Enhancing Free Geek Workplace Environment



Executive Summary

This paper talks about a popular North American nonprofit organization called Free Geek whose aim is to provide refurbished and repaired computers to the public, free or at a minimal cost. This organization functions mainly through its reliance upon its large network of volunteers, belonging from different backgrounds without having to have any form of technical skills, as the organization provides free skills training to its employees. This paper further discusses about the workplace environment of Free Geek and the problems faced by its paid staff and the volunteers. After the identification of these problems, possible recommendations are proposed to the organization, to effectively improve its workplace environment from different aspects.

Table of Contents

I.Introduction1

II.Free Geek Employees3

Paid Staff4

Volunteers5

III.Operations7

Services7

Organization of Free Geek7

Work layout8

Productivity Roll8

IV.Conclusion9

V.Recommendations9

VI.References10

VII. Appendices11

Enhancing Free Geek Workplace Environment

Introduction

Ingram (2009) states about nonprofit organizations working across the globe to deliver philanthropic services to those individuals who require them the most. Although, they are similar in their nature to the for-profit or commercial organizations in many ways, but their main differential point is that their income is entitled to tax exemption mandated by the government, while for-profit organizations profits or income is always taxed. Importantly, these nonprofit organizations only employ a certain number of employees but mainly rely on the functioning of their organization through an efficient network of volunteers. Thus, the significance of a nonprofit organization cannot also be denied because their main core of existence is to serve the humanity and the environment. These nonprofit organizations rely on large pools of volunteers mainly to accomplish daily tasks and organizing chores and work, to engage in serving of their community effectively (www.thecommon.org/).

Murphy (2011) defines volunteers as individuals who willingly offer their services to an organization in agreement of not taking any pay in return. In America alone, there are over sixty three million volunteers. Many organizations, schools, groups and health institutions, on their own cannot accomplish what they plan to do and require additional labor. In addition, such volunteers are highly educated with diverse set of skills. Furthermore, many successful nonprofit organizations such as Bullington Center, hired over eighty volunteers who successfully completed over three thousand hours of work. Their work included organizing and holding workshops for the organization, arranging the organizations work stations and work plan as well as creating and launching of the center's website. These volunteers are inducted to work in many areas of the center, such as fund raising, caring for the garden; lawn mowing and much more based on their interest and desire to acquire new skills. These volunteers work at the center in different shift timings on alternate days. Thus, this ensures volunteer presence at the center premises in all days of the week (www.bullingtoncenter.org).

Specific to our research, Free Geek too is a popular nonprofit organization founded in 2000 and located throughout Canada and America, fulfilling the purpose of reducing environmental and economic affect of technological waste through refurbishing and recycling of the donated electronic ...