Participants for:
Trailblazers and Troublemakers: Entrepreneurial Volunteers

Convening Editor: Rob Jackson

Abby Dyson is currently working for creative consultancy Cake (www.cakegroup.com ) where she is developing CSR (corporate social responsibility) activities for both the agency and its clients, as well as researching volunteering in the UK with a view to seeing how it can be made more accessible and flexible.

Prior to this Abby spent four years working to set up Big Brothers & Sisters in the UK (www.mentors.org.uk ). The approach Big Brothers & Sisters took to using volunteers as pro bono advisers was recognised as imaginative and key to enabling the charity to develop quickly, as volunteer experts were drafted in to carry out specific projects. She also developed and delivered leadership training for a number of organisations and has acted as mentor to a number of senior executives.

She was born in Malawi, educated at Oxford University , and is now living in London.

Linda L. Graff has been in the business of not-for-profit management since 1980. She has delivered workshops and keynote addresses to tens of thousands of participants over the last twenty years throughout North America and now into Europe and Asia . She is an engaging keynote presenter who is considered one of Canada 's foremost authorities on volunteerism. Linda has produced ten books and audio resources, and countless manuals and articles in the field of volunteer program management. Her specialty is risk management and three of her books are international best-sellers: By Definition , Beyond Police Checks , and Better Safe ... Risk Management for Volunteer Programs & Community Service.

Linda currently focuses her keynote and workshop presentations on new trends and advanced topics in volunteerism, and in particular, on the "tough" areas of policy development, risk management, screening, and discipline and dismissal.

Linda received undergraduate and graduate degrees from McMaster University . In 1989, after nearly ten years as the Director of the Volunteer Centre in Hamilton, Ontario, Canada, Linda established her management consulting firm, LINDA GRAFF AND ASSOCIATES, INC., located in Dundas, Ontario. Along with her associates, she works exclusively with charitable agencies and not-for-profit organizations. For more about Linda and Linda Graff and Associates Inc., visit www.lindagraff.ca.

Susan Moscareillo is Director of Volunteer Services and Community Relations of the Baltimore Ronald McDonald House. She has a B.A. in Mass Communications from Towson University in Baltimore, a Certificate in Volunteer Management from Washington State University, and a Certificate in Nonprofit Management from the University of Wisconsin . She is the author of numerous articles for Volunteer Management Review (Charity Channel) and now writes for her own website: www.managingvolunteers.com .

Ioana Muresan is currently managing the National Volunteer Center in Romania , a position which she has held for the past four years. The national center grew out of the local volunteer center she started in her home community of Cluj Napoca, the capital city of Transylvania . The National Volunteer Center works "to develop volunteerism as a valuable and irreplaceable resource in solving the problems faced by today's Romanian society, by supporting (financially and otherwise) the existing and emerging volunteer centers, publishing various resources meant to promote and develop volunteerism (website, magazine, manuals and so on), train and consult on volunteer related issues and volunteer management" - and lots more! Though it's in Romanian, you can get a feel for the Center's work from their Web site at www.voluntariat.ro .

Together with her colleague and husband, Ioana co-authored two of the first-ever publications on volunteerism in the country: A Guide for Setting Up a Volunteer Center in Romania and a Guide for Getting Involved in Environment Volunteering .

Adaire Palmer is a Volunteer Management Consultant with Australian Emergency Services, where her main focus is setting up effective volunteer management systems and encouraging good volunteer management practices with some 500 volunteer brigades and units across South Australia . Another focus is on how to deal with the tension between the bureaucracy and the volunteers who essentially come from a 'grass roots', community based approach and just want to get on with the job, plus all the associated issues.

Prior to emergency services, she worked with Australian Red Cross-SA, setting up and managing a regional centre with community services. Her other work experiences include working with volunteer programs in church-based organizations, community centres and hospitals. Most programs have been developmental or pilot programs.

Keyboard Roundtable

October-December 2003 Issue