Narelle Koteff

Many volunteer-based emergency service agencies experience high rates of volunteer turnover, in some cases as high as 20% each year. At times, up to half of all new recruits leave within the first two years. Finding out why this happens – and developing ways to improve volunteer retention – was the focus of this study. While the team determined there was no need for a leadership program per se, because most agencies offer a variety of programs that meet the traditional needs of leadership development, self-determination theory has been identified as a simple method to introduce to volunteer leaders.

Current government spending on natural disaster response is more than 20 times the spending on preparedness. Many climate-related natural hazards are increasing, along with the number of people living in hazard-prone areas. Large natural disasters also cross domains, moving from the private to the public realm, and shifting from a local, to a state or national concern. This raises the potential of future, unmanaged risks.

This project mapped a broad range of economic, social and environmental values and related them to natural hazards across several case studies. It explored who owns these values and what happens when they cross domains, as well as how a range of alternative strategies may contribute to improved resilience by sustaining economic, social and environmental values in a changing environment.