but you do sometimes get the feeling that those who get to decide things are somewhat removed from the 'average'
I fear this is perpetuated by the sort of folk who are accepted as volunteers, or at least as front of house or publicity volunteers. 2 stories:
1. I visited an NT site, was dressed for country walking. All over the entrance area were signs asking for volunteers and how much they really needed new people for all sorts of roles and please ask any staff for details. When paying to enter the formal gardens I asked about volunteering. The sales lady looked at me, dithered and said she had to get someone else. The someone else appeared, looked me up and down and then claimed none of the sales staff knew where any of the volunteering information was, in fact they did not have any, maybe I could go away and try the web site, no idea which bit of it but there may be something on there. I said well who does have these leaflets, given you have adverts all over the entrance asking for help and saying to ask staff? It then became obvious that they did not think I was 'the right sort' which is an awful term to use, but I dont know what else to call their tone and attitude. I can only presume from what I was wearing (for walking across their own trails through woods and fields) and from my regional accent (common!). If they had bothered to ask they would have found I actually worked for the local university and generally was not the rif raff they seemed to like to think I was. I was glad of their awfulness in the end as at least I did not waste any more of my time on working with such unpleasant people.
2. Some time after the above event, a friend who volunteers (ex senior manager of a prestigious institute) was complaining that NT volunteers usually only stay for a year or so, then they get bored of doing menial stuff like car parking management or digging flower beds as there is no where to progress to and it gets repetitive. It was clear such deserters were quite disappointing but their eventual boredom of hours stood in car parks was to some degree understandable.
On the same day said friend also mentioned there was a really interesting volunteering post available, writing small articles for the NT. It turned out said friend had already phoned one of her ex management colleagues and offered it directly to them with no application process. The person the job was offered to never having volunteered in any way for the NT before.
I asked if none of the existing site volunteers had been interested in applying, as I was surprised at a lack of interest. It turns out it was never offered in any form to any of the existing volunteers, the tone was that people who did general volunteering would not be bright enough to do a bit of writing so why waste time on opening up the application to them, just give it to someone 'suitable' straight off.
I hope this sort of thing was a local aberration. The NT really should stamp on these kinds of attitudes and prejudices, it is still 'them and us', the 'right' people get the benefits even in volunteer jobs.
Very sad, as the NT is a constructive idea.
) then without roads there would be less to photograph.
