Passion Mashin'

• Re-energise your volunteer group
• Grow your membership
• Harvest a crop of brilliant ideas
• Learn proven, simple, low-cost techniques to spread your message
• Win the hearts and minds of new supporters

This enjoyable interactive workshop harnesses the power of reinvention to spark new zest and enthusiasm in volunteer groups. Particpants hear about great reinvention and communication ideas and have a chance to share your own. They also create a great pitch to touch the hearts and minds of potential new members.

This workshop will transform the way volunteer leaders interact with their community and may just spark a whole new way of working.

For bookings and enquiries

Passion Mashin' originated in a short workshop Les gave at the 2011 Coastal Volunteers Forum in Wollongong. The result was so inspiring that two agencies asked him to develop a full day version to reinvigorate and inspire their Landcare and Bushcare groups.

Responses from participants have been nothing less than fantastic. Words like "inspiring", "invigorating", "enthusiastic", "confident" appeared again and again in the evaluations. The workshop clearly met a heart-felt need.

The basic idea is simple: increasing the membership of volunteer groups can"t just be about better marketing. In fact marketing has generally been found to be ineffective. Volunteers come because an activity is important and interesting and they stay because it is enjoyable and satisfying, and communication along social networks is the key.

Therefore a better approach is to reinvent what the group does so the activities are inherently more engaging, rewarding and buzz-worthy, and then refocus marketing on person-to-person communication. Reinvention is the key idea and it needs special skills and ways of thinking that participants learn and practice in the workshop.

One kind of reinvention is mashing unexpected passions, say kayaking and bushcare to create a new concept and a new volunteer experience. Passion mashing generates original and buzz-worthy ideas which change the public story of what their work is about. Here are some examples from the pilot workshops with Landcare/bushcare volunteers:

• Tea in the Trees (bushcare + making tea flavoured with native leaves)
• Coffee Lovers Bushcare (finish with campfire and real coffee tasting)
• Le Bushcare (speaking only French)
• Buzzcare (bushcare + native bee conservation)

After lunch the participants have a crash course in behaviour change followed by a session where they craft inspiring and engaging invitations Ð the key messages that invite new members to dip their toes in.

Timing: 9.30am to 3.30pm

Session 1) What is Passion Mashing?
Why are people are more intrigued and motivated by a subway symphony than by either the subway or a symphony separately! The secret is delight - something that happens when seemingly unrelated passions are mashed together. Delight is attractive, motivating and contagious. People love to be pleasantly surprised. And they love to pleasantly surprise others by talking about things that are pleasantly surprising. As a result, delightful mashes travel very well by word-of-mouth and it's easy to get their stories covered in the media.
Practice: Mashing passions.

Session 2) Reinvention case studies

Session 3) How to generate great ideas in your group

Session 4) What is disruptive innovation?
What gets us stuck is the "conventional wisdom": the set of automatic assumptions that never get questioned.
Practice: Working in facilitated teams, participants disrupt and reinvent their particular volunteer experience.

- - - lunch - - -

Session 5) An introduction to behaviour change
Very few people change in a bubble. Most of us change through interactions with people we know and trust.
Practice: Participants share emotionally engaging stories about their inspiring volunteer experiences.

Four workshops were held in Wollongong, Lawson, Picton and Hornsby in August 2011. A total of 102 volunteers attended, as well as several council officers and agency staff.

The mood of the workshops was enthusiastic and positive, with plenty of interaction and intense participant "buzz" during breaks.

74% reported being "very satisfied" and 23% reported being "satisfied"
= a 97% satisfaction rate.

Comments included:

"Thanks for providing this workshop. I'm inspired and more confident."

"Loved Loved the passion mashing and writing the invitation."

"Ideas, energy, positivity, interaction, inspiration."

"Inspirational ideas to use."

"Thinking outside the box about approaches to bushcare."

"Great facilitator. Great ideas! Great group!"

"Great to meet with reps of other groups sharing ideas. Excellent facilitation."

"We all need to do this more often - positive reflection and generation of new ideas."

"Lots of stimulating, thought-provoking ideas and concepts."

"I leave with a feeling of optimism."

"Thank you!"

"It's great for my work as well as bushcare."

"I learnt the difference between leafleting and talking personally."

"Great ideas but many need the co-operation of council. I hope the council employees here spread the ideas."

"New ideas for new approaches and models. Thinking beyond the entrenched ways of doing things."

"Inspired by Les's enthusiasm and encouragement. Great opportunity to be inspired by other local bushcarers and their stories and passions!"

"Les is so positive. Great facilitator - relaxed and funny and very well informed, very inclusive."

"Many thanks for an invigorating day!"