"I'm Bored": The Words That Can Lead to Positive Change in Your Volunteer Program
By Susan Moscareillo, CVM
Baltimore Ronald McDonald House
Jun 18, 2003, 06:00 PST

You know my volunteer Harvey. I wrote about him in the article, "Selling the Volunteer Program: It All Begins With You." Harvey is a retired salesman who does the cold calling to prospect for new volunteer groups for our Baltimore Ronald McDonald House.

Harvey always keeps me thinking. This week, as we sat discussing his assignment for the day, he said: "This is a good idea you came up with. I like to be challenged. I need to be challenged." Uh, oh. I didn't know he was bored.

Maintaining a healthy balance between comfortable routine and keeping a volunteer's assignments fresh and new is a constant challenge for managers of volunteers. Volunteers leave us - drift away - for many reasons, sometimes because they are bored (or if you prefer, as Harvey would describe it, not challenged).

This boredom can occur right at the beginning, when an assignment isn't a good fit for their interests or skills. But more often it sets in after your volunteer has been on staff for a while. Everything is going well - training is finished, the assignment is comfortable, and you can move your focus from them to a new volunteer.

Volunteers who are bored rarely complain. They just go find something more interesting to do - somewhere else. And if you are managing a big staff, it is tough to keep track of everyone's level of satisfaction. A yearly survey won't do it, and not everyone is as vocal as Harvey in expressing satisfaction or dissatisfaction.

Alan Caruba, founder of the The Boring Institute, describes boredom as "the mind's demand to be fed." So as we begin summer, the time that we, as children, traditionally proclaimed "I'm bored!" to our parents, its time to ask yourself: How can I feed my volunteer's mind and make this an interesting place to be?

Create your own list of changes for your staff. Here are some things I've done to "up dump" the way we do things in our department of volunteer services. Try to prevent the onset of boredom by focusing on these four areas:

(1) Help your volunteers learn new things.

• Teach them someone else's job - let them "job shadow." They'll meet someone new, get a different perspective on your agency, and maybe find a new assignment to interest them (perhaps as an on-call substitute).
  
• Create a lending library of books, magazine articles, and videos that relate to your agency, volunteering, and any subject of interest to the demographic groups to which your volunteers belong. My small library ranges from Leo Buscaglia to Calvin and Hobbes!
  
• Don't neglect in-service training. Interesting guest speakers can educate and offer new insights into a volunteer experience. My volunteers recently met the talented architect, Gilbert Thomas, AIA, that designed our House and learned the history of its design and building.

(2) Help them meet fellow volunteers.

• Try a monthly or quarterly social activity for your volunteers - an ice cream party, an in-house movie night with a video and popcorn, a night at the ballpark. Meeting fellow volunteers creates a feeling of being part of a team of great people - and it is hard to be bored when you are proud of what you are doing.
  
•  Create an atmosphere conducive to exchanges between volunteers. Sharing information over the office water cooler - whether it is work related or about a new grandchild - makes time at your agency more rewarding for your volunteers.

(3) Help your volunteers have fun.

• Change the looks of tools volunteers use. People were bored with plain white stick-on nametags and had stopped using them. So I changed to hot pink, neon green and bright yellow with fun stickers on them. Suddenly volunteers were standing at the front desk and pondering which one to wear that day.
  
• Try a crazy t-shirt or hat day. Keep your volunteers guessing what you'll come up with next. This kind of silliness is also good for the clients of your agency - it's a lot more pleasant for them to see smiling volunteers. People often look at me with skepticism when I remind them that volunteering is supposed to be fun - but it is part of a person's leisure time - not grim work.

(4) Help them to tell you how they're feeling.

• The most obvious way of preventing the onset of boredom is to talk to your volunteers on a regular basis and find out how they are feeling about their work at your agency. Yet so many times, as our staff and responsibilities grow, we are too pressed for time to ask the necessary questions, listen to the answers, and if necessary, offer the options for change. 
  
• Yes, it's not enough, but please do an annual volunteer satisfaction survey. People will often share their feelings in writing when they are uncomfortable telling you face to face.

You can't tell your volunteers, as our parents told us, to go clean their room or fly a kite as an antidote for boredom, but you can be sensitive to their state of mind and be proactive. Keep using your creativity and powers of perception to offer them experiences to maintain their interest so you will keep the quality staff you've created for years to come.