What challenge inspired this recipe?
Starting in a new home and organization is associated with nervousness, excitement and uncertainty. At the same time, hardly anyone is thrown in at the deep end; most organizations, even in the working world, think about a nice entry and “onboarding” process, but unfortunately rarely communicate their thoughts in advance. To counteract this and to give the volunteers a little more security at the beginning, we encourage the host organizations every year to think about a work plan for the first days, write it down and we send this plan to the volunteers before they arrive, so they know what to expect and especially who will take time for them in the first days.
Nevertheless, the host organization remains flexible enough to deviate from the plan and to find alternatives, should the plan not work out as originally thought.
Ingredients :
We build on the experience of host organizations and their efforts to best integrate volunteers into their team and organization, as well as their environment.
Step by step guide
The process is relatively simple: we provide the host organizations with a digital template based on the timetable for the final report (What? When? With whom?). The host organizations can, but do not have to, follow it. As a team, they consider what makes sense to them, what considerations worked and didn’t work in the previous project, and thus write up their “onboarding” process.
Important to highlight!The actual executions vary from organization to organization and from year to year, also depending on the time resources of the organizations. Still, at least they always have a base to build on, and it gives the volunteers a bit of security to get started.
At the same time, we have an insight into life in the host organization and see what great ideas they come up with and how they take care of the volunteers even in their free time (e.g. going to the cinema together, introducing them to their own circle of friends or family, going to concerts, welcome breakfast, etc.) and, if necessary, can point out how to supplement the work plan (e.g. setting learning goals for the volunteers) so that nothing is forgotten in the excitement of the first few days. |
Before you start cooking, keep in mind…
Especially for newcomer organizations, it is often a challenge to plan and write down this first week, as well as to communicate it with us, as this of course also means that some perceived flexibility is lost, even though the plan is not 100% set in stone. However, the more often a recording organization does this, the easier it is for them. They can build on experience, optimize their “onboarding” process and, in perspective, save time as a result.
