Calling all volunteers!  As part of National Volunteer Week, April 21st to 27th, 2013, the Social Planning Council of Ottawa is very excited to launch the Ottawa TimeBank!

The TimeBank is an interactive web portal that allows members to exchange skilled services and assets with agencies and organizations, hour-for-hour. Members are able to make a profile in the portal, identify which skills they have to offer the community, and those which their organization requires. The portal tracks offers and requests for skilled volunteer assistance, and the hours exchanged by members. For each hour you contribute to an agency or organization, you can redeem an hour of skilled assistance for your own organization from other members in the TimeBank. Members don't need to exchange services directly -- your hours become currency which can be "spent" on any service or asset in the TimeBank.

The TimeBank is currently available in French at: https://ottawatimebank.ca/, and will soon be available in English.

The TimeBank was developed as part of our mandate to support the voluntary sector, including working strategically with volunteers. All agencies and organizations looking for volunteers are encouraged to join, as well as individuals looking to contribute their time to community-based organizations in Ottawa!

Working with Skilled Volunteers

Skilled Volunteers are critical to the success of organizations today.  As the nature of skilled volunteer work is changing, many organizations are learning to adjust their practices to work better with their current volunteers, and attract new talent.

If you would like to learn more, please see our e-workshop (video at the bottom of this page): "The Busy Volunteer’s Guide to helping your organization by involving skilled volunteers". This video is for small and medium sized organizations looking to better use volunteers to support their work. In this video, you will learn:

• how volunteering has changed in recent years
• what skilled volunteers are looking for, how you can support them, and how to make use of their skills in your organization
• three strategies to better integrate volunteers, and
• where to find the skilled volunteers you need