Recently, the following question was posed on CyberVPM, “How do you interface with government officials responsible for disaster response if you are volunteer professional?” The following answer is deceptively simple: “How do you interface with other nonprofit or business professionals?”
Get to Know the Players
At first blush, government bureaucracies may seem daunting to navigate. The first step for working with governmental entities is knowing the people in the organization. As in any organization, it is important to talk to the decision makers and the gatekeepers, or the people who can navigate the bureaucracy and open doors. Identifying these individuals can be difficult and time consuming but worth the effort. Depending on your form of local government, the decision makers will probably be the city manager or the mayor. The gatekeepers are people who you will meet along your journey. One important point though is that large cities often outsource program elements when it makes economic sense for them.
Another way to form relationships and learn the established systems of emergency responders is to attend the “table-top exercises” and periodic regional inter-agency exercises that emergency responders conduct to understand the nuances of a disaster, and practice their response plans. Participating in these exercises can help each party to understand one another. Finally, the city’s volunteer management professional and Office of Emergency management can assist you with understanding the local, regional and state emergency response plans.
Voluntary Organizations Active in Disaster (VOAD) is a national organization with local and regional chapters of non-governmental organizations that have disaster response as part of their mission. For instance, the American Red Cross, Salvation Army, Baptist Men, Seventh Day Adventists, United Methodists, Medical Reserve Corps, and volunteer centers participate in this organization to network, develop relationships and plan response efforts. Local fire, police and city emergency responders often participate as non-voting or affiliate members.
Build Partnerships
As you begin to build partnerships, you will be able to define your organization’s ability to respond to disasters within the established framework of existing emergency response plans. It will be necessary to communicate your organizations capacity to respond and the services that you can provide that will supplement or address existing needs. For instance, are you able to provide volunteer management services and to what levels? Too often organizations do not realize the volume they are committing to. A substantial number of phone calls and web traffic can shut resources down. Do you have the staff capacity to maintain the referral process and send staff to the disaster site to provide spontaneous volunteer management services? Unfortunately, these questions require tough considerations that must be thought through prior to an event. When you determine the nature and level of services that your organization can provide, your organization should develop agreements with other organizations or memorandums of understanding (MOUs) that clearly outline the services you will provide. During the heat of a response effort, it is tempting to commit more resources to address a situation than is feasibly possible or prudent for your organization. It is imperative, however, for organizational and public safety that the emergency response director maintains an overall focus and an ability to say ‘no’ while finding creative solutions to requests. For instance, during the Karita response effort, I was asked several times for volunteers to perform tasks I did not feel comfortable accepting liability for. During these times, it was important that we remained focused on our organizational mission and the capacity of our staff and resources to provide the services requested. The existence of MOUs assists in this process by providing a clear statement of what the organization can be expected to provide.
Educate
When an organization is entering a new arena of service delivery, it is important to share with new partners information about your organization’s mission and capacity to respond. These efforts will continue through out the relationship. This seems to be especially true with organizations that provide volunteer support during a disaster response. Unfortunately, many do not understand the nature and logistics of volunteer management. Many will naturally equate it to the management of paid staff and not understand the true nuances of the profession. During a past project, the corporate representative said to me, “I’m still not sure what you do but you do a lot of it and do it really well. Thank You!” This comment highlights a general lack of understanding of basic volunteer management but, at the same time, demonstrate a true appreciation for the existence of professionals who do understand and apply its tenets.
Working with local governments and emergency responders does not need to be as challenging as it first appears. It can be a wonderful and mutually beneficial relationship that builds the city as a whole.