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Respect Your Volunteers A few weeks back, my colleague Joe Rominiecki made the case that we need to show that we’re supporting our community managers, who may be playing an important role without a ton of support.

“For those that host online communities for their members, the new front-line staff may very well be the person managing the online community,” he explained before hopping into The Community Roundtable’s latest “State of Community Management” report.

It’s clear here that reddit—a site that is pretty much nothing but community—faces the same kinds of disconnects between executives and ground-level support that happen in associations where communities are only small parts of the total member offerings.

The ripple effects of what happened to Taylor only highlight this. Because of the role people near the front lines play in keeping a community moving, they often have tribes of their own, and those tribes may instill a high level of passion among your most active community members—your moderators.

Because of the role people near the front lines play in keeping a community moving, they often have tribes of their own, and those tribes may instill a high level of passion among your most active community members—your moderators.

“Everything about which Reddit talks a big game—curbing abuse, protecting free speech, being the ‘front page of the Internet’—is directly tied to a model of content curation over which the company has little authority.”

tied to a model of content curation over which the company has little authority.”

In other words, volunteer moderators hold huge amounts of control, despite not getting a paycheck. They deserve to know what’s going on, and you have to keep them happy.

As much as Victoria is loved, this reaction is not all a result of her departure: there is a feeling among many of the moderators of reddit that the admins do not respect the work that is put in by the thousands of unpaid volunteers who maintain the communities of the 9,656 active subreddits, which they feel is expressed by, among other things, the lack of communication between them and the admins, and their disregard of the thousands of mods who keep reddit's communities going.

using technology to repeat, reinforce, or sustain learning after participants complete an educational product or service.

Nearly a third (31.5 percent) said they do, and 29.4 percent said they plan to do so in the coming year.

Research published in academic journal Applied Economics earlier this year included a survey of 1000 Australian employees. It found as work environments become more shared, workers report increased demands and decreased supervisor support. Workplace friendships are not improved as a result.

The research suggests the practice of movement creates additional work and a sense of marginalisation for hot-deskers.

For me the most fascinating insight was the finding that a social structure emerges distinguishing employees who settle in one place and become quasi-owners of a desk, and others who have to move constantly. That's certainly true from my experience.

32KeyFindings•About26%oftheoverallNTENCommunityconsiderstheirorganizationstobeatthe“Leading”levelontheTechnologyAdoptionSpectrum.Thisisaslightincreasecomparedtolastyear’ssurveyinwhich23%reportedthattheirorganizationswereatthetopendofthespectrum.•Aswe’veseeninpastyears,NTENMemberstendtoratetheirorganization’sapproachtotechnologydecisionshigheralongthespectrum:over82%ofcurrentNTENMembersindicatethattheirorganizationsareatthe“Operating”levelorabove,comparedto59%ofNon-members.•WhileLeadingorganizationsdotendtohavelargerannualoperatingbudgets—aswe’veseeninpreviousyears—wealsocontinuetofindLeadersacrossallbudgetsizes,including20%whocomefromorganizationswithbudgetslessthan$250K.•Weseeasignificantincreaseinthepercentageofrespondentswhoseorganizationshavetechnology-relatedtrainingandprofessionaldevelopmentallocationsintheirbudgets:71%thisyear,comparedto49%previously.•WhilethereisclearcorrelationamongNTENMembersbetweenTechnologyAdoption(TA)levelandhavingtechnology-relatedtrainingbudget–withnearly90%ofLeadingrespondentsindicatingtheyhavetechnology-trainingbudgets–wedon’tseecorrelationbetweenTAandtrainingbudgetsamongNon-members.ThismightsuggestthatthereismorevaluetoNTENMembership,intermsofTAlevel,thantrainingalone.•“Tobepartofthecommunityofnonprofitleaders”istheprimaryreasonrespondentsbecomeMembersofNTEN,followedcloselyby“generalprofessionaldevelopmentandtraining.”•Anewquestiononthisyear’ssurveyasksrespondentsabouttheirkeyprojectsandprioritiesoverthecomingtwelvemonths.Respondentsindicatedtheyweremostlikelytobe“Expandingexistingprogramorservices”inthecomingyear.•The“timeliness”ofNTENresourcesandinformationwasrankedhighestbyrespondentsintermsofNTENMembersatisfaction.•WecontinuetoseeExecutiveDirectors/CEOsasagrowingconstituencyamongtheCommunity,especiallyamongNon-members,andseemoreFundraising/DevelopmentprofessionalsparticipatingintheCommunityasMembersthisyear.•

funding”and“budget”—inotherwords,money—isakeyissueforrespondents.Likelastyear,weseethattheword“integration”appearsfrequently,especiallyamongresponsesbycurrentNTENMembers.ForNon-members,theword“management”showedupoften

struggling:“Wearestruggling;wehaveafailinginfrastructure,andourtechnologytimeandbudgetgenerallygotowardscreatingworkarounds,repairingoldequipment,andduplicatingtasks.”Functioning:“Wekeepthelightson;wehavebasicsystemsinplacetomeetimmediateneeds.Leadershipmakestechnologydecisionsbasedonefficiencies,withlittle-to-noinputfromstaff/consultant.”Operating:“Wekeepup;wehavestableinfrastructureandasetoftechnologypoliciesandpractices.Leadershipmakestechnologydecisionsbasedonstandardlevelsaccordingtoindustry/sectorinformationandgathersinputfromtechnologystaff/consultantbeforemakingfinaldecision.”Leading:“We’reinnovators;werecognizethattechnologyisaninvestmentinourmission,andleadershipintegratestechnologydecisionswithorganizationalstrategy.Technology-responsiblestaffareinvolvedinoverallstrategicplanning

So many capacity building efforts fail because we do not invest enough in people to carry out these efforts

And any effort to build the capacity of communities of color that does not take staffing into account will fail completely. Many of these orgs do amazing work but don’t have a single full-time staff, so funding anything without strategically funding staffing first will be ineffective.  

Supporting the right people so they are consistently there doing stuff, and then removing barriers that are preventing them from doing stuff and making them want to run screaming from the sector. THEN fund toolkits and workshops and peer learning circles and talk about ecosystems and partnerships, etc. With that in mind, here are 9 recommendations from Capacity Building 9.0:

direct invitation, not a Facebook post.)

clustering” – banding together to share resources or determining specialties.

Skilled volunteers can be integral to these developments, both to guide the learning management systems necessary and to present a wide array of professional development and public education programs.

support prevention rather than “bandages.” Point funders to volunteer work that brings about change and the finances needed to grow that work.  

screen applicants with experience solely in the corporate world for whether or not they also have a history of charitable giving and volunteering?

NPTimes foresees a surge in new training programs and certification opportunities, as well as nonprofits moving towards offering education to the general public to generate revenue.

Separate tasks that can legitimately be delegated to competent volunteers as their only role

Volunteers, however, can be advocates. They can speak out and be heard in more effective ways because (most of the time) they do not personally benefit from the outcome.

Marching and public protest are core activist tactics. But, the true potential for volunteerism is that many people are looking for how they can have a voice and affect decisions to come.

It seems clear that they already have a distinct advantage over me as an individual teacher.

they all transform the teacher into a more facilitative role.

hey have more resources, more money, an entire staff of professionals, and they get to concentrate on producing their specialized content,

live-streaming and other technology are also allowing some modern churches to move toward a "multisite" format, one in which a single pastor can broadcast his sermons to satellite churches guided by pastors who—this might sound familiar—concentrate on the facilitation of a common itinerary.

There is a profound difference between a local expert teacher using the Internet and all its resources to supplement and improve his or her lessons, and a teacher facilitating the educational plans of massive organizations. Why isn’t this line being publicly and sharply delineated, or even generally discussed?

consuming content to creating it. They multitask more and increasingly use the Internet to research information.

Chromebooks offered immediate access to cloud-based documents and other work; plus, all staff members and students starting in grade 4 operate within the Google ecosystem, which is more compatible with Chromebooks.

powerful enough to run multiple applications and support software that can run more complex multimedia applications.

high school students ideally need a range of proficiency in non-keyboard input devices and keyboard-input devices to teach word processing, data analysis, presentation software skills, and business-based social-media use. All those skills are essential for basic technical problem-solving and critical thinking in the digital age.

Backchanneling: Including others

“Learn-along”

But emerging and evolving tools give us the opportunity to engage with our learners in new ways, to help move us toward making workplace learning more a process and less an event. Consider where you have needs to extend the reach of a course, or stay in touch with alumni or people in particular work areas or job categories. Look for staff whose schedules, locations, and job titles keep them from live experiences, and see if you can identify ways to include them. Chances are there are easy ways of solving a problem, enriching conversations, and making L&D’s work more visible and valuable.