Recognizing Your Volunteers

Based on previous blogs I've written, most should realize how important I think recognition is to all organizations, professional and otherwise. My involvement in CSI awards started at my first chapter awards banquet in June 2001. That night, I received a Certificate of Appreciation for helping with the chapter's work with Rebuilding Together, Baltimore. Rebuilding Together is a program where groups and organizations work on the homes of disabled or elderly people on one Saturday in April. All I did was volunteer a Saturday doing minor home repairs, but I was certainly honored and surprised to receive recognition that night and it made an impression on me.

But, the idea of recognizing volunteers for their hard work began to take place in my mind when I was very young. Back in the 1970's, my parents were active in our town's chapter of The Junior Chamber of Commerce, otherwise known as the JayCees. My father has always been a wood worker and good with his hands. In the years that he was chapter president, I remember him cutting out wooden plaques and my mother using decoupage techniques to affix certificates to them. While I was too young to attend the awards banquets, I'm sure the other volunteers greatly appreciated a handmade gift that represented the work they had performed for the JayCees.

Carrying on up through junior high and high school, I was in the generation that started the idea of the "participation ribbon." I can remember getting various ribbons, patches and other items for participating in sporting, music and other activities. Through my scouting activities, I always enjoyed receiving the patches for various camporees, summer camps and other events. These sorts of "participation" recognitions were important to me growing up. They made me feel special and important, even if everyone else was getting the same thing. Many scouters from that generation and earlier have vast collections of patches to signify the activities and outings they participated in. These mementos remind them of all the fun they had and they things they learned.

I've been involved in awards with CSI for 10 years. I started helping with the chapter awards when my friend Liz was chapter president in FY2004. I was the chapter Awards Committee Chair for a couple of years before becoming chapter president in FY2007. As president, I fully participated in our chapter's awards program for my two terms as president. Following my term as president, I became an unofficial advisor and mentor to the chapter Awards Committee. Following that work, I joined the Institute Awards Committee in FY2010 and took over as chair in FY2013. I love the awards program that we administer and I wish more chapters and leaders participated in it.

Recently, my mother was cleaning out her attic and found some awards that my grandfather had earned in the 1960's. He owned a residential and light commercial HVAC and electrical contracting business. Sometime around 1965, Harbin Heating and Air Conditioning became a Fedders dealer and for 1965-1966, my grandfather earned "Most Progressive Dealer" in the state of Arkansas. Considering he was a new dealer, I suspect this was akin to Rookie of Year for all Fedders dealers in the state. He went on to be Top Dealer in Arkansas the following two years. As you can see in the photos here, these were pretty nice plaques in recognition of these accomplishments.

Recognition has been going on for a long time and has been an integral part of most of our lives. From participation ribbons to patches to plaques, physical recognition is the most widespread and most obvious way participants and volunteers are recognized. But there are many other ways to recognize volunteers. In the Leaders Training Center last year at CONSTRUCT in Nashville, Matt Fochs with CSI and I held a discussion on creating and building a recognition program for our chapters and regions. That presentation can be found here and a recording of a webinar I presented in February of this year can be found here.

The point of the recognition program is to consider all forms of recognition possible and move beyond the Certificate of Appreciation given in June of each year, the Region Awards given at region conferences and the national awards conferred at CONSTRUCT each September. Our volunteers should be recognized at many times and in many ways to ensure they feel valued and understand that their efforts are appreciated.

The presentation from Nashville discusses the creation of a recognition model that combines five different types of recognition: Participation, Self-set Goals, Peer Competition, Standards of Excellence and Cooperation. Participation recognition is the ribbons, patches and t-shirts that I mentioned above: anything that identifies a volunteer as having participated in the event. Recognition through self-set goals allows volunteers to set their own goals to measure their own outcomes. Standards of excellence are the usual ways that we recognize our volunteers: measure a volunteer’s service against a published standard of excellence. Peer competitions are any ways that peers compete against each other to determine a winner: specification writing contests are a common example. Recognition by cooperation is a way in which an entire group recognizes themselves as a separate entity that worked together to reach a common goal.

All five recognition methods listed above are essential to have a high quality and robust recognition program. I encourage all chapter leaders to take a look at the webinar and PowerPoint and consider ways to increase the level of recognition in your chapters. Your volunteers deserve to be recognized each month, not just in June or September.

If you want to participate in the Standards of Excellence program known as CSI’s Honors and Awards Program, there is still time to prepare nominations before the deadline, but not much time! All nominations are due to CSI by 5:00P ET on Friday, May 2, 2014. See www.CSINet.org/awards for all the information you need.