Human Management Services - The Issue of Volunteerism - Literature review Example

Volunteerism Your name University name A volunteer, according to Young (2004), is an individual who commits hours of service for a public agency or organization for civic, charitable or humanitarian reasons without promise, expectation or receipt of compensation for services rendered. This notion of volunteerism is invariably associated with altruism, an aspect that has spanned controversy over time. Do volunteers genuinely commit their time and resources to an organization for the mere desire to shape the society better or are there any ulterior motives involved? This is a classical concern because volunteerism is so intrinsic that somebody cannot give valid judgment concerning the reasons for volunteering. As part of the contribution to the raging debate of whether volunteers are the way to reduce costs in offering human services, Brundy (1995) argues that volunteers have quite much to add to the human services scene. Webster dictionary uses an exceptionally strong word ‘freewill’ to define volunteers. This is the word that makes the whole subject a controversy, simply because freewill is not empirical! Therefore, attempts to argue for or against this humanitarian concern of use of volunteers are rendered futile because of the subjectivity involved. However, attempts can be made to examine the subject from a less strict perspective. Brundy (1995) argues that even if volunteerism is deemed as a free service, organizations afford such staff per diem, travel expenses, stipend, child care and educational allowances. These act as motivational tools and add towards improving the services rendered through this platform. In some other cases, some remuneration is given to the volunteers, considering their educational background and experience (McCurley & Lynch, 1996). Thus, volunteerism criteria depend on the organization offering human services. The most common volunteer areas include health facilities, penitentiaries, prison, schools, community based organizations and even public offices. The services offered by volunteers include teaching or coaching, canvassing, campaigning, fundraising, collecting, making and delivering goods, serving in boards, committee or neighborhood association, providing care and transportation and consultation or administration work. The most common organizations, almost synonymous with volunteerism include non profit community organizations and religious and philanthropic outfits (Farr, 1989). The following is a deep examination of the subject, paying utmost attention to how volunteers contribute to human services and whether they can be used to reduce costs. The paper will explore the benefits, in relation to costs (social, financial) and the demerits that accrue to this venture and how they can find their link to cost reduction. The main points of focus, therefore, will be the organizations themselves. Ultimately, it may be found out that the use of volunteers is a sure way to reduce costs in human services. Young (2004, p.9) posits that volunteerism "adds value to services, promotes social harmony and creates public trust". This falls in the realm of social costs. Studies have shown that human services demand trust from the community and one of the detrimental concerns that have come up in this arena is when the organization cannot command respect and trust from the community. This is engendered by the nature of the organization’s program that does not recognize social contribution. Loss of trust in itself is a social cost. Involving volunteers in the social work drastically reduces this cost and reassures the society of the services offered by the organizations. Volunteers, mostly because of the altruism dimension to their services, tend to offer better services than staff on payment. Therefore, the community recognizes volunteers as the best service providers in organizations (Rehnborg, Fallo & Hinerfeld, 2002). Brundy (1995) also adds that volunteerism acts as a gateway to improvement of citizenship and as an effective conduit. This happens, especially in crises hit areas. Organizations like Red Cross utilize this resource of volunteers quite well. This happens because crises are essentially emergencies and when these humanitarian agencies move in to quell the fire, volunteers come in handy. Because the outfits normally operate on a tight budget that caters for supplies in the hit areas and facilitation of the mission, they can barely afford to pay for conduit services. They, therefore, call for volunteers to assist in distribution of supplies in case of famine and war, and life saving in case of natural calamities like tsunamis, storm, earthquakes and tremors. Cost reduction here comes in because the resources that could be devoted to remuneration of the personnel involved are diverted to humanitarian work. Is there any better way to reduce costs in this area? (Boraas, 2003). In relation to humanitarian services, volunteers, whose nature of schedule is to keep a stable employment apart from their volunteer activities, lend a priceless hand to these organizations by contributing towards cost saving measures. This happens through the skill and expertise they offer. Most volunteers offer services in their area of profession. As such, during their formal employment, they keep sharpening their skills and this allows them to gain more experience in their work (Brundy, 1995). Instead of paying for the regular training and experience for the workers, the organizations divert the resources to other charitable organizations thus saving costs. Another way of saving the costs through the use of volunteerism is the fact that volunteers are not permanently kept in the volunteer work so they can comfortably fend for their needs in terms of basics. They, therefore, do not depend on the organization for per diem and other expenses. This is a sure way of reducing the costs. Overtime is a word that has been touted in the employment scene for quite some time. McGruckin (1998) argues that organizations can tailor their operations in a way that the volunteers can cone in after the other normal working hours employees. This has proved to be an excellent way of reducing the costs of a firm. This is because workers tend to ask for overtime remuneration when they work extra hours. In this case, to avoid wrangles with workers, the organizations may choose to give volunteers a chance to work when the other workers have left the premises. Instead of paying the other workers overtime, they can save the resources to cater for other operational costs. Volunteers in this case work during the night especially in hospitals. This has worked in the United States, says Wenger (2000) whereby the spare money is used to purchase drugs for hospitals and even taking specialized care of the sick. The resources can still be used to organize other vital activities like rallies and awareness campaigns. It goes a long way in saving costs in the organizations. Volunteers, according to Brundy (1995), also foster the racial, social, background, income and educational diversities. All these efforts are geared towards improving the public relation faculty of the organizations. Some cases in organizations need specialized care and therefore they need people from different backgrounds to serve them, depending on the needs. Volunteers, here, offer utmost assistance because, instead of the organization outsourcing for the resource person needed, they can tap from the volunteers that they have and because they come with different diversities and backgrounds, they can easily fit into the needed criteria. The organizations, therefore, save the resources they were to devote to hiring the services to other areas that need support. This reduces costs of operation of the organization. It falls under the alternative measures taken to improve the working relations between organizations and workers. ‘Volunteers as supplements’ is another argument pursued by Brundy (1995). He says that volunteers are much needed in times of crises and peak hours to assist the permanent staff and to ascertain that the employees do not have much pressure that might compromise their operation. The argument claims that the involvement of volunteers acts as a motivational tool to the other workers because they think that if the volunteers can offer their services for free and do it perfectly, how about them because they are paid. With this motivation, the organizations reduce risks and costs of catering for faults that might be deliberately committed by the paid workers. It saves the costs incurred during compensation because of blunders. Peak hours also call for additional labor force, especially in the hospitality industry and if the organization does not have volunteers, it may suffer the consequence of having to employ more workers to cater for it. When the organization has volunteers, it requires them to assist hence reducing the cost. Cost saving, therefore, is factored in here. The normal job description of organizations does not include the scope of other activities like advocacy and fundraising. If a company or organization wants to engage in these activities, it has to get other people and engage them and eventually pay them. Other areas of the same nature involve research and campaigns. Organizations endowed with a healthy volunteers network programme save such costs (McGruckin, 1998). Instead of employing people to serve in such capacities, the outfits get help from the volunteers. It has also been proved that as part of austerity measures taken by governments and other organizations, they tend to employ less staff or even less qualified, which may lead to dangers in service delivery and therefore social cost. Organizations have been known to get volunteers who may be better qualified and even easier to manage thus having an efficient way of cost reduction as opposed to hiring under qualified staff. The costs that might have been incurred in hiring the extra labor force are used for other organizational operations thus expanding the scope of the organization in terms of service delivery. Brundy (1995) adds that besides the extrinsic benefits of volunteers to the company, the volunteers help in adding to enthusiasm and the often underrated resources that make the workplace a charm. Because of the different motivations in the workplace, enthusiasm may lack in the scene because other workers may have gone into the work because of the benefits involved. The workplace therefore becomes a bothering place since people do not enjoy being there. Volunteers restore that magic of charm by the passion they bring into the organization. Their drive being making the life of the company bearable, they employ different tactics to make sure that they get to the best working environment. The cost reduction dimension comes in when the organization saves on conducting motivational seminars for its employees. The resources for that are therefore saved and diverted to other areas. The volunteers can also bring into the organization, resources like innovation in improvement of working environment and production of better products and provision of unbeatable services, something that might otherwise cost the organization. The most fundamental function that Brundy (1995) brings to focus is the pool from which the organization gets its permanent paid workforce. Organizations that have volunteer bases do not get into the costly intricacies that are involved in hiring of new staff and the training involved. The only thing the organizations need to do is internal advertisement so that the volunteers can apply. First of all, this saves the advertizing costs involved. The organizations can use their internal advertizing platforms like online and notice boards to get the needed workers. The rigorous process of short listing, interviewing, and induction on the job training are avoided. All the resources saved from here are therefore saved. The company, instead of bringing more employees on board, can settle for getting more volunteers. The efficiency of the organization’s operations is therefore saved and the reputation maintained. McGruckin (1998) also adds that when this criterion is used, the company gains confidence from the society and even the services are improved. Many a company has tried this and it has worked remarkably well on its efficiency in production and service delivery. The main function of an organization offering human services is to provide the best services to the community. This requires many experienced and qualified workers. McGruckin (1998) says that the volunteers render the ability to serve clients and respond to the needs of the community in terms of increased service, expanded hours of operation, shorter wait time and specialized service delivery. With this, the organization saves the cost of hiring more employees to offer services that the volunteers freely give. This way, the organization can venture into activities that may improve their services thus fulfilling the main goal of the firm: satisfaction. Owing to the complex nature of managing volunteer work, there are disadvantages that may raise the cost of operations in the organization. Some of the issues that accrue to a firm due to use of volunteers as a cost reduction measure include the intricacies of legislation and unions, recruitment of suitable people with a genuine desire and altruism, getting rid of unsuitable volunteers the hidden costs involved (both financial and social), extra training needs, internal employment protocols, extra time needed to maintain volunteers, and the feelings evoked in the fulltime paid employees. All these, if not well managed, may be detrimental to the organization. The following section will try to explore the concerns in relation to the additional cost suffered by the organization due to this. Vineyard & McCurley (2001) say that the volunteers may bring tension in the organization. This is in relation to how they affect the organization’s permanent paid workforce. Sometimes, with burning philanthropy, the volunteers may move in so vigorously that the permanent workers may think they have virtually taken over. In this instance, there may be coldness in operations that may lead to paralysis in the organization. When the main workforce decides to go slow because of volunteers, and this has happened to organizations worldwide, the company may suffer bottomless losses, losses that belie the benefits accrued from the volunteers. In this case volunteers tend to be more costly than paid workers. However, Vineyard & McCurley (2001) say that there are ways to correct this. The ways include organizing capacity building activities that involve both the workers and volunteers for them to interact and understand each other better. This way of bonding may reduce chances of go slows in the organizations. Another way is creating awareness to the paid workforce before bringing in the volunteers so that they may understand the essence of the project. When precaution is taken earlier, this does not plague the organization. Judgment is another concern raised by Little (1999) whereby the organization, during recruitment of the volunteers may not be able to know their reasons for joining the outfit. Ulterior motives are discussed here. Some volunteers do not join due to the altruism urge but because they need to know the secrets of the organization and use them to topple it. Some of the volunteers are not detected early enough to save the company. When the volunteers go into the management of the organization, they alter its operations, leading to losses that are too costly for the company to bear. Organizations faced by this problem eventually collapse, serving no good to the community. Organizations that are affected by this nature of volunteers do not actually save costs as earlier intended by the company but end up increasing the costs if they want to revive the company or restore lost glory. However, Vineyard & McCurley (2001) say that this can be remedied through a thorough and rigorous process during recruitment and monitoring the record of volunteers to establish their motives. Another intervention measure, that presents another cost in running of the organization, is getting rid of the errant volunteers early enough to avoid such embarrassments. The problem presented by getting rid of the errant volunteers is discussed by Cutshall & Frederick (1999) that say that inasmuch as the organization may want to get rid of the volunteers, they have to get the best way of doing this to avoid what may lead to denting the reputation of the company. If the company uses crude ways of sending volunteers off, it may infect other volunteers to rebel and paralyze operations in the company. The indirect twist of costs incurred during the send off may be detrimental to the organization. In the process of trying to reduce the costs of operations in the firm, therefore, they lose out more than they gain from the volunteers. Volunteerism here does not prove to be an efficient cost reduction. However, just like recruitment, the company can remedy this. It can be done by getting a better way of sending the volunteers off. One of the best ways is to put them into a counseling session that will change their attitude about volunteerism or organize awareness drives for the volunteers. This provides an easier method of managing the volunteers. Volunteers need training as they join the company and might get out any time depending on their tenure agreement. Little (1999) says that the training offered to the volunteers is so valuable and resources are put into it. If the volunteers turn out to be fake, the training might be rendered useless, thus the resources are a waste. This way, the organization has not reduced the cost but actually increased it. In addition, an organization may train a large group of volunteers but those who end up   serving the organization are few. To this, McGruckin (1998) says that the organization can easily remedy it. The remedy is to take the volunteers through a rigorous orientation exercise that may include counseling and general awareness about the reasons for volunteerism, just like in checking the reasons for joining the company. During the training, assessment can be done to ensure that the persons involved in the process are genuine recruits and do not have any problem with staying in the company as part of the workforce. The costs incurred in training the volunteers that may not serve the organizations are then diverted to other projects. Challenges to this plan are that the organization may not have a framework to identify the genuine volunteers because altruism is not measurable. Hidden costs are another detrimental factor, though not extremely strong, introduced by McGruckin (1998). He says that because there are unrecognized costs in the implementation of the projects, volunteers may prove to be more costly than expected. Some of the costs include medical cover for the volunteers, transport costs, per diem that may be far too much and even training facilities. All these costs add up to the expenses of running the organization. Demands by the volunteers may also be too high for the organization to meet, in terms of basic needs during the process. Other volunteers may be doing little, therefore contributing a small fraction of service not commensurate to the upkeep costs. Some organizations that run seasonal operations may need to keep their volunteers and pay their per diem, housing and food costs even when they are not needed. This may lead to overspending in the organization, therefore, raising the costs instead of lowering. This, though, can be remedied by clear statements of terms of service of the volunteers. The top management teams, Little (1999) posits, may have problems in getting extra time in managing the volunteers. This is because they may need extra attention in instruction and in training. The extra time may be counted in terms of costs to the firm. The costs in this respect tend to be forgotten by the top management because they seem to be insignificant but when calculated overtime, they contribute to the long term costs of the organization. Most of the volunteers in organizations demand to be treated in a special way because they assume that they offer free services. If they are not treated according to the way they expect, their output may be less than expected. Because of this output, the organization suffers extra costs of trying to recover the lost glory. The issue of legislation and unions may also cost the firm. McGruckin (1998) says that the volunteers need to come together and form unions so as to present their grievances in an easier way than others. Legislation of this may pose a problem in the company because the volunteers need to regulate the unions. The resources needed to mobilize the volunteers might be from the organizations. Campbell & Ellis (1989) say that these unions may turn and paralyze the organization because in showing solidarity, they may strike or take industrial action that affects the operations in the organization thus leading to low production and low quality service, something that makes it hard for organizations to thrive. So as to reverse the trend, the organization takes measures like hiring new employees or even paying overtime for the operations to normalize. The costs incurred in these different stages may be even more than what the organization would have spent if it hired paid workers in the first place. However, this does not occur mostly if the firm can manage to talk to its volunteers well and improve their working conditions. In conclusion, it is recommended that organizations should by all means make use of volunteers in their operations in providing human se4rvices because this adds to the value of the services offered. Volunteers, when handled professionally can be a significant blessing to a deserving company. These volunteers bring in a new experience, reach more people in the organization, expand programs and projects outlook, assist full time staff in their activities, provide a pool of expertise especially when the organization plans to employ more workers, provide services outside the normal scope of the job description, offer quality services due to their altruism desire and work towards improving the image of the company and ultimately changing the society. All these merits work towards improving the operations in the firm and reducing the costs incurred in the process of maintaining the firm. However, organizations face challenges like the relationship between volunteers and paid workers, training the volunteers, evaluation of the intentions of the volunteers in joining the organization, legislation and union matters, hidden costs ,extra time for management and intricacies involving internal employment protocol. These costs can be avoided through informed planning by the organization. Ultimately, volunteers, if well managed are the best way to reduce costs in operations. References Boraas, S. (August 2003). “Volunteerism in the United States,” In The Monthly Labor Review. Washington, DC: Bureau of Labor Statistics. Brundy, J. L. (1995). “Preparing the Organization for Volunteers,” In the Volunteer Management Handbook, Edited by Tracy Connors. New York, NY: Jon Wiley and Sons. Campbell, K.N., & Ellis, S.J. (1995). The (Help!) I-Don’t-Have-Enough-Time Guide to Volunteer Management. Philadelphia: Energize, Inc Cutshall, S. & Frederick, R. (1999). Treat Em Right: Tasty Ideas for Encouraging Volunteers. Cincinnati, OH: Standard Publishing Company. Farr, C. (1989). “Volunteers,” Service delivery in the 90s: Alternative approaches for local governments. New York, NY: ICMA. Little, H. (1999).Volunteers: How to Get Them, How to Keep Them. Naperville, IL: Panacea Press. McCurley, S. & Lynch, R. (1996). Volunteer Management: Mobilizing All the Resources of the Community. Downers Grove, IL: Heritage Arts Publishing. McGruckin, F. (1998). Volunteerism. New York, NY: The H.W. Wilson Company. Rehnborg, J., Fallon, C., & Hinerfeld, B. (2002). Investing In Volunteerism: The Impact Of Service Initiatives in Selected State Agencies. Austin, TX: RGK Center of the Lyndon B. John School of Public Affairs and the Texas Commission on Volunteerism and Community Service. Valente, C. & Manchester, L. (1989). “Volunteers,” Service Delivery in the 90s: Alternative Approaches for Local Governments. A Special Report edited by C. Farr. New York, NY: ICMA. Vineyard, S. & McCurley, S. Best Practices for Volunteer Programs. Darien, IL: Heritage Arts Publishing, 2001. Wenger, S. (2000). Volunteers in the treatment program. Paradigm: 6-7, Summer. Retrieved on 7th November, 2011 from www.onlineparadigm.com/archives/123-SOO_MH.AD.pdf Young, R. D. (2004). Volunteerism: Benefits, incidence, organizational models, and participation in the public sector. Retrieved on 7th November, 2011 from http://www.ipspr.sc.edu/publication/Volunteerism%20FINAL.pdf Read More