Project Execution

The Founder and President of Kritagyata Trust Aruna Diwakar explains the background of their professional volunteering need: “In many instances we have to send out emails to different stakeholders - our volunteers, donors, acquaintances. It is not possible for me to write all the correspondence, but at the same time the staff is not able to write all these ad hoc emails from scratch. I thought, if there is a particular email template - for CSR funding, thank you email, request email, etc. it would ease our work. So anyone can use the template and send it out and there is no delay in reply. This would help everyone in the long run.”

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With interest in education and training and spare time to use, Gauravi decided that this 3-month-long volunteering project is the right one to utilize her communication and content writing skills. “I knew my personal commitments and deadlines and didn’t want to go clueless to an unfamiliar field, “ she confesses. Learning from his previous ProEngage experience, Sunil decided to apply for a project that seemed very straightforward and better suited his time availability and skills. 

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Sunil continues to describe the kick-off of the project: “Right from the very first interaction, it was clear that the NGO was very interested in the project.” After the NGO provided a brief about their organization and explained their struggles in detail, a WhatsApp group between all the project members helped to keep the communication flowing. “Although we had an idea what we needed, the volunteers helped us to come up with more templates,” explains the NGO’s Founder.

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After clarifying the deliverables, Gauravi and Sunil divided the work based on the audience the mailers were dedicated to. Once a template draft was ready, the NGO provided their inputs and specifications so the volunteers could make further adjustments. Gauravi further explains the details: “Every weekend we had a quick call, we divided the work and communicated back to the NGO once it was ready. We made sure that the template should be that good - that the NGO staff or volunteers can use it directly and send it without any extra work. It was good that we invested that much time, so there is less rework for the NGO later on.”

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After a few weeks, Sunil and Gauravi easily prepared 7 ready-to-use templates according to the NGO’s needs. “It might seem a small thing, but it is actually very helpful. Now, we can show a little more professionalism in terms of seeking funds, thank you donors, etc. It makes a big impact for our volunteers and employees who weren’t able to respond quickly and appropriately before,” mentions Aruna.

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Challenges faced

“There weren’t any challenges as such,” recollects Sunil. “The NGO assigned two people to be constantly in touch with us. Even if one person couldn’t attend the meeting, they made sure the other one was there.” Gauravi adds: “There was a slight delay in the first meeting as the NGO didn’t have our personal IDs. But after Chezuba sorted it out for us it was a smooth ride.” 

Both volunteers agreed that because the NGO had a clear vision on what they want to achieve and behaved very professionally during the whole project, it was a great experience for both of them.

Gauravi further mentions: “I thought it would be a very dynamic process, I had an experience with that kind of projects before and there were a lot of changes. Sometimes it does happen that the NGO can't predict what they want. But I was pleasantly surprised. They knew what they wanted, they were very clear in communication, and provided feedback that helped me to keep my motivation.”