Skilled Volunteers Help Empower Vietnam Nonprofits

Dear LIN Friends,

As we enter the fresh first days of the Year of the Dragon (the Vietnamese have just got back to work this week after a long celebration), we would like to wish you a year full of great opportunities and dynamic activities to help the community. Thank you for your support to our Volunteer Programs in the past year.

And what is better way to welcome a new year than looking back on what we have achieved and setting new goals for the next 12 months? In this report, we are happy to post some highlights from our annual report of the Volunteer Service in the year 2011, and our programs for the year 2012.

A. Highlight of Volunteer Activities in 2011

1.      Support to Skilled Volunteers: 2 meetings

2.      Survey: 2 surveys

• Skilled volunteer survey

- Objective: To identify challenges skilled volunteers face while providing assistance to Not-for-profit organizations (NPOs) and strategies to overcome such difficulties.

- Findings: Through this survey, we found that volunteers face similar challenges and there are opportunities to address and/or prevent those challenges. Balancing work, personal and volunteer responsibilities was a concern for over a quarter of skilled volunteers. Lack of clear instructions and/or defined volunteer roles and responsibilities was a challenge for 11% of survey respondents.

To solve the challenges that volunteers faced, 50% of the survey respondents said that they would talk directly with the organization. Others found support in sharing their experiences with another volunteer(s).

• NPO Need for Skilled Volunteers Survey

- Objective:

• Understand the extent to which our NPO partners are aware of the “skilled volunteers” concept.
• Find out the readiness of NPO partners for skilled volunteers;
• Assess the demand of NPOs for skilled volunteers; and
• Find out how LIN can bridge the demand and supply

- Findings:

• Only 48% NPOs fully understands the role of a skilled volunteer.
•  2/3 of NPOs are ready to work with skilled volunteers.
•  Most NPOs listed executive and/or practical skills as necessary from a skilled volunteer, instead of leadership or managerial-level skills.
•  How to get skilled volunteers to be a part of the organization and