My Volunteers are Incompetent
What if one or more team members in a volunteer setting don’t have the needed skills to get the job done?
This is a touchy situation. If you confront the volunteer, the organization risks losing an active member. If you let the problem go unresolved, you risk losing the other team members who may just not want to deal with the problem.
Sadly, this situation could have been prevented by following a simple procedure. Whenever a new team is formed (even a volunteer team), decide first what skills are needed. Create a job description for each position. Finally, check the qualifications of the volunteers prior to selecting them to the team.
If it’s already too late for that, here are three ideas that may help.
- Refocus. Most projects involve a wide range of tasks, each requiring a unique set of skills. Perhaps the person is not suited for one set of tasks. Are there other tasks the team needs doing that might be a better fit for the person? If so, guide the person into those tasks.
- Discuss skills. As a group, sit down and identify the specific skills needed to be a smashing success. Decide if it is important or not to have experienced people in each role. Through this discussion it may become more obvious that the person is not cut out for this team.
- Honest conversation. The team leader or another member of the team needs to offer this person the observation about skills. Team members need to be honest and straight-forward about expectations of each other. This conversation can be difficult, but is usually the strategy that most likely results in success.
Photo by Crystl
