January 2006
Happy New Year to all. I hope you are all rested, fighting fit and ready for another year of books, uniforms, lunches, excursions, homework, assignments, sports days, award nights, parent/teacher interviews, tuckshop, P&C meetings ……heavens, I feel exhausted already when I have to times that by three. My middle son is in Grade 12 this year with the younger two sons in Grades 10 and 9.
In amongst all that we have to find time for work - paid and/or volunteer. Time is becoming an ever-increasing precious commodity in our society and we have to weigh up the pros and cons of where our spare time will be spent. In my experience the time I have spent being a volunteer in schools and being involved in the education of my children, and education in general at State and National level, has been a very rewarding experience both personally and professionally. Apart from the personal satisfaction of doing this work I have acquired other skills over the years that have been of benefit to me and my personal development.
For example, in the roles within the P&C and QCPCA that I have held over the years (President, Secretary, State Executive Member, Vice-President) I have acquired skills and improved upon them in the areas of letter and report writing, public speaking, computer skills, being an employer, arbitrator, negotiator, financial literacy, corporate governance etc.
I did most of this while being a stay-at home Mum with the odd part-time job. Little did I know that although this was all unpaid work, I was actually getting work experience out of it and that if I could list all the jobs I had done it would look pretty good on a resume.
A number of times over the years, the idea has been floated within QCPCA about how rewarding it would be, to not only value a volunteer’s work with verbal acknowledgement but if we could also harness and recognise the relevant skills they acquire into some form of accreditation that would be valued by prospective employers.
Think about the Treasurer of a P&C where there is a tuckshop and OSHC. These are essentially two small businesses and in some cases the P&C could be turning over in excess of $250000 per year plus employing more than five staff. To keep the books accurately and to a standard which will stand up to an audit every year is not only a challenge but an accomplishment that should be acknowledged, either for the new skills learned or for keeping skills up to date before going back to the workforce.
Of course at P&C level, we envisage that this would be an optional course of action to take for those who wish to pursue this. To do this though you have to ensure that from the start a person knows what they are expected to do, have an assessment/review process in place that allows time to assess whether the person needs support, training or to reconsider their choice before finalising a course.
Last year QCPCA undertook a Performance Review with the vision to develop a more professional outlook on our volunteer work. All Officers’ positions at State and Regional level now have a Position Description and a list of expectations/commitments. The system has been specifically designed to recognise and reward the efforts of people who give so freely of their own time. Each year office bearers will receive feedback about how well they performed against the benchmarks set.
Some people might say that going to all this trouble for a group of volunteers is a bit over the top. But realistically, the job undertaken by a P&C Treasurer has just as much responsibility as someone doing a similar job in private enterprise – it’s just that the P&C Treasurer is not paid.
And while we are on this line, maybe it’s about time we looked at how appropriate the word “volunteer” is in today’s world as well. There are some who will say that “volunteer” has some underlying negative connotations and is a label applied to people that are doing a “claytons job”.
I tend to use the words “unpaid professional’ when I look at the quality with which P&C office bearers do their job. The only difference most times between the P&C Treasurer and the company accountant is the pay – everything else is the same.
