our man in cameroon

The important point that you need to remember is: while VSO’s recent performance has, at times, been inexcusable -  it’s still no reason not to volunteer with them.

Because while it can be an awfully run organisation, it remains a wonderful concept and opportunity. And you should do it.

Mostly, because it’s my own area of relative expertise, it’s the communications where I see how they are incredibly weak. And in particular their absolute refusal to demonstrate any value in their volunteers.

So where do I start?  Well, in my last in-country meeting the request for a counselling service was turned down.  While other international volunteers organisations offer a free phone line for volunteers, VSO deemed it impossible (I’m guessing expense-wise but it could have been logistically).

This was requested by a Filipino volunteer who has suffered an overly physical bag snatching in the street.  We were told..if you want counselling you will have to find someone local to do it.  Without wanting to decry local skills the chances of finding a suitable candidate locally seems little more than zero.

It’s recently come to my notice that I should have had a pension contribution paid to me while I was away but it hasn’t been made.  Emails to VSO email addresses just tend to bounce back with a standard message (and as I have said before, there is no one there whose job it is to actually look after volunteers in the field)  - so I tried sending a message to them via Twitter. Someone would be manning that, right?

No, message ignored.  I’m wondering how many other messages to their Twitter accounts are ignored too.  Are potential new volunteers ignored? Are potential donors ignored?  Is it just volunteers that are ignored?

Okay, just checked that VSO Twitterfeed – it hasn’t been updated in a week. The last direct/interactive message was over a month ago – to me.  Which suggests that if anyone else is referencing them or asking questions – they really are being ignored. It reaches a point where you think…there really is no reason in opening up new ways to communicate if you once more use it as another way to ignore your supporters.

It would be easy to suggest perhaps then that more traditional communications methods are being used instead.  Check the news page and you’ll find that although (PR sin) the releases aren’t dated – the content of the last press release does appear to be about a month old.

Meanwhile VSO Ireland has also signed up to Twitter. Kudos to them for at least trying to share some interesting links but they too don’t respond to any questions.  They also have put a system in place where volunteer blog posts are fed directly into their Twitter feed.  Put it this way, if I was an Irish volunteer they’d be just about to automatically broadcast this litany of complaints to their own audience.

In addition, in the two months it has been operating it has managed to attract a rather poor 36 followers. Probably not helped by them only being bothered to follow 12 themselves.  Their Canadian counterparts CUSO-VSO have been going almost a month longer and have managed a whopping 24 followers and in almost three months 12 tweets and yes, you guessed it, not one direct response or interaction.

Moving on, in June I was asked to take part in a(nother) VSO review.  Tired of talking shops – I declined.

I got talked into it eventually – taking part in a long phone interview and writing up the discussion as a report.  I was assured these would be seen by the right people to make progress.

A few weeks back I had heard nothing and emailed …something was about to happen, I was assured again.

Today got an email from somebody as cheesed off with this whole thing as I am.  And by all accounts I am not the only who gave their time who is frustrated by the absolute lack of activity or even response.  Nothing is happening.

I’ve written before of my surprise that when I went to visit VSO I met nobody who had ever been a volunteer.  A fact that, partly explains while when a recent VIP visited they were told to bring a fortnight’s worth of cereal bars because there’d be nothing to eat here (hey it’s Africa, there’s no food in Africa, right?).

There’s an issue here and a serious one.  Firstly VSO absolutely does not value its volunteers.  There is no way that it could claim to and yet so wilfully ignore them. This is hardly even an area for debate.

In wider communications what is happening?  Why can’t they manage to even pretend to try and master Twitter? Why can’t they answer queries -whoever they may come from?

Why do all my dealings with VSO take so long?  Why do promises on action and intent to change always prove to be hollow?

Why are VSO such technophobes? Not just in their attitude to communication but also in the volunteers they place.  We’re still thinking classrooms when those economies that escape from poverty do so, as often as not, through the increased opportunities available through technology and communications.

This is an organisation that preaches advocacy – and it can’t even run a Twitter feed.  What? Are we still doing petitions and leaflets?  Wearing badges is not enough (in days like these).

Why when Peace Corps volunteers can fundraise online via their own organisation for small projects like this was I told by VSO that the same thing would be absolutely technically impossible for them to offer.

It feels like this should be VSO’s golden age.  It should be using new tools to reach new people. It should be using those same tools to lift people out of poverty as well as giving them a voice.

It should be building a community.  It’s a worldwide organisation now.  Imagine the power it might wield if it could only be bothered to communicate with all the people who believe so passionately in its ideals.

I was the only long serving Brit in Bamenda – alongside a half dozen Filipinos and a half dozen Kenyans and Ugandans.  Have we given up on recruitment?  Are we even outsourcing volunteering now?  Probably not – but it feels like it.

We’ve heard of new brooms, changes, an international approach etc etc.

Instead we’ve got increased short term volunteers – volunteering on secondment they get a VSO allowance as well as pay from their employers.  They stay for two months earning several times more than long term volunteers never mind local people. This is what VSO used to be so strongly against…but this just feels like business. Growth through partnership.

Never mind the quality – feel the width.  It’s a numbers game now.

As a whole though, we’ve got even less support for overseas volunteers than ever before – we have got new tools put in place for communications but no one willing or capable of using them.

This is the biggest independent international volunteer organisation in the world and this is how it is run.

And I will end by reiterating that you should still do it.

Persevere with your application when you get the maddening standard emails in return.

Stick with the training that still revolves around “break into groups and draw a picture of how you’d like everything to be”.

Get out there and then do what you can.  Enjoy the experience because it can be wonderful.  Know that you are largely on your own.  Certainly as far as your country of recruitment is concerned.

Use whatever tools you can to make a difference but don’t expect support from HQ if you want to fundraise internationally.

I may be signing off with a grump – but that still doesn’t mean you shouldn’t sign up.

Because that’s how wonderful I think this organisation can be.