While volunteers keep many clubs running, finding the time and ways to find more helpers is a challenge for many.
For a feature story about volunteers, WaiBOP Football visited Te Aroha Junior Football Club and their president, Ben Norman.
The Waikato town of Te Aroha is about halfway between Hamilton and Thames, and the club has about 140 registered players, with a committee of five volunteers.
Ben Norman shared some tips on how his club has found volunteers to share the workload.
First Kicks timekeeper Steve Hill is originally from Auckland, and moved to Te Aroha as a retiree. He had been involved in football with his own children in Auckland when they were growing up.
Ben Norman met Hill by chance before the 2023 season, when both men were at the football grounds.
Hill shared how he loved to see all the kids playing football on a Saturday morning as he passed on a walk or bike ride.
He missed his football days, but didn’t feel it was appropriate to turn up and watch without a family member involved.
This sparked an idea.
Norman talked to his committee about creating a specific timekeeper role in the club. Someone who could be on the hooter for the first kicks games and keep the morning moving.
This was a role that had been shared by the committee, all of whom were doing other roles as well.
Norman returned to Hill with the idea: “Do you want to be part of our club? We have this job we would love you to do, if you would like to be involved.”
With a specific job to do, Hill was keen and agreed to be timekeeper for a season.
Main photo: Volunteer Steve Hill. Photo credit: WaiBOP Football.
After the winter season, he returned at the start of 2024 to run timing for six weeks of a fun 5-aside round-robin on Friday nights, and was invited to committee meetings. He’s added his input and insight, which Norman says has been valuable to have.
This season, Hill’s back again as First Kicks timekeeper, and he also gets involved with the cluster festivals.
“I was taught as a young ‘un that it was important to be involved in sport and teamwork,” Hill says.
“This involvement gives people a sense of belonging and value. To see parents and kids turning up to play on Saturdays is priceless. Thank you for the chance to be involved.”
A key takeaway for Norman and the committee of five is to have clear and specific roles that volunteers can be invited to do (rather than “come along and lend a hand”).
They recognised that one of the barriers to getting involved as a volunteer was not knowing what needs to be done.
Another issue they identified for volunteers was uncertainty over time commitments.
People don’t want to volunteer if they are not certain they’ll be able to do the job when needed.
Te Aroha is a dairy farming area, with time restraints different to other jobs.
The committee wanted to make it easier for volunteers to be involved as and when they could be.
Norman shared how the committee have been very intentional about identifying what needs to be done and breaking the roles into “bite-sized chunks” with very clear instructions, so they can be done by different people.
An example is line marking.
Previously done by committee members, it’s time-consuming, and the timing varies depending on the weather and how fast the grass grows and is mown.
The club has been able to train six volunteers (mainly dads) to use the line marking equipment.
The gear, and a map with instructions is kept in a shed with a lockbox, and the volunteers all have the code.
Norman has a group chat specifically for pitch marking. He keeps an eye on the pitches, and the weather, and lets the group know when they need doing, and the window of two or three days they can be done.
So far, one of the six has always been able to get the job done.
Norman believes there are a few key points for helping find new volunteers and supporting them:
- Breaking down tasks into clear chunks, with instructions and timeframes.
- Making it easy for some jobs to be done without dependencies on others (e.g. a lockbox with a shared code).
- The committee continues to organise tasks, and if needed, step in to do them.
The committee view managing volunteer workload as being a key to not burning out individuals, and creating a sustainable club for the future.
This story was first published on July 22, 2024.
Acknowledgement
We thank WaiBOP Football for providing us with information for this story, first published on their website.
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