Re: Volunteering at juggling festivals

Posted by Kelhoon, 2012-01-23 18:35 GMT

This is in response to Dee's Big Talk post about festival volunteering, it's not worthy of a Big Talk reply, hence putting it here. [I disagree, hence putting it here! - Orin]

Huge disclaimer, the only festival I have actually been to was in fact the EJC 2006 in Millstreet that Dee and Stephen and company organised very well in my opinion (see disclaimer).  So this is from the first-time festival goer point of view.

After travelling all that way and doing a fair bit before I got to Millstreet and it being my first ever Juggling festival, initially I just did not want to volunteer and lose valuable fun time and felt a wee bit guilty about it.  After the first few days when the buzz reduced and feeling a little overloaded on juggling and having been slightly frustrated at the on site "internet cafe", I thought as an experienced IT worker I should probably volunteer to help in that area.  After wondering how to do so and looking around I came across a rather cold unfriendly note which basically communicated they did not want any more help in that area.  If there had been someone to discuss it with, I could have pointed out that I likely knew more than 80% or more of the current volunteers in that area and that I had ideas on how to solve some of the issues and frustrations being experienced.  Once I had gotten over it and thought I would volunteer for something mundane instead, it seemed that everything that needed volunteers during my by that stage highly unpredictable waking hours had plenty of people already signed up.  In short, once I was inclined to help out, there didn't seem to be any need for me.  Now, I'm not criticising, I'm just sharing the experience from my point of view in case there's any value in it for any festival organisers.

Dee also asked for incentive ideas:

• discounted "I volunteered at ...." t-shirts (only for volunteers obviously and maybe only if they volunteer a minimum number of hours)
  
• discounted festival DVD
• record hours volunteered and have a tiered rewards system based on different levels of time given
• a coupon system for time volunteered so that volunteers can "spend" the coupons on whatever they like e.g. at on site vendors, on the festival DVD
• preferred seating at shows

hmmm they're all really the same idea aren't they

other suggestions:

• pair newbies with experienced volunteers so the newbie doesn't feel lost
• when taking the names of volunteers, grab their cell number so you can send TXTs specifically to them or broadcast TXTS like "we need 2 people for such and such at such and such a time and place"
• give volunteers the volunteer co-ordinators cell number so they can call or TXT with their unexpected availability (or unavailability)