Types of Volunteers

[txmxer]

This guy is not a volunteer in any way, shape or form. He is the "we should do this" guy, also known as the "suggestion" guy.

If you ask course maintenance people and tournament workers they will say that the "suggestion" guy is the biggest pain in the arse.

Furthermore, I get the feeling that when the course work/event is done "suggestion guy" somehow believes he contributed to it. Probably tells his friends, "that was my idea". :doh:

The idea guy.

I'm much more of a volunteer, fill in the gaps kind of guy. I don't like being the lead because I don't like trying to coax others to do stuff. It takes an energy I don't have.

Back around 1998, I was big in to the local off road/motocross scene. There was only one local track and people were frustrated that it wasn't open enough, or being maintained like they wanted, etc. One of the regulars decided we needed to do something different. He called all the regulars and set up a meeting. He then proceeds to suggest we form a club. There's 20 or so families present. He then says I should lead said club in front of the entire group. I wasn't aware of this before that moment.

Okay, so I took it on. I setup a second meeting a few weeks later. Invited all the same folks, put together an agenda and all that.

We get in the meeting and I'm getting all kinds of suggestions and I start turning those suggestions around to —okay, you going to follow up on that? Uh no, we thought you (me), would do all these things.

Uhh, no. That was the end of that.

 

[Darkgreen]

Leaf on the Wind Guy?

We have a lot of these around here. Before I criticize too much I want to say I'm still appreciative of these guys because they show up, but as a work day coordinator they make my life hard.

Let the local community know weeks if not months in advance of a volunteer date and time with multiple reminders. Projects that require a minimum number of people working a set number of hours. Sometimes we have equipment for teepad installation or brush cutters that we have for a limited time and if they are sitting idle it is a waste.

Leaf on the Wind Guys come and go as they please and they don't let you know that they are coming leaving me unsure about what projects I have the manpower to work on that day and making it impossible to plan. Will either show up late or leave early. If he leaves early then he won't tell you he is leaving. When he does show up it takes a while to find me and then I have to get him set up with some work, rather than if he had shown up at the start with everyone else. If he leaves early then I may have to move some people around to make sure higher priority work gets done.

However a lot of the Leaf on the Wind Guys are also happy to stay later than the allotted time and help clean up/pack up or finish things that take longer than expected. Almost always good guys, but I have no idea how they function in day to day life. They make for a very inefficient use of resources.

 

[Billipo]

I have locally declared myself as ... " The self proclaimed 2nd hardest working guy in disc golf".