Update: Imprint president e-mailed out that night that the board had rejected the changes to the honoraria policy.
The official student newspaper at Waterloo, Imprint, is holding its annual general meeting Monday and is proposing a policy of paying editorial staff large sums of money for “volunteering.”
The honoraria would range from $2,500 per term for the assistant editor and $2,000 for section editors to 500 for positions like photo editor, $250 for their assistants. The policy proposal also suggests $20 per >300 word contributions by senior staff and $10 for junior staff contributions.
I estimate the total cost per year would be about $56,000. I can’t be certain because at least one position isn’t listed and may have been left out in error.
Changing the policy is a worthwhile; the current version of the policy set no levels and left it up to the board of directors of Imprint Publications, Waterloo. Under that version, the board could have set honoraria at high levels with no restriction from the policy. The amounts proposed, however, are far too high.
This proposal should not be ratified because it could undermine the Imprint volunteer experience and the quality of the newspaper content. Its emphasis on external rewards can diminish intrinsic motivation and threaten the organization’s dual mission of publication and learning.
Readers and members of Imprint — Waterloo students — should want a publication that meets a high standard of quality. Offering large sums of money can overshadow the purpose of creating good content lead staff to do just enough to get the money.
Staff themselves should want to learn and gain from their experience. They should want to gain knowledge and skills that will help them make the newspaper better and help achieve their professional ambitions. Payments that come close to a wage can distract from their development.
Studies in social psychology and economics have found that paying volunteers can actually reduce the amount and quality of work they do.
There is a fairly standard pattern regarding the volunteers reaction e.g. to more labor market work hours. But we obtain the puzzling result that, when rewarded, volunteers work less. These findings are in line with a large literature in social psychology emphasizing that external rewards can undermine the intrinsic motivation for an activity.
— Does Pay Motivate Volunteers? Institute for Empirical Research in Economics
The proposed changes are also poorly written and don’t offer meaningful justification or explanation for the changes.
The writer refers to staff being paid “what they are worth,” lest value of work be “undermined,” creating a “competitive environment” for positions, and to “deter burnout.” Makes it sound like the proposer is bitter and has a bone to pick rather than wanting to improve current practice.
Volunteer work by its nature is worth more than what is paid for it — usually nothing. People choose activities despite lack of monetary reward because they are worthwhile — they improve themselves or their community. Sometimes volunteers work harder merely for the thanks or feeling appreciated. The reward of working on Imprint is producing a good newspaper and getting good at reporting, design, or perhaps even writing policy. This attempt addresses none of those things.
This proposal may also be attractive to Imprint staff because they are likely to benefit from the change compared to the non-staff student majority who may be more concerned about the costs they pay with their Imprint fees or proper operation of the organization.
Those student members may not have been properly informed of this proposed change. Imprint’s own bylaws require notice of business at a general meeting to be published in the newspaper at least 14 days prior to the meeting.
7.14 Notice of Meetings
Notice of the time, place and date of meetings of members and the general nature of the business ot be transacted shall be given at least fourteen (14) days before the ate of the general meeting to the members of the meeting by publication in the student newspaper published by the Corporation and circulated on the University of Waterloo campus and such notice shall be posted in the Corporation Head office. Notice of any meeting where special business will be transacted shall contain sufficient information to permit members to form a reasoned judgment on the decision to be taken.
— Imprint Bylaw No. 6
Which would mean notice would have had to be in the Friday 5 February issue and posted around campus by Monday 7 February.
I don’t think proper notice was given for these changes. While the bylaw does have a clause to weasel out of notice, using it usually means something is being done wrong.
14.02 Omissions and Errors
The accidental omissions to give notice of any meeting or any adjourned meeting of the Board or members of the non-receipt of any notice by any director or member or by the auditor of the Corporation or any error in any notice not affecting its substance does not invalidate any resolution passed or any proceedings taken at the meeting.
— Imprint Bylaw No. 6
This proposal to pay Imprint volunteers what amounts to a wage should not be ratified. It would hurt the quality of the newspaper and the volunteer experience. It is not justified and members have not received proper notice to make an informed decision.
- Paying volunteers is a bad idea 22 Feb 2010
Update: Board just struck it out. It has to approve everything that must go to the AGM and they decided this will not be discussed.
Comment by E Aboyeji — Mon 22 February 2010; 52 @ 08:06
However, although I was going to abstain from a possible vote on this, it might be useful for me to give some background for motivation for the move (seeing as I know it).
Every year, Imprint goes to the Canadian Universities Press Conference (CUP). It is a conference of all the student journalists in all the campus newspapers in Canada. When we talked to them, we found that paper after paper paid their staff. While we have had excellent volunteer support for sometime (thanks to awesome leadership and volunteer appreciation), it was very difficult for us to quality control because we did not pay staff. Essentially the reasoning was that like other newspapers, we could ask more of our volunteer staff especially as far as the quality of the paper was concerned if we paid them. We also thought of it as a way to attract new talent.
(Case in point: We have two Waterloo students who write for Macleans but have never written for us. This might not be why but we figured Macleans pays ,we don’t)
It was more a way of getting staff to do their jobs seriously than volunteer appreciation.
However, I personally had a few misgiving about it:
1.)It would give the Editor in Chief way more control over section editors because he and only he can truly define quality. We have a cool EIC now. But who knows, we may get a freak later?
2.)Elections for section editors might become too competitive for the wrong reasons.
3.)I could see all sort of HR problems creeping up especially in the absence of a contract.
However, I must say that while I might concede with you point that paying volunteers might make them worse, I just thought it would be worth saying that if Imprint had started to pay volunteers, it would fundamentally change the relationship. They would be paid staff now, not volunteers. And unless you have got some other empirical paper that says otherwise, I think it would have allowed Imprint to retain talent and attract new talent.
Besides, I don’t think there is a fundamental question of whether Imprint could afford it. I’ll wager the program could be paid for. Imprint makes enough money as it is.
Comment by E Aboyeji — Mon 22 February 2010; 52 @ 08:27
Though I agree that the volunteers should not be paid that much, you are wrong in that they were given proper notice. All have received copies of the proposed policy changes in their email twice and they will be voted on Monday at the AGM.
It may interest you to know that board voted down policy 14 and therefore members will not be voting on that policy.
Comment by Sam T — Mon 22 February 2010; 52 @ 09:51
@E Aboyeji
Thank you for your comment. I am glad that the board rejected the policy change. I think it was a poor proposal.
I have been to CUP conferences before and I know many people who have worked at difference student newspapers. Other papers that pay editors what amounts to a wage rather than an honorarium often have a part
time editor-in-chief and a structure much different from Imprint’s.
It is worth knowing and not speculating why those students write for Maclean’s and not Imprint and why other students don’t volunteer.
There are many more differences between Imprint and Maclean’s than just that people get paid.
With respect to the phenomenon of rewards negatively affecting motivation, I linked to a paper on the topic. I don’t know what you mean by “empirical paper” if that does not fit economic analysis of observed data.
Of course it is counterintuitive and certainly doesn’t always occur, but it is worth considering with such a proposal.
As you know, I dispute whether the policy would have improved the situation at all. Though Imprint may be able to fund it, one should answer whether that is the best place for that money.
I’m sure there are plenty of worthwhile options for $50,000 a year.
Thank you for sharing your thoughts and feedback. I really appreciate it.
Comment by Ryan — Mon 22 February 2010; 52 @ 16:25
@Sam T
Thank you for your comment. Yes I am interested and glad to know that the board rejected the policy.
With respect to notice, my concern was not for volunteers or staff but for the members, the thousands of fee paying students. The Imprint bylaw requires at least 14-days notice to be published in the newspaper, which I do not think happened.
Comment by Ryan — Mon 22 February 2010; 52 @ 16:26
I am intrigued that the proposed change to policy 14 got so much attention from former volunteers. Hah! I can’t take credit, I didn’t write it.
I did write the new policy 16, which I’ve seen zero comments on. I don’t know whether I should be happy or disappointed.
At least the AGM was well attended this year.
Comment by Michael L. Davenport — Tue 23 February 2010; 53 @ 16:21