Joan Balinson, Executive Director, Canadian International Military Tattoo & Festival

Interview with Ms. Joan Balinson, Executive Director
Canadian International Military Tattoo & Festival
Volunteer's for Success ...

For many festivals and events, it is critical to have volunteers! As part of my conversation about the Canadian International Military Tattoo & Festival, I asked both Ms. Balinson, Executive Director and Mr. John Terence, Producer of the Tattoo, how many volunteers they required for the Canadian International Military Tattoo & Festival and did they have any systems in place to “keep the volunteers happy”.

Joan Balinson, Executive Director, Canadian International Military Tattoo & Festival shares with us, “CITA (Canadian International Tattoo Association) is a not for profit registered charitable association.  As such we operate with a very limited budget.  All planning and execution of the production is done by volunteers.  From our board of directors, down to senior managers, Festival and show weekend volunteers, we utilize 80 people to help us put on the largest military tattoo in Central Canada”.

Mr. John Terence added, "quite simply the show would not go on without Volunteers”! Approximately 40-50 volunteers work with John alone, not to mention all the other teams. There are various co-coordinators in place and coordinators that liaison with all the Cadet services. The Canadian International Military Tattoo & Festival holds a wonderful Volunteer Appreciation night.  I mentioned to John that I felt Volunteers are the upmost importance to the ultimate success of a festival/event/production and John said “that’s absolutely it! It is important to keep the volunteers happy! You will ultimately end up working with higher quality people with high quality work ethics”. John says “these volunteers take a lot of pride in doing their job well, no matter how menial”. Again, John repeats his comment that “he tries to instill in his volunteers that no matter how small or menial a job might be, it most likely is critical to the intricacy of the overall performance. If the visual cues are not on time, it could affect in a major negative way”. I said to John, there must be a “Lot of Trust”! He replied … “no kidding!”  I very excited to continue this conversation with Mr. Terence and Ms. Balinson, as they both have a lot of great advice to contribute to this topic..

(To Be Continued)