Give Back by Volunteering for the EdsGuild
Recruitment underway for the Guild’s board of directors and Red Pencil Conference planning
By the Northwest Editors Guild Board of Directors
Do you want to help create beneficial opportunities for fellow editors? All it takes is your time and knowledge and signing up for one of the Northwest Editors Guild’s upcoming volunteer options.
As we adjust to new “normal” patterns, many editors are finding that they want to do something more meaningful—something that makes a difference in the greater editing community. If you have the time and energy to give, you could help the Guild and your colleagues by joining the Guild’s board of directors or by volunteering for the 2022 Red Pencil Conference. Not only can you help shape the future of the Guild and our conference, but you can also learn, build your own skills, and meet great people along the way.
The Guild is now in the process of recruiting volunteers for board service (beginning in January 2022) as well as conference planning for the next Red Pencil Conference in Seattle (scheduled for late 2022). Find out more about these opportunities with some frequently asked questions below.
General Questions:
Am I qualified to volunteer if I don’t have experience with event planning or nonprofit boards?
Yes! Part of what makes the Guild successful is embracing volunteers with a variety of experiences, backgrounds, and ideas. There are specific tasks that need specific skills, but many Guild volunteers are surprised at which past non-editing work and experiences can be useful when volunteering with the organization.
Man taking notes in planner while working remotely in cafe with laptop. Photo by Ketut Subiyanto from Pexels.
Can I volunteer if I don’t live in Seattle or Portland?
Yes. Board service and conference planning are no longer as dependent on your location as they were in the past. With Zoom, meetings can include members from anywhere with a reliable internet connection, when in the past many Guild events and meetings were limited to members who could attend in-person meetings in Seattle and Portland.
Board Service Questions:
What does the Guild’s board of directors do? What’s the time commitment?
The Guild’s board of directors is the main decision-making body for the organization and oversees many of the behind-the-scenes operations and volunteers who keep the group running. There are up to 12 board members each year and members serve a two-year term, with about half the board refreshed with new members each January. There are board meetings online every other month, and members are also expected to join one or more committees to work on things such as programming (organizing member meetings and workshops), operations (keeping the Guild running), outreach, and more. You can learn additional specifics about board service from this 2019 blog post (some things have obviously changed since the pandemic, but most of the information is still current).
What can I get out of board service?
Joining the Guild’s board of directors offers several unique opportunities:
Involvement with decisions and creating change in the organization to which you belong
Connecting with fellow editors and growing in the editing profession
A chance to use your skills to contribute to the Guild’s forward movement in the global community
Opportunity to learn more about the organization, what it does for you, its members, and the greater community
Red Pencil Conference Volunteering Questions:
What is the Red Pencil Conference?
The Guild hosts a single-day editing conference in Seattle every other year (when not in a pandemic) featuring a variety of sessions, speakers, and networking opportunities for all types of editors. Red Pencil is the largest regularly held editing conference on the West Coast and attracts upward of 200 attendees, presenters, vendors, and industry-related professionals. The last conference in 2019 focused on uplifting underrepresented voices in publishing. The next conference has been postponed a year until late 2022 due to the pandemic, but planning starts now.
What Red Pencil Conference tasks can I volunteer for? What’s the time commitment?
There are multiple opportunities with varying time commitments related to the conference. The core conference planning committee oversees everything from the big-picture ideas to detailed logistics for the day, and meets regularly over the course of a year to pull it all together. But if you have limited time to give, there are plenty of smaller jobs that only require a few hours before the conference or on the day of the conference. Depending on your interest and availability, you could spend hours helping find and schedule our next keynote speaker, or an hour checking in attendees at the door. Volunteers make the Red Pencil Conference work.
What can I get out of volunteering for the Red Pencil Conference?
The Red Pencil Conference committee needs dozens of volunteers to assist with tasks including setup, planning, implementing, logistics, and day-of helpers—any of which will give you the opportunity to:
Meet people from around the continent who are just as passionate as you are about grammar, language, and words (and reading)
Collaborate with a diverse group of people to plan an event that’s rich in information and insight from varied perspectives
Share your interests and skills to brainstorm topic ideas or provide a creative environment for attendees
How do I find out more?
There are several virtual informational recruitment happy hours scheduled in the coming weeks for interested members to find out if board service or conference planning and assistance are right for you. Registration is required through the Guild Event Calendar for all events.
Board Recruitment Happy Hour is August 18, starting at 5:01 p.m. Pacific. (The first happy hour was on July 28.) There is also an open board meeting August 16 to observe how a typical Guild board meeting runs.
Red Pencil Conference Recruitment Happy Hours are August 2 and August 16, both at 5:01 p.m. Pacific.
Keep an eye on our Event Calendar for more informational happy hours through this fall and deadlines for signing up to volunteer.
