how to recruit leaders and volunteers for your cause
TRANSCRIPT
RECRUITING TIPS AND STRATEGIES FOR COMMUNITY ORGANIZING
Presented by…
Here’s how it works…
Action Forum
Individual Change
Institutional and Policy Impact
Collective Action
Set Goals
Facilitator Training
Plan for Action
Recruit Participants and
Facilitators
Kick Off
DialogueOrganize Action
Com
mun
ity C
hang
e
Dialogue
Here’s how it works…
Action Forum
Individual Change
Institutional and Policy Impact
Collective Action
Set Goals
Facilitator Training
Plan for Action
Recruit Participants and
Facilitators
Kick Off
DialogueOrganize Action
Com
mun
ity C
hang
e
Dialogue
RECRUITING PARTICIPANTS AND FACILITATORS
Recruiting goals
When recruiting participants and facilitators for community conversations, work to:
oReflect the diversity of your community
oWork to include underrepresented groups
oAppeal to people who don’t usually participate
oUse culturally appropriate and socially responsive recruitment strategies
oAddress potential barriers and obstacles starting now
Deciding who and how many people to reach out to
o How many participants do we want?
o How many facilitators do we need?
o Which groups of people should we invite?
o How many people from each group should we invite?
o Have we made sure to include official and unofficial community leaders?
The Recruitment Funnel
To determine how many people you need to reach out to, think about:
oHow many people you want involved
oHow many people you need signed up to have that number of people show up
oHow many people need to be interested enough to want to sign up
oHow many people you need to contact to create a critical mass of interested people
RECRUITING TIPS
70% of participants join because someone they trusted asked them to be in a dialogue
or to be a facilitator.
Photo credit: http://www.freeimages.com/profile/Eastop
Recruiting tips
o Most people respond when invited by a friend or someone they respect. This is why word of mouth is the best recruiting tool.
o Use your vision statement in your recruitment materials, i.e.: “Hope for a better future through strong community and family involvement.”
o People need to hear a message from three to five times before they act on it. Use multiple ways to get the word out.
o Work with the communications committee to create materials.
The first step: Using your contacts
You and your coalition members may already have a relationship with key people and/or groups.
Tap into these connections!
Tap into the contacts of your coalition
1. Ask each coalition member to give you a list of 10 people (name, address, phone number, email) to send to invitations to.
2. Send invitations!
3. Have coalition members make follow up phone calls to their list.
4. Follow up with coalition members to let them know who has, and has not replied.
RECRUITING UNDERREPRESENTED GROUPS
Recruiting underrepresented groups
We want to include residents who don’t often participate. Often times a newspaper article, radio announcement, or a flyer will not be enough to get them to attend. What’s your strategy going to be to reach them?
What do we mean by “hard to reach”?
Exercise
Activity to explore community demographics available at:
http://everyday-democracy.org/resources/activity-explore-community-demographics
Who, Why, Where, How
At your next meeting, think about:oWho is hard to reach in our community? Why?
oWhere can we find them?
oHow can we invite them so that the “why” and “where” are addressed?
The three “L’s”
Language
Location
Literacy
One success story on recruiting underrepresented people
Think outside the [pizza] box
STRATEGIES TO RECRUIT NEW LEADERS
Recruit beyond…
The. Same. Ten. People.
#1: Ask “Who’s not here?”
Photo credit: Ben Earwicker, garrisonphoto.org
#2: Look for people with specific skills
#3: Ask for a small commitment first
Photo credit: http://www.freeimages.com/profile/BloodlessR
#4: Appeal to self interests
#5: Show how their involvement will result in positive change
#6: Clearly define the task
#7: Use current leaders to recruit new leaders
#8: Show people you value their time
#9: Offer benefits for participating
#10: Publicize your efforts
Communicate that they are important and that you value them and the contribution they can
make.
Tell them:
“We need you to help shape the future of our community. You have valuable insights and
abilities, and we need you to make this initiative and our community very successful.”
TYPES OF PEOPLE TO RECRUIT
People with communications, graphic design, and/or public relations skills
Good planners
Good writers
People with facilitation, mediation, and conflict resolution skills
Participants from every part of the community
