Politicians are jumping up and down, slathering a bit. Ha! Proof! Our Big Society concept was absodooperly spot on! The Games Makers loved it too! This is how we get our stagflative economy out of the doldrums – volunteerism! Let’s bottle it! It’s our nation’s newest greatest asset, and it’s freeee, we can afford it!
Listening to many of the Games Makers, willing to work so hard, expecting so little, and yet receiving so much, it’s hard to disagree. Many said that the experience was the best thing they had ever done.
It gets even harder to argue the power of volunteerism when you read the latest white paper from the global consulting firm, Hay Group, optimistically entitled ‘Depressed Employee Engagement stunts global business performance’. The paper claims that more than a third of employees across the world are unwilling to go the extra mile for their organization.
So two groups in the press offering their services: one unwilling, one willing. One remunerated in cash, the other remunerated…how?
In their testimony (The Guardian’s open thread on the topic), the Games Makers describe a passion for sport, pride in their product, tremendous collegiality and a sense of driving real value to the bigger whole.
Passion, pride, collegiality, value. Sentiments lacking from many a disengaged employee’s day to day.
We certainly can learn a great deal from the joyful success of volunteerism this summer. We can learn to be more ‘willing’, to find a job which delivers passion, pride, collegiality and value. We can remember that remuneration comes in many forms, cash being just one. There is a chance that if we all set out to add value, we may actually do so, and the economy may improve after all.
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