People Want to Help

The guests have arrived. The table isn't set, the salad vegs still need chopping, the hors d'oeuvres are yet to be set out. What to do?

Ask for help.

Usually, the guests are happy to comply, if they're given a specific task. Jane gets busy setting out cheese and crackers, Andrew starts cutting up carrots, and Nina distributes silverware among the place settings. In an instant, they're co-conspirators, part of the team making the evening happen. Though guests, they've turned from "they" into "we."

There's a lesson here for nonprofits.

I'm thinking specifically about boards, although the lesson could apply to all volunteers (and unwitting would-be/will-be volunteers.) It has to do with the comfort of specificity.

If you ask someone to help, but can't tell them a specific task, they're left on their own to figure it out. Maybe they'll realize the table has no knives, and maybe they'll guess if you're having steak that you need knives. And maybe they'll ask where the knives are and try to divine your (the host's) intentions. But that's a lot of maybes - and a lot of guesswork - on the guest's part to join the team.

The same is true in the boardroom. "Who wants to help with the gala?" is a pretty open-ended question. While you may think the response is a simple hand raised to say "me," the fact is that the hand-raiser has had to do a wild series of guesses and calculations to estimate what their "yes" actually means, and if they're up to the ill-defined job. Their "yes" might or might not refer to the same job you were thinking they were volunteering for - a miscommunication that can lead to ill-matched expectations and, in fact, failures of execution and resentment that can KO a volunteer or board member's enthusiasm for being of service to the organization overall.

The other response to the "Who wants to help with the gala?" open-ended question is...silence. Dead silence, and a changed subject. Because it sounds huge, whatever it is - or it MIGHT be huge - and nobody sane's going to take that on. Ever have that happen in a board meeting?

But "Sally, would you help publicize the gala to your women's club?" - now there's a task that Sally can agree to, knowing what she's taking on. And it's a hop, skip and jump from successful completion of that task to doing more publicity and indeed overall ticket marketing, because we all know that success breeds confidence and more success... and a greater appetite for taking things on.