The name comes from Welsh 'da'n gilydd meaning together.
Volunteering! Especially in environments where training and governance are essential - like first aid volunteering. But also about using open-source as a form of volunteering in (many) local communities.
I think it is important. You can read more about it here.
The below assumptions will have to be validated. They are based on my own experience volunteering in first aid in three organisation. I have discussed them with other members of those organisations in personal conversations and have some positive feedback but at the moment it is all anegdotes nothing more.
The way we interact with the world around us has been changing. Mobile phones are part of our experience from early in our development. We are past being just 'familiar' with on-screen technology and digitally-enhanced experience. More and more we expect and need it to engage.
The assumption here is, that providing a modern looking, mobile-first volunteering experience will help to better engage future generations of volunteers.
What matters most to millenials? Millenials want to mater. This is only one of many articles on the subjectin the context of workplaces. In their book The Purpose Revolution John Izzo and Jeff Vanderwielen call our times the Age of Social Good as more and more of us want to do good.
But at the same time we want to see the impact we are making! And we don't want to wait for that feedback. We want it now.
The first assumption is that it applies to volunteering similarly to what has been shown to apply in thhe workplace. To drive us we need to have relatively quick feedback on our contribution to the cause.
The second assumption is that we can deliver that quick feedback through a volunteer-centric digital experience.
What do we mean by volunteer-centric? Many of the existing systems are focused on the organisation. We have means of organising training, events, and delivering first aid cover. Most information is available only to very few.
We could change it by surfacing the data to the user, the volunteer, in a way that is relevant to them and their need to matter. How many patients did they treat? How many people attended the event they helped made safe?
Not only we want to matter, we want to know about it now. This helps with our motivation. We do something, we get a reward, even if it is some virtual points, and we feel good (thanks to release of dopamine). This makes us want to do it again. There is science behind it. Read about how others use it.
The assumption here is that we can see similar benefits in increased engagement as others who tried gamification.
- User-centric design with accessibility in mind will help us engage with a wider, more diverse group of potential volunteers.
- Working in the open, using open standards, open source, open data will allow for self-hosting of the solution by any organisation, making the outcome available anywhere in the world.
The most obvious but probably not the first journey to be implemented in the app. A journey from an interest to becoming a volunteer. The journey could be delivered independently through a web application to help with recruitment, but it is unlikley that starting the app there would attrackt users.
An individual volunteer can go to an event and log it to track activity and get rewards - the gamification element.
- Working in the open - because it is a volunteering project for volunteers.
- It has to be easy to deploy so anybody can run it.
- It has to work with intermittent internet connectivity.
- Data. We want to be ethical. Hold only what's needed, and if possible in something like Personal Online Solid Pods.
Contact me on Twitter, Mastodon, or by email. Or simply start collaboration here, on github, by creating an issue or starting a discussion.