How to get more volunteers on night shifts

Great thread Radiant, can't wait to hear ideas from the community.

Burning Man ranks shifts later in the week and at night, the less desirable shifts, with more points for Rangers. For Gate, it's a requirement to do at least one grave. That's in exchange for either guaranteed half price ticket or a free ticket, dependent on how many shifts you do. Rangers works on a point system, not an hour. Gate works on a number of shifts system, including having to have at least one shift from midnight to 6am.

AfrikaBurn has a very similar policy. For Rangers, in order to get a free ticket + all your meals for the week, you get you shifts allocated to you (and pretty much everyone gets a grave shift or two).

Both BM and AfrikaBurn also give bonus swag to those who work graves. Grave patches, which are normally organised by someone in the community. Those do encourage people to do a grave shift or two.

Most people do also want to party, so you don't get a lot of humans giving up their party nights, so unless they do get something in return, you aren't going to persuade many to work.

points system is a really good idea, didnt know this was used for other burns :thumbsup:

yeah I like the points system, and it doesn't have to relate to monetary rewards, it could be other perks - swag, free meals, etc. I like the idea of a really badass looking patch for grave shifts - people will do the less popular shifts if they get some cool style and bragging rights out of it.

at the BMorg we use credit system for free tickets similar to the rangers one described above. i forget the numbers exactly but something like 15 credits= half price ticket, 30 credits= free ticket. so some shifts are worth maybe 4 or 5 credits, but a saturday night shift during the burn would be 8 or 10 credits. Does that make sense?

For zendo project we have requirements of one grave yard and one daytime shift. you can't have one without the other unless you have a disability or some other outstanding reason in which case we deal on a case by case. but for zendo, as well, you get lots and lots of perks for being there- sometimes free tickets, but not the burn of course, instead at the burn its great camping with the dr bronners crew, private potties, meal tickets, free drinks, coffee and tea, a shower coupon- all things that make the burn highly liveable.

incentives incentives incentives people

Has changing the shift times been discussed in the past? If no, could this be an option? For example, 10pm-2am, 2am-6am, 6am-10am etc.
I struggle to stay awake late, which currently rules out all shifts from 12am-8am. I'd just about be able to manage a 10pm-2am though. I'm also an early riser and could do 6am-10am shifts happily (imagine other early birds could help pick up the slack with this change too).
This would just leave one real graveyard shift to try and fill, the 2am-6am. I do realise this might become more difficult due to the late start time though.
(I've never volunteered with Welfare and realise the shift patterns may be different for them- I'm coming from a gate and ranger perspective.)
Thoughts?

I think starting at 2am is more manageable than 4am which is very awkward as you're stuck with either powering through to a super-late time or trying to get an early night and then getting up obscenely early! Plus starting a shift when the body is naturally at its lowest ebb seems a bit counterintuitive.

Tl;Dr I agree.

Does mean no Desanka immediately after the graveyard shift though!

I wonder if it's worth trying the Welfare system of signing up volunteers for rangers? Rather than post a sign up sheet for people to fill in, use a form for people to apply. They can state when they're definitely not available but otherwise the volunteer lead decides who works each shift.

It does mean a lot more work for the volunteer lead though and it may increase the risk of no shows if people end up with shifts they're really not happy with.

May I suggest giving volunteers a piece of card or paper with their commitment title, time and location clearly marked. Another idea would be to write in on their hands or forehead. I got confused about my first shift I have to admit. I thought I was starting on Friday but in fact I was finishing my shift on Friday at 2am but I was confused by the entry line on the form. A better designed form would help with lines on it or arrows or a unicorn blood trail.

Also, maybe the comms before the event could address the hang ups about night volunteering at the weekend head on, in a friendly, inviting, non-hectoring way, using reasoning along the lines of:

"There's a party somewhere at Nest every night so no need for FOMO"

Or

"Rangering at night allows you to experience the event from a different perspective while still having fun."