Viva La Gong - Workplace Evaluation

While initially, through the induction process and the lack of communication between us and the cultural staff, I was worried about participating as a volunteer for the Viva La Gong festival. Though having completed the three days of work leading up to and during the festival, I feel as though it has been a mostly positive and greatly beneficial experience for me.

Everything I did over that time period was either something new or something that complemented my skillset.

I met some really amazing people who helped volunteer for the festival. Working with them fortified my team based working and managerial skills, understanding their strengths and weaknesses was vital – I had to make sure some of the smaller framed people weren’t trying to lift heavy things and that the all people could follow and understand precise instructions.

Having to work simultaneously under differing managers with differing objectives taught me the value of prioritising on the fly.

Being able to have extensive use of the radio transmitter was a great learning experience for me, having never used one in a formal context before. Learning the channels and protocols made me feel important and part of the crew. Issuing top-down orders to all the other volunteers was fun too.

Dealing with all the angry stall owners during the beginning of the festival was unpleasant, but it allowed me to see what sort of my conflict resolution strategies actually work – even if some of them were just making up fake answers or trying to calm them down as we waited for a response from the relevant people. Reaffirming my breaking point due to stress was also a handy thing to be reminded of.

Working in the greenroom with the artists was probably the most beneficial experience out of the whole festival for me. Meeting and interacting with everyone on a professional front and informally really did wonders for my confidence and interpersonal skills. Just listening and learning about what they all did was really interesting as well.

Everyone who volunteered, not just me, did an amazing job. It is no exaggeration to say that the festival wouldn’t have been possible without us there to volunteer, in fact the staff felt the need to remind us of that constantly. I’ve gained some contacts on the Wollongong council that could used to network if needed, and I’m sure this sort of involvement would look good on the resume.

I feel as though I made the best use of my time at the festival, being immersed in a variety of roles. I had the chance to learn so many new things. It was a long and hard day, but something I thoroughly enjoyed being a part of.

Viva la Workforce

While the council was responsible for the production and disassembly (that is stricty reffering to the drop off and collection of material) of the Viva festival, us volunteers had to handle most of the grunt work. So it should come as no surprise that we made up a majority of the workforce. There was around 12 formal volunteers (people like me who were given a formal induction) and numerous children of council staff helping out.

Everyone was off doing different things all the time and we really saw each other whilst having a break in the tea room. The roles most volunteers were given weren't set in stone, and it turns out there was quite a lot of role swaping throughout the day, so that some volunteers could try their hand in most positions. Roaming stilt walkers, surveys and helping around the community stalls were some of these positions.
Positions like the car marshalls, greenroom and some stage assistants were unable to change around because of the training required.

Naturally everyone helped out where needed, and calls over the radio ushering all of free volunteers were very common.
Everyone helped dissamble the festival when it ended. The work involved there was much more strenious than the morning bump in, but it was a more relaxed atmosphere.

Most of the Viva

For most of the actual festival time (when I wasn't out collecting information via surveys) I was either managing the Greenroom or delivering various accouncements to the different stages and artists. Again, my trusty radio was an invaluable asset during this time as I could keep track of and update timetables where need be.

Managing as a part of the greenroom staff was definitely both the most relaxed, and yet one of the most serious roles a volunteer was given. While a good chunk of it was just meeting, greeting and checking the identification of the various performers and artists, keeping track of what time and where the artists were meant to be performing whilst being given constant and conflicting updates was a challenge.

The times when the artists were actually performing was when I was free to travel around helping out at other places in the festival. I spent a fair chunk of that time forcing people at the festival to fill out our extremely shallow survey, and occasionally I was made to do some odd jobs for some of the Viva staff.

Viva la early morning

Following on from the two day promotional campaign, my first self appointed role was as a part of the bump in crew. While initially it was just consisted of straight physical labour we started to specialise after most of the chairs, tables and other little tidbits were set up.
I was able to work directly with Morag Tracey and Karen, and was given a radio system and a breifing of the protocols, procedure of communication and physical channels they had it place.

From this point onward I was able to work with security to help set up and secure barricades, and had assumed an observational and mangerial role over some of my fellow volunteers.

It was when the stall workers started arriving that all of my conflict resolution experience really came into play. Either the council stall ordering system was at fault, or some the stall owners thought we wouldn't notice and they pretened to have ordered stalls they didn't pay for ... things were manic.

It goes to show that people are always a radical element, but the council was prepared and had procedures in place. We only ran into problems when trying to find all the materials for the amount of extra stalls.

Viva Roles - Promotion

My roles leading up to and during the Viva la gong festival were extremely varied. Over the course of three days (during, and two days prior to the event) I was given 4 official roles and one small minor role, but was expected to fill in and help out wherever and whenever needed during the day.

My official roles were: Promotional distribution, Greenroom management, Bump in/out crew and Assisting stage manager.

Promotional distribution was handled at the community booth with Karen the Volunteer co-ordinator, in the Crown street mall. My Job as a volunteer was to help set up the booth (pinning the flyers, postcards and programs around the notice board and desk). After convincing all the smaller shops to let us leave the material in or near their shops, we worked in format to cover the busiest parts of the outside mall in a mostly vain attempt to convince the general population that they should be attending the festival. Interpersonal skills as well as an iron will were esstential aptitudes during this two day marketing phase. Getting and holding the attention of uninterested people was quite a difficult task, and it almost felt like we were trying to sell them the idea of going to the festival.

About Viva

Viva was presented by Wollongong City Council, and is Wollongong's annual one-day community arts festival that encourages creative spirit and cultural diversity.

Though Viva La Gong was technically run by the Wollongong city council, it certainly didn’t feel that way having worked on- site. The festival was spearheaded largely by the efforts of three people: Morag, the site production manager, Megan McKell, the festival director and Karen Pearson, the volunteer co-ordinator. Whenever the volunteers needed help, these were the to-go girls.

Morag dealt with the bump in crew, general OH&S, Carpark marshalling and general security issues. Megan was working with us volunteers and trying to make sure everything was ...well working according to schedule, she hovered mostly between the pavilion hall and the information booth. As all the artists arrived she would direct them toward the greenroom and to their appropriate stage managers.

A festival is people/content driven, so deriving the characteristics of the Wollongong City council through such an event leaves much open to interpretation. The council worked in conjunction with the local services (St john's - First aid support, Youth services and Go hire - stall and stage supplies were the most prominent) provided their own services (such as the council park, provided toilets, bins etc) and adhered to the basic OH&S practices in order to make this event a success.

Work Placement Induction

Honestly, the process to enrol as a volunteer for Viva La Gong was quite difficult and I had to jump through many obstacles to do so. In spite of this, I was surprised at seeing how many people had offered to donate their time to this event. In total around 14 volunteers showed up for the induction meeting I attended.

The actual protocol for volunteering was in fact quite simple...in theory. I contacted the cultural services department of the Viva festival to let them know of my intent to help out, and the lady was going to pass on that information and my email to the relevant person in charge. However, a week later, and after many mix-ups, I was finally sent the forms to fill out, scan and send back. The usual fair: indentifying documents, release forms, criminal checks, preferences for roles and so forth.

After enduring yet another crippling delay, I was finally informed about the induction meeting the day before. During the induction we were given formal letters that made us temporary volunteers on behalf of the council and a general briefing about the festival, and the roles we could assume. However, things weren’t finalised until we attended the second meeting - which covered the OH&S policies (which were very standard and given orally - eg, if someone has injured themselves, contact first-aid and have them fill out a report) and given the staff merchandise. This second meeting is also where we formally chose our roles for the festival.