Engage Library
Every single one of us — yes, even you! — has something of value to share that others want to read and learn from. If you write it, others read it and gain new ideas and insights that will feed our appetite for fresh ideas, insights and content for professional journals like…
July 2023
When partnering with volunteers and community, things will go wrong. Multiple stakeholders will find themselves at odds. So how do you know if that knot in your stomach is a result of an ethical dilemma? In this Ethics, Faiza Venzant, CVA, executive director of The Council for…
April 2023
In the midst of one worldwide crisis after another, Points of View editors Rob Jackson and Erin R. Spink shed light on yet another complex issue impacting Volunteer Engagement professionals: lack of trust in our institutions. “At the very moment in history that we need…
April 2023
Part One of a Four-Part SeriesA chance encounter with volunteering legend Susan J. Ellis–in a New York City hotel lobby during the 1997 Points of Light conference–sets the stage for the start of this three-part series on “Digital Care Circles: The Future in Volunteering?”In…
January 2023
There has not been a time since the World Wars where it seems the global population is facing such upheaval, so many demands and layers of losses. It seems like people are reaching the end of their tethers. Or, as J.R.R. Tolkien famously wrote, they feel "thin, sort of stretched…
January 2023
Volunteering is usually about people, but what impact and ethical considerations are there for volunteerism as artificial intelligence (AI) and robots become more embedded in everyday life? For answers, dive into this Ethics column, "Exploring the Ethics of AI and Robots in …
January 2023
The volunteering sector has been through a challenging period in the past few years, and student volunteering in the UK has been no different. Volunteering services at Higher Education Institutions (HEIs) dealt with a specific set of challenges during the COVID-19 pandemic,…
January 2023
For the past five years, the Minnesota Alliance for Volunteer Advancement (MAVA) has conducted research and education on race equity in volunteerism. Through funding from the Minneapolis Foundation, MAVA was able to convene the necessary voices – over 40 community members and…
October 2022
In Voices, Thu-Trang Tran, the CEO of Volunteer West, takes a step back from the dynamics of volatility, uncertainty, complexity and ambiguity (VUCA) that is reverberating today throughout the volunteering sector. Through her helicopter view of volunteering as a part of the…
October 2022
As we wind down towards the end of 2022, join Ethics Editors Erin McLean and Erin R. Spink as they reflect on the headlines that brought ethical dilemmas in Volunteer Engagement into the forefront during the past 12 months. The final Ethics column for the year will review these…
October 2022
As Leaders of Volunteer Engagement, we seek to make a difference to the agencies we work in and the communities we serve by recruiting community members to volunteer and make a difference. While we would like to believe we use processes that are equitable in making decisions…
October 2022
Two and a half years after the emergence of COVID-19, the world has changed in many ways. Some things about today’s life would have been completely unimaginable in December 2019. To assume that volunteering is immune from this massive wave of change would be naive at best and…
July 2022
Is there a new energy emerging in volunteering? And if so, why are these things happening now? Points of View authors Rob Jackson and Erin R. Spink charge right into these questions with a nod to an array of initiatives from England, Scotland and Australia that all point to a…
July 2022
In recent years, 70 percent of employees said they need to work at a company that offers giving and volunteering opportunities, yet only 10 percent of employees who worked at such companies participated in these programs. And in 2020, as we all know, a pandemic struck and the…
July 2022
While Points of View argues that a new energy is emerging in volunteering, the picture isn’t so clear to Holly Daniels of MAVA (Minnesota Alliance for Volunteer Advancement). In this Engage feature, Daniels taps into her daily connections with Volunteer Engagement Leaders to…
July 2022
As a Volunteer Leader, you are entrusted with the stewardship of the sensitive, personal and private information that you and your agency gather and hold about your volunteers. And while most of us know we need to take care of this information, just how many Volunteer Managers…
April 2022
As we transition from the pandemic, Points of View authors Rob Jackson and Erin R. Spink note that there are more demonstrations of anger, rudeness and other uncivil behaviours. In this increasingly uncivil society, how far can and should organizations go to protect their…
April 2022
The beginning of a new year is like a blank page, allowing us to create something entirely new and embrace big shifts. Starting 2022 off with a New Year’s resolution to ‘Get Over Ourselves’ is just what Rob Jackson and Erin Spink suggest in their latest Points of View article.…
January 2022
The sudden withdrawal of many formal volunteering opportunities at the start of the COVID pandemic in March 2020 cast a spotlight on the nature of volunteer work. In many cases, important services were suddenly curtailed while still other organizations pivoted volunteer roles…
January 2022
If you’ve ever been in the market for software and your organization has an IT person, there’s a good chance you’ve been advised to “pick something with integrations.” That’s because software integrations aren’t just a nice-to-have feature – they’re your silent assistants. Why?…
January 2022