The Canadian Birkebeiner Society (Birkie) relies on 500+ volunteers. While many of these volunteers are returning, some may want to try something new or a complete newbie may express their interest. A WordPress form and a Google Sheet collects this interest.

The Learning and Acquire phases of the Volunteer Lifecycle Model translates an interested individual into a (potentially) Tenured Volunteer. With thousands of potential volunteer opportunities, the Bikie must quickly and efficiently capture this interest and convert it into a filled role.

Great Software Not Being Used

The market is filled with excellent software which can do this. The Birkie is implementing such a tool through an incremental approach using low cost alternatives. An example of this is the better use of a lost cost HTML submission form on the Birkie website.

What Fields to Be Collected?

Enough information needs to be collected to best allocate a potential volunteer while also not overwhelming the submitter. Some fields are obvious (Name, contact details), some help to triage the respective roles (e.g. own transportation, have good winter gear), others are reliant on pre-existing information (e.g. preferred roles or areas of interest).

Status	Field	Name	Format
Context	NA	Who Are You and How do we Talk?
Existing	FName	First Name	Text
Existing	LName	Last Name	Text
Existing	Email	Email Address	Email
Existing	1Phone	Phone Number	PhoneFormat
Existing	2Phone	Alternate Phone Number	PhoneFormat
Existing	Age	Age Group, to identify minors and to track demographics.	Drop down
Existing	PriorVol	Have you volunteered for the Birkie before?	Drop down
Existing	YearsVol	How many years have you volunteered with the Birkie?	Drop down
Context	NA	How would you get to either of these locations?
New	Transport	Transportation (own or public transit)	Radio Button
Context	NA	What Would You Like to Do?
Existing	Enviro	What work environment do you prefer? Indoors, outdoors, heated tent, no preference.	Drop down
Context	NA	Not sure where to volunteer?
New	Role	Is there a role of particular interest to you?	Drop down
New	Skills	Do you have any superpowers (or cool skills) you can share?	Text
New	Time	How much time do you have?	Drop down
Existing	Hear	Where did you hear about this volunteering opportunity?	Text
Existing	Avail	When are you available (what day or days, what time of day)?	Text
Drop	Casino	Can we call you to volunteer for our casinos? (once every two years)?	Drop down
Modified	Leader	Are you interested in hearing about leadership roles within the Birkie?	Drop down
Existing	Permit	I give permission to email me communications and news	Radio

Outputs

The WordPress form is non-secure and thus should not contain confidential information such as payment details. The output is to the response function which can be exported to a CSV format. the following table is an example from two would be volunteers (Brad Pithy and Angie Joe-Lean) who are keen to volunteer.

Title	Brad’s Sign Up	Angie’s Sign Up
Source	/sign-me-up/	/sign-me-up/
Response Date	2023-10-23 8:26	2023-10-23 8:28
1_Name	brad@pithy.com	AJ@tombraider.com
1_First Name	Brad	Angie
2_Email	brad@pithy.com	AJ@tombraider.com
2_Last Name	Pithy	Jolean
3_Email Address	brad@pithy.com	AJ@tombraider.com
4_Phone Number	123-456-7289	234-567-8901
5_Alt Phone Number	987-654-3210	345-678-9012
6_Age Group	Adult (18+)	18-40
7_Volunteered before?	No	Yes
8_How many years?	First Time!	15-19
9_Transportation	I can arrange my own transportation	I rely on public transit
10_Work environment?	Indoors	Outdoors
11_Role?	No Preference, Where Needed	Loppet: Food Stations, Other
12_Skills?	Very good looking, make women swoon.	I know Brad Pithy
13_Time?	Birkie: All Day (5-10 hours)	Ongoing volunteer
14_When available?	Flexible	Tuesdays between 0912 and 0914h.
15_Where did you hear?	from my friend angie	From my friend Brad.
16_Leadership roles?	No	No
17_Permission	No	Yes
Consent
IP Address	123.89.83.159	456.89.83.159