We had a GLOWing time!

A needs assessment exercise was undertaken in March, following the GLOW principles of inclusion and participation. Two methodologies were used:

 

·         Focus group discussions for 126 HQ staff members divided into 9 groups. About 83 colleagues participated in the discussions, reflecting a participation rate of 66%

·         An online questionnaire, consisting of one ranking question and nine open questions, was sent to 213 colleagues: UNV Programme Officers, Country Offices Assistants, Programme Managers, Focal points, Liaison Office colleagues (4) and to a limited number of HQ staff (20) who could not take part in the focus group discussions.  Responses were anonymous and 19% of them were received in French, 10% in Spanish and 71% in English.

 

The overall return rate from the focus group discussions and online survey was 72%.

 

Your responses in the need assessment have been taken into account while preparing the content and designing the programme of the workshop.

 

Here is a summary of the feedback from the survey and the discussions.

 

Priority of GLOW objectives

In the online survey, colleagues prioritised the five GLOW objectives in the following order, from the most important to the less important (This question was not asked in the focus group discussions):

 

1)     Objective 1: Encourage open dialogue about issues affecting UNV as an organization

2)     Objective 2: Promote exchange of ideas on opportunities and challenges for the future

3)     Objective3: Clarify the diversity of roles and expectations throughout UNV

4)     Objective 5: Promote learning, while celebrating and appreciating our significant experiences

5)     Objective 4: Develop commitment across all parts of our organization

 

Important results expected from GLOW

Online survey respondents mentioned various subjects (“expected results”) and top 10 subjects with the highest frequencies of mention are presented below (frequency of mentions in brackets):

 

1)     The conditions of services (65)

2)     Communications (40)

3)     Support to COTs and the status of the PMs and POs (27)

4)     Policies, procedures, guidelines and strategic planning (25)

5)     Clear vision (25)

6)     Promotion of volunteerism (25)

7)     Training/Learning (23)

8)     Role and responsibilities (23)

9)     The status of COAs (22)

10)Status of UNVs (21)

 

Participants in the focus group discussions had the following priorities to be discussed: 

1.      Policies, procedures, guidelines, and priorities

2.      Corporate systems

3.      UNV future

4.      Vision/Mission

5.      Partnerships

6.      Relationships and communication

7.      Workflow

8.      Status of UN Volunteers

9.      Stock tacking/Learning from experience

10.  Programming, RBM and strategic planning

 

Important issues to discuss during GLOW

The issues raised for discussions are similar to those mentioned in the previous question about important results expected from GLOW.

 

1. Support to COTs and COTs’ workload (25)

2.      ATLAS (12)

3. Clarity of roles and responsibilities (14)

4.      Staff development and HR issues (13)

5. COS (12)
6. Partnership (11)

 

Major challenges facing UNV in next 3-5 years

Here are the major challenges identified by the online survey participants, in order of importance (frequencies of mention in brackets):

 

1)     Resource base and mobilisation (36)

2)     Programme growth and management capabilities (human/financial resources) (25)

3)     Quality of UNVs (24)

[How to attract and recruit best candidates, retain them as well as maintaining the quality while meeting the high demand? Also mentioned the qualification of staff at COT level to ensure this quality.]

4)     Promotion of the “V” (20)

[Issues raised include: notion of paid volunteerism, inclusion of “V” in new agenda, shifting perception of volunteerism, how to promote local and traditional volunteerism, how UNV can remain leader in promotion of volunteerism, how to mainstream V4D, and how to incorporate volunteerism into national development plans.]

5)     UNV’s image and recognition (of 18)

[What are the ways to increase UNV’s visibility, image and voice?]

6)     Partnership (11)

[UNV’s strategy in building relationships with the UN system, donors and governments.]

7)     UN reform (9)

[How UNV will cope with the UN reform and new leadership of UNDP?]

From the focus group discussions, the following points were identified as key challenges:

 

1.      UN reform [impact on UNDP, impact on UNV, where will UNV be positioned after UN reform]

2.      Remaining relevant in a changing world

3.      Addressing concretely gender issues

4.      To ensure that volunteers are the best advocate of UNV mission statement/ mandate/ objectives

5.      To remain focussed in our programmes/direction

6.      To remain highly responsive and adaptive to external and internal changes (donors, international relations context, UN reform, “competitors”)

 

Areas in promotion of V that should be discussed during GLOW

Following are the main areas mentioned by online survey respondents, by order of importance:

 

1)Funding for promotion of volunteerism (36)

2)Motivation/mobilisation of UNVs in promoting volunteerism (32)

3)Policy/guidelines/strategies on promotion of volunteerism (28)

4)Advocacy/promotion materials (25)

5)Sensitisation/partnering with government (18)

6)Share knowledge/experiences/ best practices (14)

7)Finding creative solutions for promoting  volunteerism (11)

8)Assist/support local volunteer organisation (11)

 

The focus group discussions identified the following as main areas to be discussed during GLOW:

 

·       How others (UN system, governments and VIOs) see UNV doing HR and promotion of “V”?

·       Promoting UNV and Volunteerism

·       PR/”V” stories

·       Governance particularly human right and peace building

·       Focus among emerging themes for voluntary action

·       Common understanding of UNV vision and long term strategy

·       Internet services (websites, CONET, Intra, Internet, etc.)

·       Role of universities volunteers

·       Focus on UNV not software

·       Volunteerism: its promotion, evolution of volunteerism, UNV’s modalities

·       Volunteerism how do we understand and apply it

·       Convincing UN Agencies to stick with IUNV rather than NUNV

·       How do you measure promotion of volunteerism?

·       Discussion on promoting Volunteerism

·       How to strengthen UNV’s advocacy for the “V”

·       The role of universities in volunteerism

·       To promote “V” spirit through all means (i.e. application form for UNV assignment or for UNV HQ posts) as to attract persons committed with mission and vision (M)

·       How to support the “V” beyond UNV

·       How to foster “V” among UNVs

·       Defining Volunteerism in operational terms and to enter UNDP MYFF

·       Expansion of volunteer movement and increased number of VIOs: where and what will be UNV’s role and place?

·       Capacity to absorb and manage an ever-increasing number of UN     Volunteers. (Identify optimum balance between quality and quantity)

·       Integrating the UN Volunteers into the programme

·       Trends in number of UN Volunteers: increased number of IUNV in PKO and decrease number of IUNV in PDOG, increased number of NUNV in PDOG, Associate

·       How to better advocate Volunteerism (Walking the Talk)

·       Use of IUNV/NUNV should not be a trade-off for UNV as well as its partners

·       Provide tools for promoting the “V”

·       Influence political processes to promote the “V”

 

How UNV is perceived as an organization in Country Offices

In general, online survey respondents said UNV is positively perceived (frequency of mention: 176) against 47 for negative perception. Some perceptions that could be interpreted as positive or negative have a freq of 50.

 

The main reasons for the positive perception are:

1. It is a source of highly qualified professionals (14)
2. Part of UN system (11)

3.      Universality and global outreach (9)

4. Can be trusted and is well known (8)

5.      Volunteer spirit (8)

6.      Contributes to development (4)

 

For the negative perception, the main reasons are:

1. Low status given to UNVs (10)
2. Not well known (9)
3. Bureaucracy

 

Being part of UNDP is mentioned as positive and negative. 

For responses that can leave room for interpretation are the low cost of UNVs, recruitment agency (“just a volunteer sending agency”) (6).

 

Key strengths & weaknesses of UNV                                                                  

A total of 250 attributes of strengths and 257 attributes of weaknesses were mentioned. Below is a table of those with the highest frequencies.

 

Strengths	Freq	Weaknesses	Freq
Mobilisation & recruitment of qualified personnel	23	Lack of resources (financial, material)	22
Being part of UN system	10	Conditions of service	17
Universality & global outreach	9	Bureaucracy/Slow responding to needs	15
Flexible	8	Centralised authority in HQ	8
Volunteer spirit	8	Unclear relationship with UNDP	6
Clear mission/vision/mandate	7	Personnel constraint	5
High quality roster	7	Others(with a frequency of less than 5)	184
Human	6
Diversity	5
Others(with a frequency of less than 5)	167
Total	250		257

 

 

Advice to workshop planners and facilitators

 

The online survey respondents said the workshop should:

 

·         Be participatory and interactive

·         Provide time for regional meeting

·         Provide an opportunity to COTs to express themselves while HQ is more in a listener seat

·         Be Practical, simple and linked to reality in the field as expressed by needs assessment

·         Be relaxed and fun

·         Promote a learning environment

·         Take into account language diversity: English, French, Spanish

·         Be results oriented: participants should be able to take back concrete and useful results

·         Update on recommendations from Global workshop 1999

 

The focus group participants gave the following advice:

 

·       Ensure facilitators are well briefed

·       Give opportunity to staff members to present/act as resource persons

·       Involve and include everyone

·       Involve COTs in as many steps as possible of GLOW preparation

·       Less process more results

·       Plan practical/relevant stuff

·       Better communications tools and strategy

·       Simplicity

·       Sessions in French and Spanish

·       Very clear objectives/practical, not conceptual

·       Focussed discussions

·       Time constrained discussions/sessions

·       Ensure active participation of All (Timing by person)

·       Create Emergency Unit while the workshop is on-going

·       Result-oriented with ground rules

·       Better use of communication tools developed

·       Focal points for specific tasks during the workshop

·       Active participation

·       Inform staff that some functional teams still need more members

·       Ensure inclusion through continued multiple interactions

·       Make best use of COTs presence in Bonn

·       Lots of interaction between COT and HQ team