Blog post by Reed from Washington, DC
The Year of Giving transitioned from a blog to a social movement a few months into my year-long journey in 2010 and all of a sudden I was thrust into the space of social media. Given my background, I figured I would be a good volunteer for the DC Social Media Summit. I spent four years organizing and producing events and conferences in addition to my experience navigating the ever-changing field of social media. Sounds like a perfect match right?
The event was produced by the Center for Nonprofit Success, a nonprofit registered under the name Mediate Facilitate Inc. This is the second time I have volunteered with this organization. The first time was back in Week 7. It’s an interesting organization. Part of me really loves the concept. They run conferences around theUS with no onsite staff. That’s right. Every single person working at the conference is a volunteer. That’s amazing!
Despite the fact that I think our small team of volunteers managed to make the best of the situation we were presented with, it was not easy. We were missing guidance, information, tools, etc. Attendees seemed frustrated with our lack of information and less than organized demeanor. It got so bad at one point that some of the volunteers contemplated walking out during the middle of the conference. Thankfully the content of the sessions was quite good. The organizer managed to secure some really talented speakers who dazzled the couple hundred attendees.
Although I did say that I was impressed that such an organization exists and puts on conferences all around the country with just volunteers staffing the events, I don’t think this is the best model. I believe there should be at least one employee at each event from start to finish to manage the conference. I think that would help in a variety of ways as well as help create the culture of the volunteer staff.
I did some research on this organization. The math is just not adding up for me. For a nonprofit that has such a skeleton staff that onsite management is done completely by volunteers, I have to wonder where all their revenue goes? There were no handouts to give to attendees – they were asked to print them themselves along with their name badges. The speakers were also donating their time and not compensated for their appearance or travel expenses. So I was left with more questions than answers.
I did get to meet some interesting people who were volunteering with me and got to see a few minutes of one of the presentations which I found very interesting. Having said that, I don’t think I will volunteer with this organization again.
Click here to see more of the photographs that I took during the event.
Year of Giving 
Your experience and research is an excellent reminder for volunteers and job seekers alike to perform background checks on the organizations they associate with, just as organizations delve into applicant work histories.
Thank you for your informative review. I think I’ll delve a little further to find out where the money goes for this “non-profit”. Wouldn’t it be great to find out they’re actually doing something good with the money?
I’m happy to hear you volunteered to participate in this again in spite of some initial concerns in your past post. I wonder if we sometimes spend too much time evaluating how our time is given, rather than just giving our time. Everything can be improved. And any good idea can be nurtured, even a poorly run conference.
I’d be curious how you go about evaluating a non-profit. Where do you look when you research them? Which financial statements do you look at? What do you look for?
Thanks, Eric
Ditto on what Eric said. I am getting ready to volunteer at a new location and decided for just this once not to ask questions, but do what I feel moved to do.