BizWorks Studio

Ok, so everything is breaking down. Do you have to break down? So what if there are not jobs for you today? Does that mean you can’t work?

Why not help the other guy? Why not give when you lack?

This is a time to reach out to those who, like you, need help. Could be they’re lonely. Can you lend an ear? Could be they have no one to turn to. Can you be there for them?

Sure you can. Just because the fear of lack is raising doubt doesn’t mean we have to follow. Rise up brother – be the change. Rise up sister – be the peace. Let’s move forward together into a new world – one in which every opportunity to serve is instantly matched by joyful service.

Joyce and I just returned from a breakfast meeting with the mayor of Sedona and about fifty community leaders. The mayor’s idea, and the thrust of the For Our Town programs springing up across Arizona, is to partner government and faith-based organizations, along with nonprofits and businesses, to tackle the big problems and issues facing the community.

In a moving talk focused on his own awakening through service, the mayor, Rob Adams, aligned everyone in the room around our passion to serve.

In the work our table did, we identified people as the core of every organization and spoke about communication as perhaps our greatest need.

I suggest that, rather than searching for that one issue that will unite the community in service, we choose communication as the source of our commitment to work together. Let’s commit to meaningful conversation  together about ourselves, our community, our dreams, and our work. Until we get communication right, everything else will continue to look like a lot of failure to connect.

Communication is itself a root cause of problems in the community – communication inside the family, between neighbors, inside schools and churches – and on and on.  Communication is often perceived as not having much value – as not counting as real action. I believe meaningful conversation IS action – action of the highest sort – action which must precede all other considered action.

People in the room were surely filled with heart and enlivened by service. As a group, there was nothing resembling consensus around a single issue cause, and so nothing to which we could commit.

Let’s move beyond this stuck stage – let’s make a personal commitment to talk  with our brothers and sisters about what’s important. I have an idea that will move the action forward.

Typically, when I think of volunteering, I imagine an organization with a mission and work to do, recruiting free labor and supporting individual recruits to accomplish both their own purpose and the purpose of the organization.

I’m beginning to see things a bit differently.

For example, when I help my mother around the house or in an emergency, is that volunteering? When I stop to give directions to a stranger or hug a troubled friend, is that volunteering?

Am I to consider those who take a public stand for peace as volunteers?

Underlying our drive to volunteer are the needs to connect and contribute. In order to fulfill these needs, do we require an organization?

I’m beginning to think that whenever we give of ourselves – whenever we serve – that’s volunteering. Maybe we need a new word to describe this experience.

Is “service” the right word? How about “stewardship?” Or simply “giving?”

The reason this seems to be coming up for me today is that both the deep changes and the meaningful connections that appear necessary in these troubled times are largely coming outside organizations. It’s as though our organizations are no longer able to support systemic change or personal healing.

That’s not always true, of course. Maybe I’m just not in the right places to see it. Or maybe it’s just true for me that the moments of love and justice that arise in my life come outside organizations. I’m just not seeing much connection between the work that needs doing and the organizations that say they’re doing it. And, there’s a lot of important waiting to be done. On the other hand, I increasingly see the connection between the work and individuals either quietly doing the work or striving to involve others with them in doing the work.

So, what is volunteering? Could it be simply the kind of response we’re reading about from the people of Japan, who, as so much is being stripped away, find themselves peacefully helping each other in each moment?

I think I’ll play around with that as my new definition of volunteering: “Peacefully helping each other in each moment.” How will that effect my ideas about volunteering? About social structures? About change?

Fortunately, I’m increasingly able to draw some distinctions regarding our work. It always keeps coming back to the same thing, so I’m going to say it once again. Hopefully, I’ll get it!

BizWorks Studio is about The Volunteer Experience. That means it’s not primarily about the organization, the cause, the project, or the program. These are all means to the end, which is The Volunteer Experience.

We understand that organizations are about themselves and their mission, that a cause has a life of its own, that a project has a result to be achieved within a budget and a timeframe, and that a program serves clients.

What we want to pay attention to is The Volunteer Experience.

And so, we are glad for opportunities to support organizations, to further just causes, to guide projects, and to improve programs. But we do so in service to The Volunteer Experience. That’s our game.

Volunteering can remove money from the social contract. Let’s put that in very simple terms: if volunteers and organizations trade an experience in which the volunteer receives an opportunity to make a difference, the opportunity to make a friend, and the opportunity to have fun, then the organization can ask the volunteer to contribute work.

That’s it. No money in the exchange. Yet the volunteer receives an experience quite precious and the organization receives much-needed work.

Volunteers don’t get these kinds of opportunities generally – may find it difficult to locate them anywhere. Organizations do not have money to hire work out – must get work done in order to serve clients. For volunteers and organizations, this is a GREAT DEAL!

…especially in this day when people feel separated and struggle to find meaning.

…especially in this day when organizations struggle to survive as their missions and client bases expand.

It’s really that simple. Organizations, please devote your energy, your heart, and your soul to your volunteers. Volunteers, do great work. Many years ago I attended the national volunteer conference along with leaders of volunteers across the country. There I came to believe that volunteers not only provide hope for solving our human problems – volunteers are the ONLY HOPE.

Today it seems there are many resources and many answers available to address issues and opportunities in our cities and towns. Somehow though, they don’t seem to come together in powerful ways that move action forward. Instead, the landscape is littered with new initiatives, new organizations, new committees and task forces, and meetings, meetings, meetings.

In searching for a model to pull all of us together and put us on the road to transformation, some things are growing clearer for me. We know a resilient system is characterized by robust, free-wheeling communication; our civic system is not. Although today’s resources are flexible, they aren’t linked effectively. And as we see capacity issues everywhere, we see much spinning in place without addressing the important issues of the day.

What’s missing for me is a metasystem – a system that sits on top of all this and directs traffic. Government tries to perform this role, but often brings a heavy hand, bureaucracy, and regulation. Funding organizations such as United Way also try to do their share. Still, the glue that holds the system together seems missing.

Here are my ideas about what such a metasystem would provide:

• An umbrella large enough to support all civic organizations – government, business, nonprofits, and faith-based
• Identifying and prioritizing community issues
• A known process for creating, managing, and sustaining community projects
• A robust, real-time communication system that engages the community
• An open architecture for sharing information
• Training for volunteer leaders in organization and program development and management
• A spirit of cooperation that overshadows competition – a commitment to sharing resources across existing silos

Now, let’s say a few words about eacah element of the metasystem.

The umbrella cannot look like any known organization – not a goverment agency, or a business, or a nonprofit, or a faith-based organization. The umbrella cannot be an existing organization picking up this new work. The umbrella must be created by all. The umbrella itself must have no formal power – instead relying on good will and good work to attract what it needs.

Identifying and prioritizing community issues is a community task. We must look deeply for root causes and not be shy or fearful about the consequences of this deep looking. This work takes time and requires practice by the community. Attention must be paid to the words we use to describe an issue, an opportunity, or a cause.

A process for launching community projects must engage all stakeholders – in a community, that’s just about everyone. This process would identify all resources in the community which could be brought to bear on the issue, as well as identifying what resources are missing. This process would include developing missing resources in the community. And this process would include ways to tie together those on the front lines fully engaged with the project.

Our communication system must allow everyone in the community to access the information they need. It must allow us to input information we feel is valuable to others. It must facilitate conversations between those engaged with a particular issue, in a way that allows others to access these conversations when they desire or need to know.

Our real-time communication functions as a giant brain that knows what our community is up to in this moment. It feeds active conversations throughout the community, both public ones and kitchen-table ones. It helps make it possible to care deeply about our community and to take responsibility for it. This communication must become part of the fabric of community life.

Leaders need our support – we need to look after their development as a community. We need well-trained leaders to lead larger groups of citizens in dealing with larger, more complex issues and opportunities. Our leaders must know each other and learn to work together – as well as building capacity in their own organizations.

And finally, decisions made by individuals and organizations must reflect community issues and opportunites. They must account for the wellbeing of individuals and the community as a whole, as well as the needs of the organization. They must focus on the reality of situations rather than the appearance. They must put people and the planet before money considerations.

I live on the edge of an organization whose success I would love to see. Not too long ago, it came apart. Staff, key volunteers, and even board members left. What remains is a severe lack of capacity.

Most of what was known about the operation of the organization had not been transferred either to the organization’s process and systems, or its volunteers. Much of it was totally lost.

This organization is absolutely committed to rebuilding – is actually inspired by the idea of rebuilding. In the meantimes, there’s a lot of scrambling to get through each day and the progress appears very slow.

So Rog, what’s your advice? How would you approach rebuilding? How would you make sure the organization never experiences this kind of crash again?

One of the things I love about this organization is that it’s clearly more of a community than a company. It used to run like a company, even when the “clients” kept trying to become a community. That’s one reason why it came apart. In the end, the will of the people won’t be denied.

What I would do is treat it like a community. I would begin by replacing the “need to know” mentality of a company with the “open book” mentality of a community. In order to flourish, a community must be characterized by open, clear, and extensive lines of communication. That means using every tool at hand – website, newsletter, gatherings, and the grapevine – to move loads of information out – and receive loads of feedback in.

Next, I would prioritize the fires. There’s not time or capacity to sit back and figure everything out. Processes and systems must be built in action. And that’s a good thing! These days, there are very few old rules to block creating something wonderful.

I would create a volunteer program. It’s interesting that this particular community is loaded with talent and skills and life experience. There’s plenty here to build a lot of capacity. And, members are aching to contribute – to bring their gift to the table and to play with other members in a field of creating.

Of course, such an organization doesn’t have the capacity to man the communication lines or create the volunteer program – they’re way too busy fighting fires and trying to figure things out. That’s why I’m here. Building sustainable capacity through processes, systems, and volunteers is my gift.