Results from our Volunteer Reward and Recognition Survey

Our volunteers give up a lot to serve their communities and that's why at Fire and Emergency we have a range of ways we recognise, respect and promote our volunteers.

To make sure we are hitting the mark with our recognition activities we ran a Volunteer Reward and Recognition Survey in July. If you took part in the survey, thank you for taking the time to share your thoughts and feedback.

The results of our Volunteer Reward and Recognition Survey are below.

To summarise the key findings:

• Fire and Emergency has strong foundations on which to build an effective Volunteer Recognition Approach
• Fire and Emergency’s approach to recognition has some good features but needs to be more clearly defined
• Many of the current activities represent good practice, however, they could be better targeted to volunteer motives and preferences.

One of the things our volunteers told us in the survey was that our International Volunteer Day gift was not meaningful to them, of limited quality and not the best use of money. So, in response to this, we will be replacing the International Volunteer Day gift with initiatives that better meet the needs and preferences of our people. We’re still working through our options, and we are committed to the development of a reward and recognition implementation plan by the end of this financial year.

Based on our volunteer’s feedback, we are maintaining many other ways to recognise the contribution of our volunteers, such as our family/whānau allowance and an annual $300 reimbursement for out-of-pocket expenses.

We are committed to the development of our reward and recognition so we can ensure we are recognising and thanking our volunteers for their ongoing dedication to their communities.

If our current programme doesn’t fit volunteers needs, we’ll improve it. Auahatanga – we strive to improve.