Ch-ch-ch-ch-Changes

So, forgot to mention why we have so many things happening at the moment that might not be happening otherwise -- Chris and I are expecting a baby this Fall!  Squee!

My parents generously offered to move into our carriage house and help out with daycare once the baby arrives, so we're in the midst of quite a transition with that part of the property.  And it is a heck of a transition -- we have a tenant living there who has been on the property for nearly 15 years, and the previous owners did little or no maintenance for about 5 years prior to us buying the place.  We've been making modest changes since we bought the place, but now we'll be doing  a pretty extensive renovation of the place, inside and out. 

Wish us luck, on the baby and the house!

Speaking of Stuff Happening...

If you don't live under a rock, you probably know that I live a few blocks from the infamous Sandusky trial.  I'm not going to talk about the trial itself -- I don't know Sandusky or anything that anyone else wouldn't know who has general access to the media.  However, I am going to comment on what it's like living near the courthouse during an event like this.

In a phrase, kind of annoying.  I'm thrilled that the media is renting storefronts, drinking coffee, and eating in our restaurants.  I wish the borough had done a better job of staging the satellite trucks around the courthouse, though.  And each morning's commute is a little more challenging than is normal, due to the large number of people on the street. 

Also happening this week: The Bellefonte Cruise.  Which is a car show commemorating the tradition of cruising.  Honestly, please remind me next year, if I consider staying home during this event that I should leave town.  Again, I like the shot in the arm that it provides to the local economy.  Quite frankly, though, I hate the exhaust, the crowds, the people stomping my flowers, revving engines, you name it.  Next year I'm going away. Mark my words.

House Hijinks

Progress on the New Bath, a photo by Athens Nikita on Flickr.

So, what've we been up to the in the 'Fonte? Quite a bit, actually.

There's been a lot happening in town lately, which I'll briefly touch on another time.

However, at our house we've suffered some catastrophes and entered unwittingly into several unplanned projects. But we also had projects slated for the summer -- like an additional bath with a tub for our new tenant in the other half of the house.

Yesterday Herman came over and helped Chris kick that project off -- what you're looking at in this photo is the first stages of what hopefully will be a rapidly unfolding laundry/bath addition where the commercial space used to be.

So far it's just spec'd out and framed, but baby steps, folks. Baby steps.

Why Volunteers Quit

Those of you who know me reasonably well know that I've been in development for about a decade now, and have also been involved with many nonprofits and organizations. Over the years, an issue that's always concerned me has been volunteer turnover and burnout. And I'm extrapolating here both from nonprofits and all-volunteer organizations to for-profit businesses and other more commercial enterprises -- because, let's face it, even in a business environment there's a gulf between what's required and what a lot of people choose to do.

But, too, every environment loses people and loses talent because, for whatever reason, the talent isn't motivated or engaged appropriately or well enough, and as a result the talent chooses to apply itself elsewhere.

Listed in no particular order are some of the reasons this happens:

• Burn out -- Usually this happens when willing volunteers find themselves unable or unwilling to contribute to the degree demanded by the organization.



• Cool out -- When people who offer their talent find it unused. Usually they're offering because they have a desire to contribute. And if your organization won't give them a meaningful way to contribute, they contribute elsewhere.



• A lack of context -- What are we doing, why are we doing it, and what does it matter if we do it? People volunteer to achieve things. They want to see the significance of their work.



• Static opportunity -- People volunteer out of enlightened self-interest, and one thing they're interested in is taking on more responsibility, learning new things, and being able to grow within their volunteer role.



• Excluded stakeholders -- Usually this means the volunteer's family, who may not have a meaningful way to be involved in the volunteer's philanthropy, and may resent the conflict that volunteering can create with shared time. However, there are a lot of people competing for your volunteer's time and attention, and if you want to avoid losing your volunteer you have to keep this in mind and engage those competing interests as well.



• A Bad Environment -- People volunteer because they enjoy it. And when they don't enjoy it, they quit. Usual reasons for this are that they don't feel well-enough respected, they're not having fun doing it, etc.

So, what's the solution? There are many things that can improve issues with volunteer morale, but it all comes down to the Aretha Franklin Solution: R-E-S-P-E-C-T, find out what it means to me.

Sorry for the hokey rhyme, but this really is approximately 90% of the solution to issues with volunteer engagement.

Broken down:

1. Give respect to your volunteers, your stakeholders, and your staff. If your professionalism is lacking, fix that first. Nothing is more detrimental to morale than the failure to communicate appropriately and respectfully with everyone who's engaged in the mission of your organization.

A corollary to this is that transparency and fair practices will serve you well.

2. "Find out what it means to me" means exactly that -- what is meaningful to your stakeholders? There are some stakeholders who want a limited role -- they may want to be respected and given relatively free reign to perform tasks which they feel adept at performing. Do that for them. Others will want to grow, to learn, and to get more deeply engaged with the organization -- help them do that. Keep in mind that while they give you their time, talent, and treasure, you're also giving them a meaningful way to be engaged in your organization. Take your side of the exchange seriously.

Summarized greatly, do what, within the needs of your organization, would be meaningful for your volunteers. That's how you keep them.

Yes! Day One!

So, today was Day One of Nanowrimo. I've "participated" before, but without much of a plan I basically just wrote character descriptions and set pieces till I got bored and gave up.

However, I'm talking about my goals for this year to keep myself accountable. So, here goes...

Getting to the end and "winning" is as simple as averaging 1,667 words per day. Today I wrote like crazy and got to that number in about 1.5 hours. So, not bad. I could probably do it in less if I had some ability to focus, but as it was I did about 500 words while waiting for Chris to get his hair trimmed at Great Clips (as an aside, ever got your hair cut at Great Clips? I'm surprised I got anything written), and then managed to clack out about 1500 more while watching the end of the Anaheim Ducks/Washington Capitals game at home. (What can I say? Temmu Selanne inspires me.)

So...the grand total for today? 2,600! Go, me! Just 29 days to go!

Nature Has Other Plans...

I have guests in town, my parents, who hate the cold. So when we planned their visit, we talked a fair amount about the potential for snowfall. "No problem," I assured them, "it'll be way before the first snow. It only snowed this early once before, and that was an anomaly."

Put simply: WRONG. Yes, it almost never snows so early. It hasn't since 1972, actually. But I woke this morning to blankets and blankets of flakes coming down, and it's only gotten worse since then.

And in fact yesterday was a great day to be outside. I rode my horse in the afternoon, and it was a fantastic day to have a panoramic view of the mountains with all the leaves changing. Then, later, my guests and I had dinner at the Nittany Lion Inn and participated in the Lantern Tours that are put on by the Lion Ambassadors. The highlight was climbing Old Main's tower, which isn't usually open.

But we're definitely not going out there today. So, now my parents and I are hunkered down in the basement watching college football. Which is pretty awesome, but very different from what I had planned this weekend.

Literary Endeavors

This is one of those omnibus posts where I just throw a summary of my recent activities out there for everyone to peruse. I've been on a bit of a literary jag, in addition to my other activities.

This has included reading -- and I read what's handed to me, what I see on the shelves at the library, and what I get assigned for various reasons, so there's no particular value judgement afoot here.

• Just finished re-Reading Ellison's Invisible Man, Bryson's At Home, and McEwan's Amsterdam. These actually do come with a value judgment, because I like them enough to keep them around and rotate them on and off the shelves for frequent re-reads.



• Just finished reading, from the library: T.C. Boyle's When the Killing's Done and Clyde Edgerton's The Night Train.



• I'm currently reading: GHW Bush's All the Best (wherein he refers to that old battle axe Barbara Bush as "Bopsie"), Hoover's The Quickening, and Ian Weir's Daniel O'Thunder.

Beyond all that, did I mention that I'm endeavouring this year to participate in National Novel Writing Month and to "win" it? More on that later. Suffice it to say that I have a challenge what with my travel for work, my lack of a laptop, and my other obligations. But I'm spending a lot of my non-copious free time this month doing research, writing character sketches, and generally setting myself up so that I can just write when it's just writing time.