Future Proofing Tassie Volunteering
10 October 2012 at 12:18 pm
| Volunteering Tasmania CEO Adrienne Picone speaking at the Future Focus Symposium, at the Old Woolstore in Hobart. Photo supplied. |
Tasmania’s volunteer organisations have been urged to maximise the opportunities presented by advances in digital technologies in order to future proof volunteerism and find innovative ways to increase volunteer participation in Tasmania.
Speaking at Volunteering Tasmania’s (VT) Future Focus Symposium, Director of 3p Consulting Kym Goodes said digital technologies offered volunteer groups a vast range of possibilities to spread their reach, better serve members, and engage with the younger generation and the wider community to achieve greater social impacts.
“These can range from interactive online training on iPad applications, to virtual volunteers, online volunteer matching databases and mobile applications for micro-volunteering on the move,” Goodes said.
“Virtual volunteering is an exciting new concept, which coupled with the NBN rollout, offers Tasmanian organisations online access to volunteer services from around the globe.”
VT CEO Adrienne Picone said population ageing was an unparalleled global trend in human history and in line with this trend, Tasmania’s population was ageing at a faster rate than anywhere else in Australia.
“We know from our research that baby boomers make up 40 per cent of our volunteering population in Tasmania, followed by Gen Y (23 per cent), then Gen X at (19 per cent) and older people and veterans at 18 per cent,” Picone said.
“To ensure Tasmania can maintain and even increase a sustainable population of volunteers, we need to identify innovative means of engagement and training for volunteers in any future planning.”
“Volunteering is vital to Tasmania –at present we have around 155,600 volunteers who give around 49,000 hours on any given day.
Picone says it has been estimated that up to $540 million in costs are saved in Tasmania each year alone due to the commitment and dedication of volunteers.
“The outcome of the Future Focus Symposium will be a set of recommendations for future action to address the impact of an ageing population on volunteerism.”
One of the key hurdles to volunteering are the hours of operation for NPOs. Very few opportunities exist for prospective volunteers outside standard 9 – 5, Mon – Fri working hours.