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Chapter 2 - The Challenges of Voluntary Service Leadership

Some think that the voluntary organization is simpler than the business corporation. Not so. The voluntary organization is at least twice as complicated. The business corporation has a single bottom line: profit. The voluntary organization has at least two: efficiency and effectiveness.

Given the number of big challenges, one wonders why we take on leadership.

Here is a list of big challenges facing every human services leader:

1. Suffering is inseparable from helpfulness. Who says so? Leaders from as far back as 2,000 years. No good deed goes unpunished.

A retired nurse supervisor was asked about her leader’s job. Her answer was, “The worst job I ever had—95 percent suffering and 5 percent satisfaction.”

How could this be for a caring, sensitive leader? Her suffering could have multiple sources: difficult clients, the upset counselor, critical colleagues and the administration. Apparently these combined to make her life miserable.

There is another side to this story. This nurse was one leader of six different family services of an agency. Her program was home care. From the continuous data from all services, this home care service proved to be the most effective. This program was known for its strong integrated team.

So, the whole story is that this nurse did her job well despite the suffering.

For some leaders, the suffering is too much—they withdraw. Others decide to grow a thick skin. The most effective leaders accept suffering as part of the process of helping.

2. What could be more complex than volunteers holding important roles at every level of the organization?

Volunteers at the level of the board of directors constitute the ultimate authority for the organization’s operation.

Volunteers at the service level assist in the processes with the client.

Imagine a volunteer who believes her role is to be a direct conduit between the board and the frontline services to the clients. Without clearly written role definitions and training, such frightening prospects can occur.

3. Next on the complexity list is efficiency. The simple definition of efficiency is the ratio of services provided to the resources used. Cost per case is an excellent example of an efficiency indicator. The most commonly used standard of measurement is “total served.” The first use of cost per 27 case can come as a great shock to an organization, with few realizing things like the actual cost of a team meeting.

Those in the helping professions are usually resistant to efficiency measures. They claim their work is humane, not statistical. This resistance is usually overcome with well-placed attention to indicators of effectiveness.

4. Effectiveness indicators measure outcomes for clients —a more popular indicator. That popularity shrinks with the necessity of measurement methods. An example of an effectiveness measure is “percentage of goals achieved.” Not many human service professionals have the experience of continuous outcome measures of their service. Not many welcome such measurements.

These bottom lines require a discipline of common measures acceptable to all staff. Their indicators are more a matter of relationships and trust than the mechanics of measurement.

It should be apparent that these two bottom lines of human services offer solid evidence of the organization’s helpfulness. In more blunt language, without such indicators, the organization does not know what it is doing.

5. Quality assurance. This refers to a continuous process of monitoring service practices based on written standards of practice. Standards must be selected with full participation by all practitioners. A monitoring system acceptable to all must be designed.

Imagine asking local clergy to meet to develop standards for their ministry roles. Then, try to imagine these clergy serving with a monitoring system that reviews logs of their actual practices.

However complex quality assurance is, no claim for quality is justified without a system of quality assurance. The nursing profession and children’s mental health practitioners are making encouraging progress on this demanding discipline.

6. On the list of complexities we also find relationships with government. Voluntary organizations, in the main, require some level of government regulation and funding. This funding comes with two significant costs: regulations and subsidies. Government relationships usually bring severe tests to the voluntary organization.

Regulations are one thing. Subsidies are quite another. All must suffer and respect the regulations. Subsidies easily become a challenge to the unique role of the voluntary organization.

Government representatives can, at times, seek to shape the services of a voluntary organization. Government agents can use funding as leverage. This can occur despite their lack of familiarity with the local community or the growth of knowledge in a particular field. Government relationships can easily become the greatest challenge to the role of the voluntary board of directors. There are times when the board must take a stand and remind governments of the constitutional powers of the voluntary organization. The high quality organization that provides high quality services has little to fear from such confrontations.

7. Relationship between the professions is the last item on this list of leadership challenges. One single profession can seldom achieve optimum service to a client. Human problems are always complex. The various professions in a voluntary organization must work together. The common goal is the welfare of the client. All professionals must share that goal. However, sharing responsibilities in a team does not come naturally to a professional trained in one specialty.

The leader in a voluntary organization, at whatever level, faces a daunting list of complexities. The one supreme strength is the mission. The first call of the leader is to enunciate and clarify the mission and the practical ways to manage its complexities. The mission says that the client’s welfare is at stake in all decisions.

This handbook provides examples on how leaders can face these unique challenges.

Leadership Challenges in Human Services

Suffering | Volunteers | Efficiency | Effectiveness

Quality Assurance | Governments | Professions

Keys to Leadership

Equipped with the mission, the leader’s challenge is to orchestrate these vital elements in ways that:

• Meet the special needs of clients.

• Respect the volunteer contributions at the board and service levels.

• Honor the special skills of the various professions.