Job Discription...

So what exactly does a volunteer coordinator do?  A lot more than one might think.

As with any company who's services are paid for by a government agency, there are certain rules and regulations that the company must follow.  In order for a hospice company to meet the set guidelines they MUST have volunteers services reflective of five percent of the total number of all the patient care hours provided by paid staff members. 

Volunteers must be recruited, trained, and retained.  Once a volunteer is signed on, the second and third conditions require team building between the volunteers and staff.  Each groups needs to understand the very important roles each other fulfill (This is done most successfully when there is both food and fun involved).  In order for the powers that be to stay in the loop about the day to day operations of the volunteer program there are reports to be written, and numbers to crunch on a monthly basis (Lucky for me I only need to impute the numbers and the computer does the crunching for me).  

The first few weeks of my job I spent learning the paperwork part of the job from a very patient person.  I wrote up several ads regarding the type of volunteers I was looking for and placed them on Craig's List, then figured out how to sign up for volunteermatch.com.  Then I tackled the training manual.   It is one thing to have the information you are suppose to impart to new volunteers, it is quite another to figure out the style in which you want to present it.

Fortunately for me, the training has been streamlined extensively over the months that I have held this position so now I can complete a full training with a new volunteer in about two hours.  I felt bad before about the thirteen tests and fifty-seven (just a guess) signatures required by our volunteers before they ever laid eyes on an assignment.  Early on, one volunteer mentioned she didn't have to do as much paperwork to apply to grad school!  Yes, but in grad school you are not dealing with the sick and dying.  We are responsible to our patients needs first and foremost after all.  That being said, I am very grateful for all the effort our family support services manager put into making the training less complicated for our volunteers.

After a month on the job there were only two things that I was struggling with; my time sheet and finding my car at the end of the day.  Our building was not that big, nor is the parking lot, but it is bigger than my two car garage.  If I would need to make a visit to a patient during the day I wouldn't always be able to park in the same spot and I never paid enough attention to where I did park to be able to find my car the next time I wanted it without wandering around for several minutes feeling like an idiot! 

I solved this problem by asking my angels to hold a spot open for me.  That was three months ago and no matter how much I come and go in a day one in a group of six spots has ALWAYS been open for me and I have never misplaced my car since.  Pretty cool hu?

As for the time card, that continues to be a work in progress.  I need to put codes down for my activities which isn't hard, but paying attention to the times that I am doing which item is sometimes a little too detailed for this big picture gal.  But is that is the only thing I stuggle with at work I have to say I am pretty blessed.  Wouldn't you agree?