Linda Graff Workshops April 7, 2009

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Linda Graff Workshops
Volunteer Edmonton is pleased to have Linda Graff back in Edmonton presenting two half-day community workshops on Tuesday, April 7.
Where: Santa Maria Goretti Community Centre, 11050-90 St (near Commonwealth Stadium). FREE parking on the street, behind the centre orat the Commonwealth Stadium LRT parking lot.
Time: Workshop #1: 9 - 12 pm (registration at 8:30 am)Workshop #2: 1 - 4 pm (registration at 12:45 pm)
Cost: $80/workshop; Refreshments will be provided in the morning and afternoon for all workshop participants. Ifyou register for BOTH workshops for a total of $160, lunch is included in your registration fee. Details:
Workshop #1Emerging Trends and Best Practice in Volunteer ManagementTime: 9 - 12 pm (registration at 8:30 am)Cost: $80
Over the last twenty years, unprecedented changes have occurred in the nonprofit and human service sectors as organizations struggle to respond to new models of service and increasing need with decreasing financial resources. One of the consequences has been more complicated expectations of volunteers. A call has rung out throughout the nonprofit sector to engage volunteers in increasingly demanding, complex, and direct-service roles. And one of the essential miracles of our business is that millions of volunteers have responded. As a consequence, we have come to take volunteer availability for granted, and we assume that they will always be there for us, as they always have been. Not so.It is clear that the available volunteer labour pool is undergoing profound shifts.Older, long-term volunteers are moving on while short-term , outcomes-oriented volunteers demand new roles through which they will offer amazing, but very different contributions. But current trends involve more than just the transition to short-term Baby Boomers. There are emerging trends in both society and in volunteerism which are pushing us to begin to work in completely different ways with those who will be willing to serve in the future.
From the very beginning of program planning and position design, through screening, training, supervision, and recognition, all of our old ways of doing things need to be thoroughly scrutinized. It now appears that most will need fundamental transformation to remain current and effective. Keeping up with change is no longer sufficient. Staying ahead of change is the only way to ensure relevant and successful volunteer engagement.
With change also comes opportunity. The new wave of volunteers is already bringing an entirely new toolbox of skills, talents, experience, and influence to community involvement. For those organizations sufficiently visionary and creative to engage them, the potential is nearly boundless. But radical shifts in how we think about volunteers - at the organizational level - and how we support them will be necessary if their potential is to be realized.
This is an eye-opening, sometimes shocking, sometimes scary look at the future of volunteering, and by extension, the future of nonprofit operations. The underlying message is one of great optimism for those organizations that make the necessary adjustments. Join us as we explore just what those shifts look like.
Workshop #2Volunteer Job Design - It's a Privilege to Volunteer HereTime: 1 - 4 pm (registration at 12:45 pm)Cost: $80

"It's getting harder and harder to find good volunteers!" That's a sentiment widely held throughout the nonprofit sector, yet experience indicates that, in fact, we are still involving huge numbers of ever-more-skilled volunteers. We experience most difficulty when the job itself is not attractive to the kinds of volunteers most often available. This workshop looks at the principles of sound volunteer job design. We will explore some key principles of volunteer motivation, and borrow from marketing to make jobs attractive to todays volunteers. Learn how to make it a privilege to volunteer in your organization.

Linda Graff Bio:Linda Graff has been working and consulting in the nonprofit sector since 1980. She is a voluntary sector and risk management specialist, an impassioned advocate for the field of volunteer program management, and a dynamic and in-demand international trainer.
Linda was the Director of the Volunteer Centre in Hamilton for nearly ten years. There, she worked extensively with leadership volunteers, and delivered workshops and papers on volunteer program management to thousands of participants with a particular specialty in volunteer/paid staff/union relations.

Organized by Volunteer Edmonton
Volunteer Edmonton is a local nonprofitprogram dedicated to supporting volunteerism in the community.
Our goals are to:

promote volunteerism;
advocate good standards of practice for volunteer involvement; and
facilitate collective action among organizations that support volunteerism.

It is throughmeeting these goals that Volunteer Edmonton will demonstrate leadership in volunteerism and facilitate sound stewardship of Edmontons volunteer resources.

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Ticket Info:  

• Workshop 1: Emerging Trends and Best Practices in Volunteer Managment, C$80.00
• Workshop 2: Volunteer Job Design - It's a Priviledge to Volunteer Here, C$80.00
• Workshop 1 AND Workshop 2, C$160.00

Official Website: http://lindagraffworkshops-upcoming.eventbrite.com