#VOLUNTEERS AND MUSEUMS
##A FEW OBSERVATIONS

by Nicholas Bernhard

**This talk was given at a meeting of the Association of Northern Front Range Museums on May 20, 2024, at the Arvada Flour Mill.**

**This text is copyright 2024 Nicholas Bernhard, and licensed under Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0. Please visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/deed.en for full licensing information.**

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My name is Nicholas Bernhard, and for the next half-hour or so, I thought we'd talk about volunteers. We'll talk about some ways you might procure volunteers, some tips on managing volunteers, and lastly I'll look at some of the ways things can go wrong. 

#ABOUT MYSELF

I've been in the museum field for eight years. I spent four years with the Lafayette Historical Society, and two and a half years with the Adams County Historical Society. I currently work for the Summit Historical Society across the divide, but I'm not here representing them, and this talk does not reflect any position or policy from them. I have been on the board of ANFRM since last year. Relevant to this talk, I've volunteered for the BFD Film Festival, the Boulder International Film Festival, and I consulted for their student-run branch, CU@BIFF. In all my staff positions I've managed volunteers, which is one of the high points of my job. I've learned a lot from volunteers, and I know I've been able to teach them a few things, too. It's these experiences that have informed what I have to say today.

#VOLUNTEERS
##THE LIFEBLOOD OF ANY MUSEUM

Volunteers are the life-blood of any museum. Without its volunteers, a museum isn't much. Volunteers help in a basic sense by offering their time and labor. They can offer expertise, often of a very specialized kind, and in my experience this proves crucial when you least expect it. Good volunteers help a museum promote from within, because it gets people enaged on the ground level. Today's volunteer might be next year's board member, and next decade's benefactor. It's at the volunteer level that someone really sees if your organization is worth their support. Lastly, volunteers are your best public relations. These are the people coming from the local community to work with you. They're providing you with word of mouth, telling their friends and family about what they're working on. They're inviting their friends, family, church members, to volunteer too, provide some company, find an outlet like they've found. 

They are your best resource, and they need to be cultivated. 'Cultivated' does not mean planting the seed and ignoring it for six months. You have to care for them with respect, patience, and more than a little vigilance. If you manage your volunteers properly, you will do well. 

#PROCURING VOLUNTEERS

I've gotten volunteers from a variety of sources. 

Many of the volunteers I've worked with have been local retirees looking to apply their time and effort. These are people who stopped by the museum and inquired about opportunities. Other volunteers were referred by current board members and membership. I have also received volunteers from local high schools, colleges, and scouting organizations.

I can remember at what is now the Lafayette History Museum, we had a local Boy Scout clean and organize our coal shed for an Eagle Scout project. Scouting isn't as popular these days, but the right project at your museum can be very appealing. The nice thing about Eagle Scout projects is that family and friends are happy to help. 

One suggestion is reaching out to scouting groups for tours, and then leveraging that to suggest the idea of an Eagle Scout project.

At the Adams County Museum I partnered with a high school on an internship. That was a very positive experience. He learned a lot as an intern, he gained experience on tours, research, and exhibits. It was an unpaid internship, and you do have to be careful with those when assigning work. The purpose of the intership has to be education, training the intern in skills they can use in a job. In the film business, where I got started, internships were just unpaid labor, so I take that very seriously. I'm very proud to say that he's majoring in history at Metro now, and doing a new internship at History Colorado. 

The nice thing about high school interships is that if it works out, that encourages the school to think of a student for the next year.

Here's some other vectors for volunteer recruitment: 

Some businesses offer an incentive to employees for volunteering. Elevation Credit Union is known for this. Prepare a flyer or create a web page listing opportunities and send it to them. 

Write a press release for your local paper, they will often have a section on volunteer opportunities each week. Last year I helped with a fundraiser for the Depot Museum in Grover. Grover is the most remote town in Colorado, way up in the Pawnee Buttes, 22 miles from the nearest highway. To promote that event, I made a list of every newspaper in Weld County, and surrounding counties, and I made sure all of them got a press release. That helped produce a good turnout, and a paper in Wyoming even sent out a reporter to do a press release. 

Obviously, if your museum is tied to local or county government, that's a good connection to have. 

Community Service is not always a popular option, but again, I think for the right project, it's worth considering.

#SOME MANAGEMENT TIPS

If you have volunteers, let's talk about some aspects of management. You need a way to log volunteer hours. If you receive funding from SCFD, they are going to ask for volunteer hours. SCFD is all about the hard numbers. My advice is, before any volunteer walks out the door after their work, you have them log their hours. All you need is a clipboard and some ruled paper. Get them into a habit of doing it. 

The museum software Past Perfect makes it very easy to log volunteer hours. You can set up volunteer projects, log by volunteer, and then generate reports. If you're already using Past Perfect to manage artifacts or memberships, I'd recommend Past Perfect for volunteers as well; keeps everything in one place.

You'll want to think about your museum's liability policies. That volunteer, or staff, or whomever, can use that step-stool for years in perfect safety, and then one day they fall on their tailbone. You might think "we're all family here", but I'd play it safe and make sure you understand your coverage. 

I would suggest good documentation of volunteer duties. It's wonderful to have volunteers come in, and you're happy for whatever help you can get, but write it down. Write down exactly what that volunteer is going to do, yearly, monthly, or daily. 

Lastly, you want to be very clear to volunteers about the goals of the board and the direction of the museum. Be up-front about changes in policy and mission. A great thing about volunteers is that they'll think of things that never occured to you, and propose ideas that could be amazing for your museum. You want to embrace that energy and initiative, but also make sure it fits with your museum's goals. If you communicate those goals with clarity, it can prevent confusion later on. 

#WHEN THINGS GO WRONG 

The problems I'm going to talk about can be found in any organization, big or small. 

#"THIS IS HOW IT'S ALWAYS BEEN DONE"

The first problem is what I like to call "This is how it's always been done." For this one, I'm going to give an example from a specific museum, because it was in a public report from the National Parks Service (https://anfrm.org/assets/docs/bentsfort.pdf). The report was about Bent's Old Fort in southeast Colorado. The fort's new director recently announced that it would be curtailing its famous historical re-enactments. There were many reasons for this, but one had to do with the volunteer actors. The fort's management wanted to try some new things, expand its scope of history, but the volunteers didn't want to. That wasn't how things were done. 

When we think of the reasons that people volunteer, one reason is that the volunteer might have a unique skill or passion that they want to share. At a previous job we had a farm windmill on the site that had broken, we didn't know how we were going to fix it. One day a man walked in who knew everything there was to know about windmills. He looked at our busted windmill and knew every part, which parts from other windmills were compatible, which weren't, which farms might have those parts. It goes without saying he had a beaten-up photo album in his car of every windmill he'd fixed. It was extraordinary. You think about how often could this man share his passion in day-to-day life. At the museum, he could. His knowledg had value there. 

Meanwhile, the volunteers at Bent's Old Fort were creating a kind of historical interactive theater that was quite special. Some of them were traveling hundreds of miles to La Junta to perform. They were bringing their own equipment, which they stored inside the fort. Some were sleeping inside the fort, which was a liability issue. 

It seems that in this case, it was the volunteers who were running the show. If the fort's management wanted to change interpretation of the site, or amend it, and it conflicted with the goals of the volunteers, it didn't happen. "That's just not how it's done." Eventually, the system became untenable, and the re-enactments will be limited from now on. In this case, the volunteers worked hard, they took pride in their work, and had been a large force in the area's culture for decades, but their goals conflicted with the long-term future of the site. 

I'll give two more example in this area. There's a Colorado museum that's in charge of docents for a motorized tour of a major recreational area. The museum reviewed the handbook for the tour and decided it could be updated: better language, correcting some historical facts, and so on. There was some resistance from the docents to changes. Out on the tour, they have a large degree of autonomy. Some had given this tour for years, and had a solid routine. Efforts to change the tour were not always welcome. 

For the final example, there was a museum that had a major fundraising program four times a year that drew thousands of visitors. Volunteers were recruited to greet visitors and take admissions fees. The museum's board decided to adopt a no-animals policy. This was a prudent decision: food was sold indoors, and dog bites have a way of begetting lawsuits. Better to play it safe? Tell that to the volunteers. In this case, staff and management received more than one angry diatrabe, face-to-face, about how cruel this policy was to their dogs who were placed on the admissions table. There were the usual defenses that *their* dog never hurt anyone, but there was another consistent argument: I've been volunteering foryears. How could you change things? Haven't I earned some consideration for all my work? 

From what I've been told, things will get resolved at these museums, but they are examples of how something that attracts volunteers, having a more or less free hand to explore a passion, can sometimes lead to inflexibility and conflict. 

#INSTITUTIONAL MEMORY LOSS

Another problem that can happen with volunteers is the loss of institutional memory, and this is a problem that ties into the first problem. Volunteers find new opportunities, they get older, they move, some pass away. What happens to their knowledge? What happens to the new ideas they've brought to the table? If it's lost, then at best you can hope this knowledge gets rediscovered at a later date, but what a waste. 

Here's an example I saw firsthand. I went to college to study filmmaking. Some of my classmates started the BFD Film Festival, run entirely by students. They crafted the awards, they rented the venue and programmed the show, they wrote and choreographed their own musical numbers, they promoted it and sold tickets. I volunteered and wrote the banter between presenters, it was some of my first writing to be performed in public (blessedly lost to time). This film festival was a boon for the film school. It offered practical experience in collaboration, logistics, and working under a deadline: good life skills, and essential skills on a film set. Every student who volunteered for that festival saw benefit from it. 

The festival went on for a couple years, until the organizers graduated. My one disappointment with that project is that the organizers gained from the experience, but the batons were not passed to the next runners. The groundwork was laid for future classes, it just didn't happen. After I graduated, the Boulder International Film Festival wanted to start a student-run division, and I volunteered as a consultant. Again, things went well for a couple years, but without any kind of succession, there was no third year. 

To tie this in with the last problem, sometimes the passage of institutional memory is blocked more intentionally. I've seen this happen at other organizations. There's a city in Boulder County that used to have a large Veterans of Foreign Wars chapter, one of the largest in the state. Now they're a shadow of their former selves, they sold their building over a decade ago. They had grown under the leadership of veterans of World War II, Korea, and Vietnam, and it got locked into that leadership. Younger veterans from Desert Storm and Iraq had ideas for the VFW, but those ideas Weren't How Things Were Done. At least in the case of this chapter, the town's younger veterans went elsewhere. 

You need to think about how you preserve what you have. Museums are dedicated to the conservation of knowledge; don't overlook the knowledge of volunteers. If volunteers have helped develop procedures or programs you rely on, take time to get it documented. It could be as big as a detailed memo, or as simple as a quick interview. If you are recruiting new volunteers, pair them with a more experienced volunteer. This can be mutually beneficial: a lot of people take pride in mentorship (or collboration, depending on the ages involved). Volunteers are likely at your museum because of their love of learning, or sharing what they know. 


#THE MYTHICAL MAN-MONTH

The third problem is one that may not affect you, but it can happen, and that's too many volunteers. There is a museum in Colorado, I'd say mid-level, well-funded but with a staff of six or fewer. They have almost two dozen board members. For comparison, the Baseball Hall of Fame has sixteen board members. I know someone who was on the staff at this museum, and I asked them, "Twenty-three board members, what was that about?" They said that the board thought that more board members meant more people to work on projects and chair committees, so they had been aggressive in growing the board. 

Unfortunately, this does not work. Some of you might recognize this problem as the Mythical Man Month, coined by IBM executie Frederick P. Brooks. Past a certain point, adding more people to a project doesn't improve productivity, it decreases productivity. The amount of work it takes to get new people trained on the project, and managing all these people, is greater than the productivity these new people contribute. From what I've heard, having two dozen board members was great for networking and fundraising, but inside the museum office, not much was getting done. 

My point is that growing your volunteer base has to be done alongside the rest of your growth, and it is possible to have too much of a good thing. 

#SOMETHING TO THINK ABOUT
##KD: A CASE STUDY

I'll conclude with a slightly longer case study. I'd like you to think about what would you do in this case. While some elements of this case are inspired by a real event, I am presenting it as hypothetical. 

This story is about a volunteer who we'll call KD, like the singer. KD is a retiree and a new grandparent. They and a friend have been volunteers at a front-range museum for several years. In particular, KD helps with the logistics for multiple fundraisers. KD schedules guest services, contacts clients about payment issues, processees payments for fundraisers, and at fundraisers, answers questions from attendees. KD speaks to staff more than once about the amount of work they volunteer, and which volunteers and board members they feel don't measure up.

There are a few personnel issues. KD frequently argues with and complains about other volunteers. During some of these fundraising events, which involve impatient vendors and can get quite hectic, KD is seen getting into shouting matches with vendors, in full view of guests. While concerning, this is always weighed against the value of their labor, which is considered a huge help for the staff and other volunteers. They are consistently amongst the volunteers with the most hours each month. 

At the time, a new staff member had been hired by the museum to manage the society's biggest fundraisers. KD assisted the fundraising manager in their efforts. KD had applied for this staff position, and while the two work well together, KD expresses some resentment that they were not hired. 

On the morning of the biggest fundraising weekend of the year, KD has been looking flustered. The fundraising manager approached KD, and said that KD didn't have to worry so much, since they were a volunteer. Any issues, especially difficult customers, could be brought to the staff, and KD didn't need to take on even more work. These words were offered explicitly as support, though they were not taken that way to KD. They left the event a few hours later without notice, and did not show up at all the next day. Their role at the fundraiser had to be filled by staff. KD was a no-show for a major museum event the following weekend, again with no notice. 

Several attempts were made by staff to contact KD and discuss any issues she may have had with staff. These attempts were unsuccessful. When staff felt that no further communication was possible, management and the board agreed to not contact KD about future volunteer positions. 

These are just my speculations, my opinions: we can see here a person who was a good fit for volunteering, who sought a place to apply their skills, and apply it with more than a little autonomy. While KD was a hard and consistent worker, they were not a consistent communicator. In this case, KD may have had legitimate complaints, but was unwilling to discuss those complaints with the fundraising manager. This was a worst-case scenario for an organization, where one or more parties completely gives up on communication, leading to a situation where nothing can improve. This what Paul Simon meant by the *Sound of Silence*, "people talking without speaking, people hearing without listening." 

Could the staff and board have done better? Yes. It's likely KD had some grievances, and the staff could have been more proactive in having difficult conversations. While staff tried to reach out, it may have been that, from KD's point of view, it was too late. I'm not saying that's the correct view to have, but just viewing the case with empathy. 

I think the board and staff made the right decision in this case: KD's actions were injurous to the museum, and deliberate. In hindsight, a more careful exchange of views between the museum and this volunteer may have avoided that choice altogether. 

#CONCLUSION

Volunteers work for free, so from one point of view the volunteers can leave at any time. Staff needs to respect the volunteer's time and effort. Too much deference to the volunteer may lead to a situation like at Bent's Old Fort, and too little will leave you with no volunteers and bad publicity. The challenge, easier said than done, is to show respect to volunteers, recognize their efforts, give them clear and documented expectations, and be consistent in your museum's vision. Keep the lines of communicaton open, even when it might be uncomfortable. 
Keep these ideals as your compass, and your volunteers will be your first and best resource for many years to come. 

Email: nicholas@ndhfilms.com