Skills-Based Volunteering

Skills-based volunteering has begun to get a lot of attention of late, most recently in a very informative Boston Globe Article. Individuals and companies are interested, and many organizations, have made great strides. However, differences between mostly small, resource-poor nonprofits and mostly large, resource-rich corporations are often obstacles to successful skills-based volunteer initiatives. This is where skillful intermediaries can make a tremendous difference.

There are several local organizations doing work in this area. Two that come to mind are Common Impact and the Jericho Road Project, and they each take a somewhat different approach. Common Impact focuses on specific disciplines such as IT, marketing and Human Resources management, so that they can use a tight focus to maximize quality. Jericho Road, a faith-based organization starting out as a project of Social Action Committee of the Unitarian Universalist First Parish church in Concord, Massachusetts, comes from a different angle. One of their primary goals is linking affluent communities, like Concord, with neighboring cities, like Lowell, where many people struggle to get by. Both organizations have worked with United Way corporate partners, like State Street Corporation and Sovereign Bank

United Way’s approach to this question has changed over the years. Prior to the development of our current strategies, when we were less focused, we were involved in more generalized capacity building. Now that we have a much sharper focus, we’re less interested in the welfare of nonprofits per se, but keenly interested in building the capacity of organizations that do work that is consistent with our strategies to do it better.

United Way’s challenge in this area is to deliver skills based volunteering programs that accomplish three things simultaneously:

 

1) build the capacity of organizations to support children and families;

2) provide volunteers with engaging and rewarding opportunities to share their special skills; and,

3) deliver the experience in such a way that volunteers become informed advocates for children and families.

 

Last year we applied for a federal Compassion Capital grant to leverage Jericho Road’s experience and unique position as a faith-based organization to increase capacity and build bridges between corporations and communities in the Merrimack Valley. While we did not receive funding, we are going ahead with on a much smaller scale with a pilot project that we expect will begin in October 2008. Stay tuned...