I’m about to sound a little judge-y, I guess. So, if you don’t feel like hearing that attitude, wait ’til we get to the next one.
This was an interesting event, to say the least.
The person who’d been talking to all the volunteers and assigning them shifts and such was not a volunteer coordinator, but the producer of the event.
Now, it’s not that weird that for a small event there wouldn’t be an extra coordinator for the volunteers. However, he didn’t really check on the volunteers at all. He didn’t make sure any positions were staffed or that anybody knew what they were doing.
And I don’t really fault him, because he was busy doing a lot of other things and running the slideshow and all that jazz. Technically, he’d even gotten a volunteer coordinator apparently, but I helped her when she showed up at the registration desk.
So, he probably thought since he got a volunteer coordinator, everything would be fine. However, that person didn’t show up until the event was starting and many people were in place. She also didn’t seem interested in volunteer coordinating at all.
All she did was complain that we didn’t have a bid number assigned to her – even though she wasn’t a registered guest. She hob-knobbed with the fancy people and went in and sat down at a table, enjoying the same dinner and show as all of the guests.
I don’t like to step on toes, so even though the volunteer situation seemed a bit like a mess, and even though she didn’t seem interested in coordinating at all, and I think it was just her way of getting in for free – I still deferred to her because she was the coordinator.
When she got there, I tried to get her up to speed on who people were, and what was happening before she came in. I even told her where some free volunteers were standing, and pointed out stations stations that could probably use more people so that she could assign people how she saw fit.
Not too surprisingly, she seemed completely uncaring. And once she started drinking with her friends and disappearing, I knew it was time to just step up and get stuff done.
(By the way, I don’t think there’s anything wrong with having some fun at your event when you’re sure are you’re moving parts are working correctly. Life should be fun. But if you’re there to be the volunteer coordinator, maybe, just maybe, make sure every station is staffed and that people know what they’re doing? You know, maybe. If you feel like it.)
So, we were a rogue set of volunteers practically on our own, and this is where I’ll pick up tomorrow.