Micro-volunteering. It鈥檚 a new term for me, but the concept makes complete sense.
The term refers to volunteer opportunities to complete small tasks necessary for the success of a larger project. The opportunities typically take only minutes or an hour to complete and don鈥檛 require a long-term commitment.
Your association staff is busy. Your members are busy. No one has the bandwidth to take on new projects, even when they may be impactful.
It鈥檚 the familiar struggle to balance 鈥渘eed to do鈥� efforts that sustain an organization with 鈥渨ant to do鈥� efforts that help organizations grow, evolve and improve.
That鈥檚 where micro-volunteer opportunities can be an effective solution.
A recent Associations Now article shares the story of an association chapter that is聽聽to contribute to the chapter鈥檚 newsletter, blog and social media in bite-size ways. These contributions not only help free up staff for other projects, but they freshen content ideas and they increase member engagement.
In that article, Michelle Chavez, Communications Chair for the Austin chapter of National Association for Catering and Events (NACE), explains, 鈥淢icro-volunteering opportunities are something new that we are trying out this year. We hope this will inspire members to get more involved over time, with the eventual goal that they might enjoy it so much they want to be on the board.鈥�
As Chavez also mentions in the article, members are eager to get involved in small but meaningful ways.
That sounds great, right? But, sticking with the theme of micro and bite-size, how can your association get started without 鈥渂iting off more than it can chew?鈥�
In our article about聽creating content and increasing engagement with member storytelling, we mention that your organization鈥檚 events are a great place to get started. At one of your member conferences, experiment by setting up an area for capturing stories on camera where you can control elements that impact video quality, like equipment, lighting and background noise.
Since members will already be on site, their travel and lodging is already covered, reducing the cost of such efforts. And, since attending members are away from their normal duties, they are much more likely to volunteer a few minutes to contribute to your content gathering effort.
Another idea is to weave micro-volunteering opportunities into the聽charitable activities your association is already using to support your organization鈥檚 mission. Consider how you can engage members who don鈥檛 have enough time to attend this year鈥檚 charitable events, but who can contribute by sharing personal stories about their rewarding experience from previous events.
Take note, however. As MissionBox shares in聽, members will lose interest in volunteering opportunities if they鈥檙e not well organized or if communication is poor.
Start small and experiment. As Katie Domanowski, Director of Communications for The American Academy of Dermatology, said in聽this article about developing new content efforts, 鈥淪ometimes you just need to try things to see what works.鈥�
