Cultural centre De Grote Post developed an online module to automate the planning of volunteers’ activities, with the help of web bureau Encima. This volunteer planner was then refined further, together with Yesplan, and is now also offered to other organisations by Encima-Yesplan.
We talked to director Stefan Tanghe and Marion Buckens, operating officer of the cultural center, about this project and about their intensive cooperation with volunteers.
Stefan: Cultural centre De Grote Post opened its doors at the end of 2012, and since our start we have always been able to rely on a large number of volunteers. They are called in almost on a daily basis for our operations. However, the planning of the volunteers and the communication with them is quite a challenge. So from the start there was a great need for a fixed instrument in order not to have to individually follow each volunteer. We asked Encima for advice, and together with them we developed a platform through which the volunteer planning and communication can smoothly proceed. For Encima this was a new subject. That was the reason why Marion explained to them step by step what was required and how we work, and this is what they have tried to implement.
Stefan: We found that an awful lot of time was spent on the planning of the volunteers. Of course we try to provide the necessary means for each co-worker to allow them to carry out their tasks as well, as quickly and as efficiently as possible. The investment in planning software had to ensure that Marion would then have more time to do other things than filling in Excel-sheets.
Marion: The main challenge was to develop a system with which each volunteer could understand as quickly as possible, and sufficiently in advance, which tasks he or she was to carry out on which day, and from what time to what time. So in fact it is more a communication tool, and that is something you cannot resolve with Excel. The only good solution then is a web-based module.
Marion: There is a group of 80 to 110 people, of which about 50 to 80 are involved on a regular basis.
Stefan: It is also a fact that Ostend is a town in which volunteer actions are more explicitly present that in the rest of Flanders. This has to do with the demographics and how time is spent, in particular the fact that there really are more people over the age of 55 who have more free time in Ostend, and that they want to be useful. That goes for De Grote Post as well as for Theater Aan Zee.
Marion: Yes, especially at the start. This was a change which required adaptation. We met these people to present and explain it. We now also organise training sessions. Once they are familiar with it, things actually run smoothly.
Stefan: Working with our volunteers is rather intensive. But this intensity will always be financially more advantageous than the sum of the full expenses of all volunteers. But what is most important when working with volunteers is the social relationship with these people. Especially in the long term, because if you enter into a relationship with volunteers solely on the basis of financial advantages, you are on the one hand not working ethically, and on the other hand the motivation of the group of volunteers will quickly diminish. At that moment people will start feeling used, and justly so. So in fact there is no way we can ever invest too much time in a good relationship with each of our volunteers, individually and as a group. In this way each volunteer is also a real ambassador for De Grote Post.
Stefan: First of all, when a cultural centre opens to the public, a period of preparation has preceded this. At De Grote Post this preparatory period lasted barely 3 months. A programme of 30 to 40 activities was planned for the first 10 days. So I very quickly chose to recruit a first person who could set up volunteers’ activities. At the start the deployment of volunteers was purely functional-instrumental. They were deployed for the checking of entry tickets, guiding the public etc. Today, however, we try to give the volunteers more tasks relating to content. We deploy them during the setting up as well as regarding the content of various workshops or supportive activities. For instance, we have a reading club which is carried by volunteers: once a month they read theatre texts to children. And in this way we have multiple projects running in the various departments. Therefore, they actually are participants in our activities.
