Sometimes staff need assistance understanding that “free help” doesn’t mean there’s no investment on their end. To nurture staff-volunteer relations, the first step is to give staff the tools to best communicate with volunteers. Help staff fully embrace volunteers make by helping them feel comfortable in their interactions with volunteers.
 
Allison has worked in volunteer engagement for over 7 years and has also been a volunteer herself. She has a degree in Business Management with an emphasis on Human Resources. Combined with her previous teaching experience, she has found a perfect blend to use these skills as while falling under admiration for the drive and passion that volunteers have. Allison resides in Colorado Springs with her “furry family” that consists of her bearded boyfriend, Josh, and their collective squad of 6: four tiny dogs, one giant cat, and a regular-sized rabbit.

                                                                                                         

Story-telling isn't just fun, it's effective in many areas of a nonprofit's goings-on, (volunteer recruitment, grant writing, marketing, fundraising). We all need to learn "how to tell our story" in various contexts so to be successful. This workshop will explain "story" and give 2 tools for sharing in impactful ways!
 
Andrew Davies is the SeniorCorps-RSVP Director for Larimer County, and the Volunteer Project Manager for VOA northern Colorado. He has a 20 year history of public speaking and writing for nonprofits and ministries.

 

Volunteering connects supporters with a mission. When donors are connected to the mission, they give more and give longer. Volunteerism is an effective way to both build relationships with donors and retain them over time. This presentation will focus on current giving trends and how volunteering can help with fundraising.
 
Jules Kelty is Development Director of the Rocky Mountain MS Center. Kelty's experience includes more than a decade as a nonprofit fundraiser, having served as a major gift officer for American Red Cross Colorado and Wyoming Region and director of development for Colorado Youth at Risk. Previously, she taught with Denver Public Schools for seven years, specializing in elementary education, social studies, language arts, and Spanish instruction. Kelty has her bachelors from Grinnell College and masters from University of Denver.

 

Volunteering is a good way to expand your skill set, network, and resume. How can volunteering can help establish your career and build your marketable skill set? Join us to talk about integrating volunteer activities into a killer resume. Managers: learn how to help your volunteers translate what they do.
 
Cindy Anderson has over thirty years of experience in Colorado education (K-12 and Higher Education) and has done career development work with students and staff from institutions across the country. She is also an active Volunteer for several Denver-area non-profit, including the Denver Art Museum and the Tennyson Center for Children. She is a UCD alum and a grandmother of four.

 

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This workshop explores fundamentals of creating and running an effective, efficient volunteer program: identifying and documenting potential volunteer roles, determining appropriate intake and screening processes, developing necessary orientation and training components, managing and tracking volunteer assignments, and retaining your vital volunteers.
 
Traci Lato-Smith, a Certified Volunteer Administrator, has spent her career developing systems for engaging volunteers to support mission focused work. Traci has created vibrant volunteer programs for organizations in the fields of social justice, senior advocacy and education, and consults on building infrastructure for effective volunteer programs across all sectors.

 

Would you like a tool to help you manage the chaos? Learn how Fort Collins acquired and helped design an enterprise volunteer management system. Engage (Offero) handles activity registration, volunteer applications, scheduling, feedback, training, and reporting. How could technology elevate innovation and creativity in your organization? 
 
Charlotte Boney is the Volunteer Program Manager with the City of Fort Collins FC Volunteer program. She is a Certified Volunteer Administrator, serves on the DOVIA Colorado Board, and has over six years of experience in the field.
Susan Schafer is the Education and Volunteer Coordinator for the City of Fort Collins Natural Areas Department. She has been teaching environmental education her entire career, 19 years.
Lindsey Rehder is the Chief Operating Officer at Squarei Technologies. She combines her deep technological understanding, entrepreneurial spirit and innovative leadership to help clients succeed.

 

 

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This session will teach participants to use the Restorative Conversation model to address conflict with volunteers. A restorative conversation can be held informally in 3-10 minutes to address immediate needs and concerns around a problematic interaction that has impacted your relationship with someone else
 
Lonnie Hernandez has 8 years of experience as a Loss Prevention Supervisor and Regional Trainer for Kohl's Department Store. He is the 2016 LCJP Volunteer of the Year! He advocates for restorative justice in loss prevention, and helped LCJP innovate restorative approaches to shoplifting. Lonnie has a B.A. in Psychology from University of Colorado.
Jessica Goldberg has been the Volunteer and Training Coordinator for LCJP since 2015. She loves recruiting and training volunteers. Jessica worked for the New York Peace Institute from 2008-2010. Jessica has a M.A. in Conflict Transformation from SIT Graduate Institute (2010).

 

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How do we ensure volunteers represent the communities they serve? It takes data and customization to build a group as diverse as the skills they offer. This interactive session provides guidance and tools to identify hard-to-reach populations, address barriers, and create programs and communications that meet them where they are.
 
Annie Bierbower is the Civic Engagement Liaison for the City of Fort Collins where she creates meaningful ways to connect the community to local government. She develops tools and methods to support those that experience barriers to participation such as people that speak English as a second language, single parents, and youth. Always interested in the overlap between culture, communications and civic literacy, she has worked as a journalist, production assistant, and content manager for an international education organization. She studied abroad in Peru and traveled extensively through Asia before finding her position in the community she loves. 

 

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Nonprofits working on social issues sometimes operate in isolation, without understanding their place in an evolving field. Improving requires a hard look inward and outward. In this skills-based workshop, you will learn HPT (Gap/Root Cause Analysis) principles. Un-earth levels of awareness and possibilities that map directly to your strategic plans.
 
Professional Experience as a coach, trainer, performance consultant, curriculum developer, training manager and master trainer: 25 I serve (or have served) in Leadership capacities for Project Angel Heart, Live Well Colorado, Doors Open Denver, Denver Dumb Friends League, Denver Mayors Bicycle Advisory Commission, and Cooking Matters Colorado. Recently, I served as a mentor and Vice President for the Sprint Hispanic Employee Network, Enlace, completed ten years as an education consultant for the Anti-Defamation League in New York, and I served in an advisory role for Denver Public Schools. James is an avid cyclist, hiker, and spends his spare time his adopted German shepherd, Anja.

 

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Does hearing the word strategy send you running for the hills? Matt has a fresh spin on creatively building your strategy, asking questions that must be asked, and building the best team in the right context. Using design thinking activities, you’ll experience the seven steps necessary to solve any problem.
 
Matt Gray serves as the Executive Director of the Rocky Mountain Innovation Lab, an organization dedicated to coaching Creative Leadership and Organizational Development. Whether in the classroom or in a strategy session, Matt recognizes the power of collaboration and the strengths that each individual brings to community. Along with engaging others find their individual balance and wellbeing as leaders, Matt relies on community to ignite his work. For inspiration, Matt can often be found in Colorado’s fine open space and public lands, running, taking a hike with his family, gazing at birds and panoramas, and sometimes even dancing.

 

Deciding where to lend your time and talent is crucial in finding a rewarding volunteer opportunity. It is easy to get in a volunteer rut by picking the same population, type of organization, etc.  Learn more about actively seeking and creating volunteer experiences that step outside one's comfort zone.
 
Tiffany Estell, a “career volunteer”, developed a passion for giving back at a young age. Volunteering is a key element in Tiffany’s life. Tiffany has held several volunteer positions including Make-A-Wish wish grantor, Special Olympics Coach, Sexual Assault and Domestic Violence Crisis Counselor, adult literacy tutor. Tiffany’s drive to be a part of something bigger than her has influenced her professional career as well. She has worked in the non-profit sector for the past 16 years in operations, logistics/production and volunteer engagement.

 

A well-written survey generates substantive, actionable feedback from volunteers and can increase engagement among volunteers. This session will help participants design high-quality surveys, including when surveys are most appropriate, key principles for writing survey questions, best practices for structuring surveys, and how-to tips on survey distribution.
 
Elena is the founder of Vantage Evaluation, helping purpose-driven organizations understand what works and what could be working better for our communities. She holds a B.S. in Brain and Cognitive Sciences from M.I.T. and a Ph.D. in Evaluation and Applied Research Methods from Claremont Graduate University.

 

Volunteer engagement in today's world can be easier than we make it. Come and explore simple tools that can make your lives better and ignite the passion in your volunteer workforce! You will learn research findings and tested approaches from a pro with 20 years’ experience empowering volunteers.
 
Eric has served in volunteer organizations since the 1990’s energizing all of those around him. From Key Club, environmental and political organizations, forest service trail maintenance crews, search and rescue members, wild land fire teams and more recently 15 years with the Red Cross Disaster Services, he has a wealth of experience leading and empowering 1,000s of volunteers across geographies and generations in good times and bad. Eric is an avid outdoorsman with a passion for humanity and lives in Lakewood with his wife and son.

 

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Volunteers are great workers but not great salespeople… and often feel intimidated if asked to recruit new volunteers. This proven 5-step process for peer-to-peer recruitment helps cultivate an effective grassroots recruitment team. Engage volunteers in a new activity, instill confidence, and provide encouragement for their recruitment efforts, while exponentially growing your base.
 
Leslie Franklin has 30 years of integrated marketing and communications experience in various niche and affinity markets. Through positions in nonprofit, corporate, and start-up organizations, she has leveraged human capital and marketplace data to benchmark results, expand services, and develop new business. Leslie has worked directly with local and national organizations to recruit, motivate, engage, and recognize key stakeholders like volunteers, members, and employees. A lifelong volunteer, she currently works as Client Services Manager for Metro Volunteers. She also manages her own consulting company, Snowgumbo Services, which helps clients grow market share, improve stakeholder relations, and realize greater customer/client satisfaction.

 

Volunteers are interested, they’re calling (!), but what happens when you don’t have enough opportunities, or the right opportunities for them currently? How can you keep them involved for future volunteer needs or prospecting? In this session, learn tools for keeping individuals engaged when volunteering isn’t an option at present.
 
Jessy Bergeman is currently the Manager of Volunteers and Corporate Engagement for Urban Peak, a Denver non-profit that provides services for youth experiencing homelessness. Previously, she was Urban Peak’s Group Volunteer Coordinator. Jessy also served as the Volunteer Program Manager, coordinating habitat restoration projects for the Golden Gate National Parks Conservancy in San Francisco, following an internship on Alcatraz with the National Park Service.

 

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Engage corporations, small businesses, and professionals in meaningful ways. The Center for Nonprofit Excellence has experimented with done-in-a-day scope-a-thons and pro bono projects, connecting for-profit employees with social impact missions. Develop a plan to help companies deploy experts to make an impact on capacity or the broader social issue at hand.
 
Amber Coté is the Leadership & Community Steward at the Center for Nonprofit Excellence, your first-stop nonprofit shop, providing valuable resources to nonprofits, businesses, and individuals to benefit Southern Colorado. In this capacity, Amber oversees the Executive Service Corps (ESC), corporate engagement for the nonprofit sector, and community-wide volunteer engagement initiatives. Ms. Coté is a native to the Pikes Peak region and has built her nonprofit career around improving the lives of under-served people for a better quality of life for all. Ms. Coté’s experience in nonprofit administration, education, victim advocacy, and business informs her approach to collaboration-building and organizational leadership.

 

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The Corporation for National and Community Service (CNCS) is a Federal Agency that provides opportunities for individuals of all ages and backgrounds to address vital community needs through service. This is an introductory session for those who are new or unfamiliar with the opportunities available through national service in Colorado.
 
Tanesha Bell, an AmeriCorps Program Officer at Serve Colorado joined the Governor’s Commission on Community Service in August of 2014. Tanesha is a Bill Daniels Scholar (class of 2000) with extensive experience managing federal grants within state government and the nonprofit sectors to support programs in education, volunteerism, and transitional housing for homeless youth and families. She is a Denver Public Schools alumna and received a Bachelor of Arts degree from Drury University.