The Olympics' Greatest Feat: An Unpaid, Highly Engaged Workforce | Hacker News Reader

The Olympics' Greatest Feat: An Unpaid, Highly Engaged Workforce

blogs.hbr.org

51 points1337biz28 comments

This is a strange article. It seems a bit gloaty to champion the myriad volunteers working at a for-profit event, but this story isn't about the volunteers. It's about how the organization benefits from them, as a "lesson to business." Well no kidding they benefit!

The R&D scientist, the shop-keeper and their "honest advice," the bartender who knows your name, and other examples of simply giving a crap, are used in service of "engagement," and "alternative customer experience[s]." There is not one iota of critique for how companies breed enthusiasm out of the people they pay, much less those who are volunteering, and least of all how crappy companies are made, but that's obviously not what they were trying to do...but what is the point of this story? Even people given to slavery without smiles aren't going to get anything out of this article.

Coming from the HBR, an site notable in irony for running this story at the same time the top-selling item in their store is a 7-page case study entitled, "PCL: A Breakdown in the Enforcement of Management Control." Maybe PCL just needed more happy volunteers? One thing is for sure: when half of your workforce is unpaid, it's not hard to make your numbers.

I thought it was going to be about the athletes.

They get paid. (Some do, at least)

I thought the more notable take-away was how much unpaid volunteers went above-and-beyond, and how nice it is when one experiences that kind of authenticity from paid workers - they specifically mention that it seems to have "rubbed off" on other people, and that it'd be nice to see more of that.

I can definitely say that at Zipcar, it's quite easy to find people that exhibit that same property, people that are genuinely enthusiastic about doing their job, helping you, and really want you to have a nice day. I think it's an important thing to seek out for any customer service oriented business.

Sure, but from a customer service standpoint the article would be too abstract, and from a worker standpoint it's apples and oranges to compare Olympic volunteers with Zipcar employees, who are getting paid. Is the point that it's good to have half of your workforce be unpaid? Is it perhaps that not paying people is the key to good customer service? I really can't tell. I've been thinking about this for a day now and the only concrete positive I can pull out of it is to "have a good product," with the implication that, well, if you have a business that can't thrive with a 50% unpaid workforce, your product must be bad. I may have too much imagination.

I will admit to having been pretty cynical about the London Olympics before they started. However, since it started I've enjoyed every minute on it, to the extent that (as a Brit in the US) I decided to get a last minute flight to come back this week to enjoy the atmosphere and see the closing ceremony.

In more relevance to the article: I'm pleased that there are enough British people out there willing to shed the stereotype of being negative about everything, because I was guilty of it. I'd actually love to do it if I had the time (I wonder what proportion are retirees? I've seen a few). Although working as a developer is clearly superior in almost every way to the grocery store job I had at the age of sixteen, I do still miss the personal interaction you get when you're meeting new people every day.

Also being around London right now you can see that retirees are not a vast majority of the volunteers you meet throughout London that help visitors getting around! Having also worked at the olympics in 2006 I know there was a lot of students on holidays with me and also a lot of people with a day job that decided to take 2 weeks off of work to be part of this event.

As another (still living here) Brit, I was reasonably cynical too. I had tickets for two events, and was expecting the type of fiasco you get when attending Glastonbury or other large events - massive queues, disorganisation, bad facilities etc.

I have to say I was wrong on every count. Every detail was thought of, the facilities were excellent and, as the article says, the "Games Makers" really were outstanding. Helpful, friendly, and enthusiastic. The soldiers filling in as security were equally so.

The project management of these games has been excellent. The only real let-down was the whole ticket buying experience.

The media is so incredibly negative just before every Olympics that I can remember, with almost exactly the same stories. Transport will not be able to handle it, airports will collapse, the facilities will not be ready in time, not enough people. For Sydney, Athens, Beijing and London, the media in the UK and Australia all did the same repeated boring stories.

It is no wonder that you and most people felt bad about it.

The media is so incredibly negative just before every Olympics that I can remember, with almost exactly the same stories.

That's because it's an editorial strategy to lead up with negativity before spending two weeks delighting their readers/viewer by describing how awesome it all is. You spotted it yourself: they don't even bother changing the stories.

You may as well enjoy it as you're paying for it. Host cities generally carry event related debt for a considerable time.

Well, I'm not, because I live in the US. But you're right, plenty are.

Maybe it’s the "I am doing this for free so I can be myself"

All personal option below, Friday afternoon ramble Example when starting a new job, most people purposely hold back expressing themselves, they just want to fit in and keep people happy. There is a fear of over stepping boundaries, saying something that someone might take offensive all contribute to this “shut up and do your job”. The issue is that it’s hard to get a job, and people don’t want to rock the boat so heads down and work because the job is tied to their ability to live.

The People at the games have nothing to lose, no expectations, they are free to enjoy and present themselves as they wish. Someone in a job at a desk in a call centre for a bank does not get that freedom and never will. The bank needs that person answering phones as quickly as possible to make their wall board stats look good so their managers can get bonuses.

This whole article was interesting from the point of a small company and how a smaller company could empower its staff to enjoy their roles more and in turn the new hire staff they bring in would follow the same patterns. For main street corporates this is the last thing they want, cutting away efficiency for what? Staff that enjoy their jobs, ha-ha don’t be foolish drones are easier to control, also the people attracted to upper management jobs are generally in it for the money more than the “lets make a warm and happy team and all live happily ever after”

The guy writing this bit was getting excited over the idea of an energized work force for free, everyone likes the personal touch however in customer service roles they are given scripts and told what to say and how they should say it and told that if they step out of line or say something that is wrong they could lose their incoming and in turn the ability to live their life (who has savings anymore?) until they get another hard to find job.

If you do something for free you can do what you like, worse case you get sent home, in a job you can lose your job over expressing an option or spending too much time trying to help a single customer and in turn you lose your incoming (ability to live). No wonder people are more held back and reserved in their paying jobs than when they offer to do something for free.

/ramble

I love it: these unpaid, enthusiastic volunteers are providing real, honest customer service -- as opposed to the theater of customer service one normally gets from the paid "customer support" staff of large organizations.

The article points at professionals in R&D organizations, etc. having such a positive attitude. This misses the point completely. If management pushes workers to the brink, they will be cranky and unhelpful. They just don't have time to do any better. Some professions are harder to push. R&D being an example but this is changing.

In the world of software, daily scrum meetings come to mind. For me, coding is something I love to do. But if you give me impossible deadlines and manage me to death, I will hate it. When I hate it, I don't willingly work nights and weekends (I do that for love .. not for money). This creates a vicious cycle.

"as opposed to the theater of customer service one normally gets from the paid "customer support" staff of large organizations."

Keep in mind also that the olympics is a short term thing and a job is a long term thing. It's easier to remain enthusiastic over the short term and for something that you choose because you wanted to do it. As opposed to something you have to do.

So the group of volunteers is both self selecting and additionally short term.

This reminds me of Dan Pink's talk on the science of motivation [0]. Ask a bunch of people to do something for little to no reward, and they find the task much more pleasurable than those who are highly rewarded for the same task.

Likely there's a good dose of cognitive dissonance thrown in: people who are highly rewarded justify doing the routine task for the money; those without pay have no extrinsic motivation so their brain fools itself and finds intrinsic reasons to enjoy the task.

In the case of the Festivus of Athletes™ (not 2011, not 2013, but somewhere in between) the volunteers get to have an insider's experience they otherwise wouldn't have, it's short duration so they don't burn out and get bored, and they experience camaraderie with the other volunteers.

[0] http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u6XAPnuFjJc

Well they aren't paid with money, but there is value in being a part of something like the Olympics. Getting up close to the athletes, seeing the action from the floor, even being on TV in the background of something being watched by millions is exciting for many people. This is something people would probably gladly pay for, so getting to do it for free is a method of payment.

It's not just Olympics that capitalize on volunteers. Any industry that is viewed as glorious/glamorous with a potential of high payoff (not just monetary, but also in terms of fame and reputation) exploits volunteers and low-paid workers to death.

Acting ("When someone in LA tells me 'I am an aspiring actor', I ask 'Which restaurant?'"), fashion, arts, music, charity, design and architecture to some extent. Take for example http://workinculture.ca/ You would never see that many volunteer and unpaid internship positions in IT or engineering.

That's a good point, re: internships and spec work.

The volunteers were great, but not perfect. They needed to be more selective about which roles the volunteers were capable of handling. This story comes to mind: http://1045theteam.com/american-tv-neglected-the-saddest-sto...

The timekeeper should not have been a 15 year old kid.

I would like to say that age is not indicative of capabilities. That could have just as likely happened to a 25 year old or 65 year old.

I disagree. I think there are more capable 15 year-olds than others and it's not a comprehensive indicator, but brain development is not complete at that age and therefore having an adequate attention span to competently time keep is arguably more difficult to secure from a 15 year old than a 25 year old.

The timekeeper should not have been a human at all.

As someone who volunteered at the 2010 Winter Olympics in Vancouver, I can confidently say that the two weeks of the Games was the most exciting time of my life.

The culture of being a volunteer was incredible, and it almost felt like you were part of a cult (in a good way!). I think that biggest reason for the authenticity and commitment of the volunteers was the ongoing emphasis that the actions of any single volunteer could be the difference in ensuring that an athlete, spectator, media person, or official would have a great experience in Vancouver. The organizers made it clear that they were entrusting the volunteers in that responsibility to represent our city and country to the world.

I'm a London olympics volunteer. I took some time off work. (I contract so its not hard to do). Its fun and makes a change to normality.

I think that what you really get out of it [apart from access to some of the events] is a change of scenery and a break from the routine by doing something 'different'.

Plus we get special pink oyster cards (london transport) .

And a ton of free Adidas kit, at least according to the Games Maker I know.

Salient fact: most of these volunteers are working for a very short, albeit intense, amount of time.

Other than "an engaged workforce is good," (duh!) it is difficult to draw any key lessons for my organization when we're seeking (like most of you here) retention, investment, and engagement over a span of years.

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