Training Ideas, Resources, Tools

Founded in 1904, the American Lung Association is the nation’s oldest voluntary health agency. Our work throughout our first century has been innovative – ours was the first disease-specific organization to couple the skills and expertise of the medical professional with the dedication and commitment of the lay volunteer, which is now the model most other voluntary health agencies follow. Volunteers were integral to the founding of our organization almost 100 years ago and still play a significant role in our efforts to prevent lung disease and promote lung health nationwide. With 1,300 staff and 130,000 volunteers working to achieve our mission in our 200 Lung Association offices, you can imagine the enormous challenges we face to stay connected and offer the essential learning needed to help those with lung disease.

As Director, Volunteer Management and Learning and a member of our organization’s Learning Center, the use of technology and e-learning techniques is an essential part of my efforts to enable idea sharing and learning opportunities no matter where our staff and volunteers may be located. The following article outlines some of the methods that we are employing.

When designing a training workshop or planning a conference, you probably consider using an icebreaker or two as part of your format. Before settling for conventional icebreakers that you have used time and again in the past, take a moment to read this Training Design. Author Jim Laden explains why the “games people play” represent new ideas for icebreakers, which can bring added meaning and fun to the age-old practice of helping participants get to know each other. “Hello, my name is. . .” may never be the same again.

This Training Design by Rick Lynch presents basic points about how to design an effective training session for volunteers. Co-author of the best-selling book, Volunteer Management, Lynch describes three distinct training arenas or “domains”  – training to increase volunteer knowledge, training to improve volunteer skills and training to affect volunteer attitudes. He then guides the reader to understand what works best in each.  Lynch’s suggestions for how to design a multi-hour training program provide both insights and valuable suggestions for anyone who has ever been involved in training volunteers.

The Internet increasingly provides a means for nonprofits and government organizations to engage with people in their circles of influence. More and more organizations are blogging and posting YouTube videos and, more importantly, a great many organizations are asking their volunteers to blog on their behalf, to share photos of their events and to tweet about upcoming opportunities. In this way, organizations reach  volunteers in the spaces where they are already comfortable and engage them around their passions. And while working to increase the volunteers’ connection with the organization, we also spread our message to all of their friends.

This Training Design is not intended to be a how-to for online volunteer engagement. Rather, it will help participants identify opportunities to use social media in their volunteer engagement strategy. After the training session, participants will be able to develop the strategy for one or two small and simple Web2.0 initiatives. Those who started the training feeling overwhelmed or apprehensive about social media will leave feeling excited about the abundant opportunities that these technologies afford.

In these incredibly difficult economic times, there is perhaps one silver lining: volunteer resources.  For those organizations wise enough to seize it, the economic crisis can be viewed as an opportunity to take advantage of the skills and ambitions that today’s volunteers have to offer.  This Training Design can be used to guide volunteer leaders in exploring the challenges and opportunities of volunteer management during economic distress. Participants in the training  learn six strategies to capitalize on volunteer resources during tough times. The result?  A win-win for both organizations and volunteers.

In the spring of 2001, e-Volunteerism published a feature story about online training efforts called “Workshops the Wired Way.” Now, in our periodic feature series called “Whatever Happened To . . .”, e-Volunteerism revisits modern technology training and how it is used for volunteers. What was a pioneering effort eight years ago is now a fully-accepted training practice, complete with self-study Web modules, Web sites, e-newsletters and online research reports and resources. Once again, we talk about this important development with online training innovators Vicki Trottier, Project Manager, Community Literacy of Ontario, and Joanne Kaattari, Co-Executive Director, Community Literacy of Ontario.

During this economic downturn, volunteer experience and accomplishments may be pivotal to getting a foot in the door for a paid job interview.  It's important that volunteers know how to present relevant volunteer experience in a "business light" on a resume — whether it's a student seeking that first real job, a retiree looking for part-time work or someone actively job hunting after a layoff. In this e-Volunteerism feature story, we review resume recommendations and four resume examples to see how job seekers incorporate their volunteer experiences into stronger resumes.

Ivan Scheier delighted in creating group exercises that allowed people to actively interact, have fun and still accomplish serious goals.  One of his early and most popular training designs started out as “Mini-Max” and evolved over 20 years into other formats, notably the “Glad Give Game.” The ultimate purpose of the design is to show a group of people that they all have something to give that is of value to someone else – and to create interpersonal commitments to exchange service.  The process was obviously a real community builder.

In this Training Design, we present the original Mini-Max process. We explain how it was originally developed to help delinquents and volunteers interact, and how to adapt it to new situations.

One of Ivan Scheier’s unique contributions to the volunteer field was his multi-day retreats for experienced practitioners, which he called “Challenge Think Tanks.” He hosted these retreats in various places across America during the 1980s and 1990s, whenever he could find a host organization. Ivan led the Think Tanks as a facilitator, not an instructor. He constructed the program to make people think and provided plenty of time for small group discussions and individual reflections. Most attendees remember their Think Tank opportunities with gratitude, and many credit them with changing the course of their careers.

The Challenge Think Tank approach is remembered in this article. It includes examples of  different retreats and explains how elements of the program continue today in events like the annual Australasian Retreat for Advanced Volunteer Management. Several colleagues share impressions and memories from their Think Tanks, as well as ideas for keeping the concept alive today and in the future.