Fido proving a valuable recruitment method for The Centre's members
[April 2007 | The Centre of Volunteering]
The Centre's Fido Skilled Volunteer Search is a service which allows members to advertise for volunteers free-of-charge in the Sydney Morning Herald (SMH) on Saturdays (inside back page of the News Review section) and on Mondays (inside back page of the main news section). Priority is given to positions requiring certain skills, qualifications or experience.
Five volunteer positions are advertised on Mondays and three on Saturdays. In addition, details of these positions are posted weekly on the Fido website (www.fido.com.au) and are emailed to 1100 people registered on the website to receive the weekly jobs e-bulletin.
Denis Porter, The Centre's Fido liaison officer, reports that members advertising through Fido have a very high success rate with the service. Denis said: "Fido has a success rate of at least 70% to 80%, and the great majority of members who use Fido are very happy with the number and quality of the responses they get from potential volunteers. Members are continually giving us feedback that Fido is a very valuable way to recruit volunteers, particularly for specialised roles which may be difficult to fill through other channels."
In 2006, approximately 300 positions were advertised in Fido for over 100 organisations. With some positions involving more than one volunteer, the effective number advertised was significantly higher.
Positions recently advertised through Fido range from IT specialists, accountants, lawyers and marketing and management consultants to teachers, musicians and counsellors. Most of the positions are in Sydney or other centres in NSW. However some of the more unusual positions recently advertised have been for Australian Business Volunteers and have included a horse trainer in Cambodia and a hairdresser trainer in Vietnam.
The ability to advertise in the SMH is a valuable feature of Fido. With an average readership of 875,000 on weekdays and 1.2 million on Saturdays and a significant readership in the professional/skilled/higher income segments of the community, the SMH is an ideal mechanism to reach Fido's target audience.
Fido is being used by a wide range of members and potential exists for more members to take advantage of it. Denis says that despite promotion of the service by The Centre, he suspects that some members are still not aware of the service. He encourages more members to get hold of a copy of the SMH and see the range of jobs being advertised. Members then wanting to use the service can lodge requests through the website or can give Denis a call on Wednesdays or Thursdays at The Centre.