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When deciding whether to volunteer, public service values and motives, such as democracy, community, and public interest, play a large role. These motives encourage community members to volunteer their time by providing individuals with a sense of involvement and purpose (Denhardt, Denhardt, Aristigueta, & Rawlings, 2020, p. 472). Although these motives are also important to the paid staff members of an organization, paid employees are additionally driven by financial benefits. Financial compensation helps to ensure efficiency and productivity within the workplace.

Leaders can use democracy, community, and public interest to strengthen their organization’s volunteer workforce and to encourage civic engagement. This strengthening can be accomplished by “modeling democratic values within organizations” and treating employees with respect (Denhardt et al., 2020, p. 473). Citizens are much more likely to seek involvement with an agency that models virtuous behaviors and truly practices what they preach.

Because volunteers typically do not operate within organizations full time, managing volunteers will require more communication and coordination than daily, paid workers. Technological communication can be used to maintain contact with community members and to improve the performance of both paid and volunteer workers. “Research has found that about 80% of the population is now registered on social networks”. Resources such as social media, blogs, and podcasts can be used to connect to members of the public and encourage involvement (Denhardt et al., 2020, pp. 445-448).

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