April of 2020 will go down in history for the Coronavirus Pandemic its unprecedented effects on global society. The world-wide shared experience aspect of this whole ordeal is one of the things that gives me a sense of hope in the face of mass unemployment, illness, and death. Personally, I vacillate between despair and hopefulness as expectations for what will come next get murkier and murkier. As of the writing of this post it becomes clear to me that the quarantine will last much longer than anticipated and that in many ways life is permanently altered.
The sands are shifting under my feet. I am scheduled to be laid off from the science museum at the end of this month. Unemployment will be at levels not seen since the Great Depression by then and I am not sure what I will do.
What I do know, however, is that the profession of Volunteer Management will still exist regardless of what the economy does because its two biggest motivating factors are not disappearing. Those factors are, one, that there is a need that exists in the community for some kind of service and, two, that there are people willing to address that need. The skills of identifying a set of problems and inventing possible solutions to them, recruiting and motivating a group of people, and the ability to work with very limited resources are ideal for emergency situations.
One of the things that gives me the most anxiety is the unpredictability of how events will play out right now. I am most unsettled when I can’t plan further than a few weeks into the future. All I can do is look for the next proverbial stone in the river as I make my way forward. Will there be stones all the way across the river? Probably, but possibly not. I may just need to redefine what counts as solid footing.
And so, maybe this is a message of hope I am writing to myself. I’ll leave it here for you too. Things move, the sands shift, the river flows. Change is inevitable and is the one constant that exists. I know it’s dangerous to try to hold too tightly to past ways of thinking and acting, relying on them to navigate through the crisis. Some things will need to be jettisoned and abandoned, some things will need to be changed, and some things previously discounted will need to be strengthened. I don’t know what those things are yet but I don’t doubt that this will be the case.
Volunteer Managers are leaders and leaders have a specific set of duties to perform for the good of the community. The skills you have cultivated can serve a great many people and make life better for them. The trick is not to get bogged down in despair or the futility of doing things in outmoded ways. There will be calls for help, heed them. They are the next stone across the river.
All Willing Hands 