Volunteerism… Is not dead, but it is frequently misused.
We have a very exciting and busy fall ahead!
Every day, I wear several hats—Mama (my ultimate reason for everything I do), Gems Cup 2026, THRIVE (launching publicly this November in honour of Domestic Abuse Awareness Month!), our Jewelry Drive (GEMS Jewelry Drive), and Hope’s Cradle (GEMS: Hope’s Cradle). These initiatives are on my daily docket! The Scholarship Program, the Gems Cup 2026, and our Ambassador Program are also on my radar, but at this time of year, THRIVE and the Jewelry Drive create a heavy workload—more on those in the coming blog posts!
One important lesson I learned in the early years of GEMS is to have grace with myself and others. You can’t do everything at 100% all the time—but if you give specific things your full effort at the right time, they will succeed. Especially when working with a team of volunteers (our ambassadors) your mission needs to be clear and the tasks need to be just as clear. It is hard to be the quarter back with that if there are too many elements heavily at play at one time. Prioritizing is absolutely essential.
All programs under our GEMS banner are heavily supported by our ambassador team. GEMS has always been very welcoming to those in our community who would like to support us from the inside and have a very meaningful/ transparent role in our organization. For example, THRIVE has a team of ambassadors who host, promote it as we are leading up to the event and help me set up the location, food, drinks, speakers etc. Each THRIVE event has about 3 months of prep work put into it. For THRIVE, we will have a team of about 10 ambassadors per event. The Gems Cup is no different except for the fact that the team works all year on it due to the scale of the event. There's a dedicated team of about 15 GEMS ambassadors who have built the Gems Cup with me over the past two years. Does it have to take a full year? Technically, no. Should it? Yes—and here’s why:
Most people think in terms of how much time an event will take to execute. But when you're working with an entirely volunteer-based team (thank goodness for them—they have full-time jobs, families, hobbies, and yet still make time for GEMS), I want their experience with GEMS to be as painless and stress-free as possible. That doesn’t always work, but I do my best to build in buffers that help ensure the experience remains fun and rewarding. When time crunches do happen, we’re better equipped to handle them both from a time perspective and from a team rapport perspective.
Charities often get so focused on the need at hand that they fall into two main pitfalls in relation to their volunteers:
Giving only menial tasks for the volunteers to do which does not create a sense of purpose or connection to the cause.
Not being appreciative enough for the donated time.
The problem is that they get volunteers to fill in spots which lead to their paid employees being more productive, i.e. a case worker may have paper work to fill out that is not confidential and with a volunteers help, they can move on to the next client faster. This also leads to volunteers being treated like paid employees which often leads to less appreciation being shown/vocalized. On one hand this makes a level of sense since it maximizes the paid employees productivity. The problem is that it does not create a strong connection between your volunteers and your organization which then leads to volunteer turn over. GEMS receives applications from these volunteers all the time and this very thing is mentioned frequently.
So many people say volunteerism is dead and that you can’t rely on volunteers because people don’t show commitment and loyalty the same way they use to. Volunteerism is not dead, but it is frequently misused.
Here’s my advice: When people are giving to you—contributing to your dreams and goals purely out of the goodness of their hearts—you should meet them where they are and, go as far as you can to give back to them too. Whether it’s through warmth, kindness, time, or just being present, it’s so important to never lose sight of what they’re sacrificing for the cause. Of course this can be applied to personal relationships as well.
This post was originally going to be about some of the events we have coming up and what they look like from behind the scenes… but it quickly became about our team. As we say in Nova Scotia— ‘proper thing’. They are the heartbeat of GEMS. I could not do any of what I do without our board and incredible team of ambassadors. From day one, GEMS has been a community-led effort, and every level of success and impact we’ve achieved has been thanks to that community. In the 10 years GEMS has existed we have only lost a handful of volunteers. Due to this retention, I have been able to build, scale and operate programs hand in hand with our team because they provide stability through their love and connection to GEMS. I couldn’t be more grateful.
W. Somerset Maugham once warned against choosing personality over character in friendships. I have been, perhaps, the most fortunate woman in the world to have had the mission of GEMS attract people with both phenomenal personalities and character. Even more fortunate to call so many of them my friends.
This doesn’t mean we haven’t had the odd ‘bad egg’, but they show their true colors before long. The trick is to believe them, the first time they show you and act accordingly. Bad energy is a cancer that must be handled quickly to maintain and protect the experience for all volunteers. One ‘bad egg’ can bring the whole team down. Be willing to ask someone to leave if they are not a good fit.
I’ll leave you with this quote:
“. . . success is a combination of many things, but a good character is the foundation of the kind of success that will bring you real happiness. Choose your friends wisely—they will make or break you.”
— J. Willard Marriott
Sincerely and with love,
Jordan