s your ticket to staying afloat and reach broader audiences with some useful social media tools!

AppMakr.com is a browser-based platform designed to make creating your own iPhone app quick and easy. Its free drag and drop tool enables anyone to build rich content based apps using a point and click solution.

AppMakr connects to existing RSS and social networking feeds for easier app integration. You can monitor downloads, create image galleries, and post alerts to keep all of your users updated and allows you to share app to get feedback before it is actually published.

Panabee.com is Brainstorm engine for finding cool names and checking domain availability. The domain name generator sifts through popular spelling or word pairings. Although many domain registrars have domain name spinners to suggest new domain names in case of the one you want is taken, Panabee shows you interesting options.

  • Suggestions and phonetic variations of the domain name/phrase you’re interested in, Panabee queries Facebook, Twitter, and the web to find similar terms that people are using.

Quixey.com is a functional search engine for applications. It doesn’t require users to know the name or exact description of app, users simply search “what they want to do,” and Quixey does all the looking. Quixey produces the most relevant search results by searching blogs, forums, social media and other sources to learn about each app.

Vanity URLS are domain names created to point to something to which it is related and indicated in the name of the URL. In many cases this is done by a company to point to a specific product or advertising campaign microsite. Link shortening programs like bit.ly sometimes offer customizable shortened urls for a fee.

  • Vanity URLs are creatively linked to something making them easier to remember than a more random link.

Bufferapp.com is a smarter way to schedule tweets. First, simply work out all your tweets at one point in time during the day. Then, fill up your Buffer with your tweets and Buffer schedules them for you. Simply keep that Buffer topped up and you will then be tweeting consistently all day round, all week long.

 

PeerIndex.net is an algorithmic mapping out of the influence on the social web. Similar to Klout, but PeerIndex.net gives users influence rankings in predetermined categories. It’s an interesting way to see how people interact with you on Twitter.

 

Rowfeeder is the latest tool for social media monitoring and analysis.

  • Input date and track Keywords, Hashtags, or Usernames from Twitter and Facebook.
  • Get reported updates in excel.

 

 

Social Media for Social Good Camp

Tuesday, May 10th, 2011

Whether you want to grow your membership, raise funds or loans, recruit more followers, gather petition signatures, find volunteers for your cause or connect with your community, Social Media for Social Good: How to Mobilize Your Supporters to Take Action will offer guidance that will help your organization create impact for years to come.

This special 3-hour workshop at the National Conference on Volunteering and Service will dive deeply into strategy, tactics and tools available to volunteer organizations and nonprofit managers. NCVS has no tech track this year, so get up to speed on the mission-critical social tools in your sector from two of the nation’s leading nonprofit tech leaders.

You have the passion, now learn the latest techniques in this power-packed interactive workshop!

The camp is the Sunday before the National Conference on Volunteering and Service, June 5, from 2 to 5 pm in the New Orleans Convention Center. When you sign up, the room number will be emailed to you before the workshop. There is an additional fee of $99 for the workshop.

When you register for the National Conference on Volunteering and Service, register for session 5638 to sign up for the workshop.

J.D. Lasica is a social media strategist, nonprofit consultant and author who is considered one of the world’s leading experts on the social Web. He is founder of Socialbrite.org, a learning hub & global consultancy that works with nonprofits and NGOs, and Socialmedia.biz, which works with major brands. A blogger since 2001, J.D. co-founded Ourmedia.org, the first free video hosting site, a month before YouTube.

He has spoken at or given workshops at Harvard’s Berkman Center, Stanford, MIT, NYU, SXSW, the Cannes Film Festival and at events in Paris, Milan and Seoul. J.D. was named one of the Top 40 Silicon Valley Influencers and one of CNET’s Top 100 Media Bloggers. Follow him on Twitter at .

George Weiner is chief technology officer of DoSomething.org. a not-for-profit that uses communication technologies to empower young people to take action. Under his leadership, the organization has become an innovator in social media, mobile technologies and causes. He oversaw the complete overhaul of the site, landing a People’s Choice Webby Award in the Youth category.

George is a self-taught techie and graduate of the University of Pennsylvania. He is a frequent speaker on nonprofit tech issues at forums including the Google Grants Conference, U.N. Youth Summit, National Conference on Volunteering and Service, NTEN and BlogWorld Expo and has guest lectured at NYU and NYIT. Follow him on Twitter at .

Agenda

Social Media for Social Good Camp will focus on practical, down-to-earth tactics and strategies that busy professionals can immediately take to engage supporters. The emphasis is on actionable takeaways. You’ll be introduced to several examples of nonprofits and volunteer organizations that are creating impact – with real-world examples you can learn from.

We encourage interaction and questions during our sessions! what you’d like to see covered, and tell us if you have any lessons learned that you’d like to share.

Some of the questions we’ll cover:

  • What strategies & tactics will motivate supporters and newcomers to take specific actions on behalf of my organization or cause?
  • What are the essential elements of a successful advocacy campaign?
  • How can I successfully use social tools to mobilize volunteers, spread awareness, enlist supporters, raise funds and drive action?
  • What metrics are critical to measure? (To drive social media decisions, ask, “What does the data say?” instead of “What does my gut say?”)
  • How can storytelling and video advance the mission of my organization?
  • Which organizations are creating impact, and what are they doing right?
  • What are some of the cutting-edge tools and resources available for change agents looking to make a difference?
  • What do you want to know? in advance.

Where possible, we’ll use a roundtable approach and a short small-group breakout session that encourages dialogue and interaction.

This is part of Socialbrite’s nationwide series of social media bootcamps. It has been presented to positive reviews at Personal Democracy Forum in New York and at Sustainatopia in Miami.

Hear what Jeff Pfaff, founder & CEO of mtbMobile, said about taking the bootcamp in this 60-second audio:

Jeff-Pfaff.mp3

Bonus materials!

In addition to this 3-hour live training, during the bootcamp you’ll also be able to access these full-color handouts and guides at no additional cost — and share them with your team!:

  1. 12 Steps to Mobilize Your Cause – Summary of all the action items you need to conduct a successful campaign.
  2. Team Collaboration – Tools to help you work with other organizations or your own team members in multiple locations.
  3. 15 Best Practices for the Social Web – High-level principles to help you succeed in social media.
  4. 12 Social Action Hubs – Selectively plug into some of these online communities and crowdsource platforms to promote a social cause.
  5. 40 Hashtags for Social Good – Use these Twitter hashtags as you tweet for your cause to gain wider visibility and viral help from the community.
  6. A Mobile Activism User’s Guide – A 16-page guide introducing you to the world of mobile activism and showing you how you can take your organization mobile.
  7. 10 Mobile Apps for Social Good – Apps for your iPhone or Android.
  8. 6 Twitter Tips for Change-Makers – A series of tips to help your organization use Twitter more strategically.

We’ve never had a disappointed attendee! Please register now!

What’s Your Heart & Soul?

Tuesday, March 1st, 2011

Heart and Soul 2011 Grant Award

How often does your organization step back and remember your mission?

Sure, you know what your mission is, but how often do you refine the sense of mission that exists in the hearts of your staff, board members and supporters?

This year’s Heart & Soul grant program, put on by the CTK Foundation, is designed to do just that.

To win, you have to channel your creativity to write an original four- to eight-line poem or stanza that reflects the work or mission of your nonprofit.

No poets on staff?

Why not ask your supporters to write a poem for you?

The 1st place winner will receive $10,000 and will have their submission turned into a song to be used in public education or awareness.

The song will be written and recorded by songwriter Bill Dillon — who was recently exonerated after 27 years in prison thanks to Innocence Project of Florida — and produced by Jim Tullio of Butcher Boy Studios.

The contest is open to all nonprofits in the United States, Canada and the UK.

The winning nonprofits will receive one of the following awards:

  • 1st place award is the song, plus a cash grant of $10,000 (US) or it’s value in foreign currency
  • 2nd place award is a cash grant of $5,000 (US) or it’s value in foreign currency
  • The 2011 Blogger’s Choice Award, where a randomly selected blogger participating in spreading the word among nonprofits about the H&S Grant Award Program will choose a nonprofit applicant to receive a $1,000 cash grant or it’s value in foreign currency
  • 2 steel-stringed guitars, signed by all members of Los Lonely Boys (which you can auction for fund-raising)
  • Up to 20 technology grants, valued at $10,000, to nonprofits that indicate an interest

There is a quick turnaround on these grants. You must submit an application by midnight on March 28, 2011, and you’ll be notified if you’ve won on April 10. Visit www.communitytech.net to apply.

Follow the effort on Twitter at .

Time to wax poetic!

HandsOn University – Becoming the Service University

Thursday, February 24th, 2011

Today’s post comes from Tricia Thompson, HandsOn Network‘s Manager of Training Development

Because of HandsOn University’s involvement in IBM’s Service Jam, we’ve been anticipating the release of the Jam’s impact report and are excited to share those results with all of you. In October, 15,000 people from 119 countries participated in the Service Jam. They discussed, debated and discovered the “possibilities of new solutions to long-standing societal problems.”

In the recently released “The Systems of Service,” a synthesis of the Jam discussions, the idea of a “Service University” emerged.

“What do you mean by ‘Service University?’” you might ask.

Jam participants defined it as an accessible and credible education for those involved in service. “A Service University would have to be just-in-time, available whenever the need for training arises,” said Barbara Salop, and independent consultant.

This is of particular interest for HOU, who is working toward building a solution to this need. HandsOn University is working toward developing an online learning environment that connects individuals involved in service with the tools and resources they need in real time.

Our staff and affiliate leadership faculty will develop some of these resources. For others, HOU Online will be the conduit to direct individuals to resources developed by other organizations and experts in the sector like CNCS National Service Resource Center and Susan Ellis’s Energize Inc.,  VolunteerMatch, IdeaEncore, Do Something.org or National Youth Leadership Council resource library .

HandsOn University’s vision is to be a one-stop shop for service related resources, tools and e-courses. We want to promote effective tools that already exist in the sector and work to build tools and resources to fill the gaps where currently no tools, training, or resources exist.  We have already started with the following resources:  HandsOn library, Service Project Playbook Library, and Get HandsOn website.

But the notion of a Service University doesn’t stop at training and resources. The demand for leadership and community infrastructure continues to grow at a rate that exceeds the supply.

We must provide the framework for a cycle of neighbors becoming leaders, leaders reaching a depth of impact, and that impact being an inspiration to others to start the cycle over again. HandsOn University is incubating a solution for that too – a little something called the Service Leader Network. But you’ll have to wait until Summer 2011 when that plan fully hatches.

In the mean time, HandsOn University has been experimenting with online learning tools and has developed two courses, one on Skills-based Volunteering and one on Service Leadership (launching soon in conjunction with the Road to the Gulf and GetHandsOn initiatives).

We’ve also developed interactive Virtual Service Project Playbooks, and before June 2011 we will launch the Volunteer Leader Certificate Program to train leaders to develop and manage effective service projects in their communities while the building capacity of HandsOn affiliates and other organizations.

HandsOn University will be developing online courses in the following areas:

  • Volunteer Lifecycle Management
  • Scaling Service Through Technology
  • Leveraging Social Media
  • Working with the Private Sector
  • Estimating and Measuring Impact
  • Service Management
  • Globalization and Service

About HandsOn University

As the training and consulting division of HandsOn Network, the largest volunteer network in the nation, HandsOn University (HOU) offers tools and resources that are accessible, easy to implement and focused on impact. Find out more about HandsOn University here.

8 Volunteer Management Behaviors that Lead to Effective Volunteer Programs

Friday, February 11th, 2011

1. Recruitment
Word-of-mouth continues to be the primary gateway into service. Effective recruitment strategies offer variety, flexibility and meaningful experiences.

2. Supervision
Volunteers who are supported, coordinated and well managed are likely to feel positive about their volunteer experience and stay.

3. Role Clarification
Written position descriptions equip volunteers with the tools they need to deliver maximum impact and receive a sense of personal fulfillment.

4. Development
Training and development is important to nourishing strong volunteer leadership and extending the volunteer life cycle.

5. Resource Procurement
While volunteers are unpaid by definition, they are not cost free. Resources are needed to deliver effective volunteer management programs.

6. Balancing Skilled & Unskilled
Volunteers bring a wide array of skill sets to the table. Assessing the required skills for specific tasks enables the best use of volunteer man power and minimizes resource expenditure.

7.  Appreciation
While volunteers do not participate for the sole purpose of reward or recognition, it is important to acknowledge and thank volunteers to promote an ongoing culture of service.

8.  Retention
Engaging volunteers is only the first step. Incorporating the seven aforementioned volunteer management behaviors helps to avoid the costly cycle of recruiting and training new volunteers.

These ideas originally appeared as a sidebar in IBM’s Service Jam White Paper and were contributed by The Department of Communities, Queensland — Australia’s lead government agency addressing issues in service and volunteerism, managing volunteers requires time and resources. We loved the list and wanted to share it.  You can download the full Service Jam white paper here.

8 Standard Practices of Service Learning

Thursday, February 10th, 2011

How do we institutionalize a culture of service so that it transcends calls to service, generations, countries, cultures and time?  I often thought that if we could make service a true rite of passage in a person’s life – starting early in school, providing opportunities and inducements along the way, and igniting a passion to something beyond the pursuit of material goods, it would be a good start.” —John Bridgeland, President and CEO of Civic Enterprises, IBM Service Jam.

The difference between teaching service in schools and service learning is that service learning is integrated into the curriculum.

Every service learning opportunity should be tailored to meet specific academic goals.

The National Youth Leadership Council suggests that successful engagements will incorporate the following eight elements:

1. Meaningful Service

Service learning actively engages participants in meaningful and personally relevant service activities.

2. Link to Curriculum

Service learning is intentionally used as an instructional strategy to meet learning goals and/or content standards.

3. Reflection

Service learning incorporates multiple challenging reflection activities that are ongoing and that prompt deep thinking and analysis about oneself and one’s relationship to society.

4. Diversity

Service learning promotes under­standing of diversity and mutual respect among all partici­pants.

5. Youth Voice

Service learning provides youth with a strong voice in planning, implementing, and evaluating service learning experiences with guidance from adults.

6. Partnerships

Service learning partnerships are collaborative, mutually beneficial, and address community needs.

7. Progress Monitoring

Service learning engages participants in an ongoing process to assess the quality of implementation and progress toward meeting specified goals, and uses results for improvement and sustainability.

8. Duration and Intensity

Service learning has sufficient duration and intensity to address community needs and meet specified outcomes.

Service-learning is not an add-on to the classroom lesson, it is the classroom lesson.” -IBM Service Jam

Learn more about Service Learning at the upcoming NYLC Conference to be held in Atlanta, April 6-9, 2011.

You can also find great service learning curriculum and ideas at generationOn.

These standard practices originally appeared as a sidebar in IBM’s Service Jam White Paper. We thought it was great and wanted to share it.  You can download the full Service Jam white paper here.

Five Great Ways to Engage Youth as Leaders in Service

Tuesday, February 8th, 2011

volunteer, volunteering, volunteerism, Hannah Dalporto, youth service, generationOnToday’s post comes from Hannah Dalporto, a Youth Leadership Intern with generationOn.

[Today is the last day to nominate a middle or high school student for generationOn's Youth Advisory Council.  Find out more here.]

Whether you’re planning a small service project in your community, or creating a youth council for young leaders, follow these simple steps to empower youth in your next project!

1.  Establish Roles

By establishing distinct roles for youth, you will be able to provide the kind of structure that will allow young leaders to flourish while also being better equipped to address challenges as they arise. Consider: Will youth be in a supporting role or will their participation be integral to the planning and implementation of the project? Will the youth be working alongside other youth or with other adults? Remember, youth can provide more than just input on an existing project, they can be the drivers of the work itself. Creating meaningful roles will generate buy-in.

2. Share the Power

When determining roles, consider ways of sharing responsibility, and giving youth leaders decision-making tasks to keep them invested in the project. Think about how much freedom, flexibility, and responsibility you’re confident handing off, and consider ways in which you’ll offer that responsibility. Will you assign a specific task to your youth leaders? Or will you allow your youth leaders the chance to create or decide on their own tasks and responsibilities? By giving youth a say in their own roles, they’ll have ownership and responsibility – both of which will also keep everyone on task and committed to the project. Double the win!

3. Be Relatable

While a quick quip about Blanche from The Golden Girls might provoke a laugh from your adult leaders, will your youth agree? Think about shows, music, sports, extracurriculars, and current events that will spark the greatest interest in your young leaders. Consider hosting a survey to gauge interests. Then, you can tweak your programming and focus accordingly. Or, better yet, as was suggested above, you can let your youth leaders tweak the agendas themselves.

4. Provide Support

With a sturdy foundation of support, youth can become vested with the confidence that brings them from a bystander to active catalyst. Decide how you will offer your guidance and support to youth leaders. Will there be opportunities for open brainstorming and planning? Will you provide a tool to structure the thought process such as a graphic organizer? (I’m partial to the generationOn Do Your Own Thing Guide.) When and how will you check-in with youth leaders, and with what frequency?

5.  Recognize and Reflect

Make your project even more meaningful to youth volunteers by recognizing their efforts and reflecting on their progress and achievements, as well as any challenges or road blocks they may have encountered. You’ll want to decide how you’ll help generate reflective thought – will you create a list of questions, or would you rather have a more organic conversation? Will everyone sit together in a circle? Will you read a quote or offer a related statistic to spark conversation and reflection?

Hannah Dalporto just completed a term as a Youth Leadership Intern at generationOn where she promoted generationOn’s mission to engage youth in service from a young age by planning and co-leading several youth leadership programs within generationOn. She is currently heading off on a Fulbright fellowship to work with university students in Argentina.

Defining Success

Monday, February 7th, 2011

When it comes to volunteering and volunteer programs, “success” can be an elusive target.  What makes a project successful?  Is it the number of volunteers that show up?  Maybe it’s the hours of work contributed to a project.  What about the number of people impacted by the work?  How do you know if your project was a success?

Defining what makes a project successful depends on the goals of the project and the organization.  Success can relate directly to the outcome of the project, such as collecting a certain amount of food for a canned food drive, or it can have an indirect goal like ensuring the participants’ happiness and enjoyment of the project or helping students to learn while performing service.

After you have set your goal for a service project, you have to figure out a way to measure whether you’ve achieved that goal.  There are many different ways to this, from individual and group interviews to asking volunteers a set of questions before their service and asking them again after their service.  Each measurement tool can tell you different information about your volunteer project.

What’s the best tool to use?  That depends on what you’re trying to measure.

A one-on-one or group interview might not be the best tool to find out if your volunteers have learned something from participating in an event, but it’s a great way to find out what volunteers did and whether they enjoyed their service.

Once you’ve found out that your project was a success, it’s important to share that information.  Report back to the people you’ve worked with on what your goals for the project were, and how you met them.  Include information about the success of the project in the thank you notes that you write to the volunteers and the project’s supporters.

How did you know that your last volunteer project was successful?  Tell us about the project and how you measured its success in the comments below!

If you’re looking for some help defining and measuring your project’s success, check out the Assessment and Evaluation section of our Tools and Resources library!