A couple weeks ago, I had the privilege to speak to Kathlyn McGuill, the special events manager for the Ronald McDonald House of Dallas and organizer for Young Friends. This brought up the interesting conversation behind young professional groups adapting to COVID-19 both locally and on the world stage. Another group called the Global Shapers, an established global network of over 7000 inspiring young professionals, has made great strides to address growing concerns during this pandemic. This group has stated that young people have a key stake in the need to minimize impacts on public health and socioeconomic disruptions. I reached out to Faye Francisco, the Curator for the Dallas Global Shapers with 2 years of experience in the Global Shapers Community, to get more insight on what young professional groups can expect now and in a post-COVID climate.
Hello Faye, how will these YP groups still offer networking opportunities during a time where in-person interactions are limited?
Since Covid, I’ve been continuing to network with others by joining small online meetings that are focused on topics that interest me. Currently Dallas Global Shapers are hosting Civic Dinners, where people can discuss issues that are important to them and encourage others to participate in the upcoming election. The main agenda of these dinners aren’t networking, but I have met some pretty cool people that I’m LinkedIn Friends with now. The other way YP groups can continue networking is really embracing technology and utilizing it to not only reach a massive amount of people in a webinar, but to do breakout rooms during the webinar. I’ve been in a few Zoom webinars where they did breakout rooms by splitting all the attendees into smaller meetings and it made it so much easier to create a meaningful connection.
How has your group changed fundraising strategies in the current climate where young professionals might have less disposable income and businesses are possibly looking at new layoffs?
Prior to Covid, we were working on creating membership fees to help fundraise, but since Covid we put a halt on that. What we’re doing now is when it comes to activities where we need funds, we either try to get an in-kind donation, sponsorship, or ask the group in a Google Survey if they would be willing to pitch in. The Google Survey allows us as a group to not pressure anyone to contribute on the spot during our meetings. When the economy gets better, we will probably look into membership fees again, but for now, we want to be understanding of what everyone’s situation might be.
With events like happy hour socials being a huge magnet for new members, how has your group adapted to virtual recruiting and how do you build a high retention rate?
We’ve been fortunate enough to have a surge of applicants recently, but we do plan on creating a virtual recruiting strategy, where we will be leveraging social media to generate interest in joining. I also plan on doing outreach to potential candidates that I feel would be a good addition to the group. As far as retention goes, I tend to be pretty hands on with new members and try to find ways they can get involved whether it be leading a project or helping out with internal processes. In addition, I also host social activities to help everyone get to know each other on a personal level, outside of being a Shaper. This helps to create a bond so everyone can not only network, but form friendships as well.
What projects or volunteering initiatives is your group currently involved with and has this been easy to achieve on a remote basis?
With 2020 being an election year, we are highly focusing on our project Shaping the Vote to help drive young people to register and to get them to the polls in November. It’s important that our voices are heard. We are also working on a book club for the youth to provide a means of escape for them during the pandemic. Going remote has made things easier in terms of having efficient meetings. In terms of getting projects to progress, they each come with their own challenges that we experience pre-covid. With being remote, it’s just shining more light on those challenges so it creates more motivation to ensure we solve those despite pre-covid, pandemic, or post covid.
Do you think there will be a higher need for networking post-COVID and if so what will your group’s first item of business be?
Yes! 100%! With Covid, we are limited to small gatherings or our social distancing circles and virtual meetings. There’s only so much networking you can do in those spaces. Although it’s possible to do a lot of networking in a virtual space, physical interaction is something technology can’t really imitate. So once it’s safe, more people will be excited to do actual networking in person. Post Covid, the first thing I plan on doing is a Happy Hour!
