In May, our Support Team began offering monthly training webinars. These training sessions will be consistently held on the third Wednesday of each month at 2pm EDT.
Our topic for July 15, 2020 at 2pm EDT is Advanced Reporting: Statistics – Analysis Area.
The goal of this training is to help iCarol users:
Understand what data is included in each Chart Type in Analysis area
Learn how to use the Filters and Tools available in the Analysis area, including:
Call (Contact) Content Filters
Standard Filters
Total Distinct Calls
Click here to see Contact Records that match these filters
Saved Chart Type
Drilling into charts
Exporting chart data to csv files
Consider different use cases for the various Chart Types, Filters, and Tools available
The Monthly Support Trainings are available exclusively to iCarol customers. To sign up, please sign into your iCarol system and navigate to the iCarol Help Center, where the registration link is provided in the Announcements area.
With the cancellation of iCarol’s Annual Customer Conference, we will unfortunately miss the opportunity to provide our typical day full of in-person training on iCarol’s tools and features to help our customers carry our their work. However, to support our customers in the absence of this in-person event, the iCarol Support Team will begin offering monthly training webinars. We will use customer feedback and other data available to us to determine what topics to cover — ensuring that these trainings are providing the information you need and want most. These training sessions will be consistently held on the third Wednesday of each month at 2pm EDT.
The first monthly session will occur on May 20 at 2pm EDT, and is titled “Introduction to Reporting.” This training session will establish a foundation of understanding of the reports available in the Statistics section of iCarol, and provide fundamental knowledge about the data exports available in iCarol. This training can be considered a pre-requisite for future Support Trainings that will cover individual Statistics and Reporting topics in greater detail.
During this training participants will:
Receive a high level overview of Statistics and Data Exports in iCarol
Learn about the different reports and tools available in each area of Statistics
Review the data available in the Data Export tool
Begin to understand the relationships between the files included in the export
The Monthly Support Trainings are available exclusively to iCarol customers. To sign up, please sign into your iCarol system and navigate to the iCarol Help Center, where the registration link is provided in the Announcements area.
iCarol offers multiple ways for you to retrieve the data you put into your system. You can use our Statistics area to access dozens of available-on-demand charts and graphs that present information that our clients most commonly need to meet their reporting requirements. You can also apply numerous filters to these reports, drilling directly in to uncover the desired information. This area is a sufficient source of information for most of your basic reporting needs.
But, we understand that others may want or need to run cross tabulations, pivot tables, or otherwise customize their reporting experience a bit further. Our users can extract their raw data files for further analysis in external programs like Microsoft Access or Excel, or simply export the data for offline storage. These data tables contain every last detail about activities like your shifts, volunteer and staff profiles, the records in your resource database, and contact records including the data from contact record text entry fields, among other activities.
Our philosophy is this: The data you put into iCarol is YOUR data— we are simply the stewards of it by keeping it stored and protected for you, and so of course you should have access to it as needed. Many of our users choose to go to the Admin Tools area of iCarol to export this data on a regular basis. However, this does require taking a few steps to initiate the download, then waiting for the export to complete before you can begin your analysis.
We’ve created an enhancement to the Admin Tools export area: Scheduled Exports. Using this feature, our users can schedule an automatic export to occur. This export can be delivered in your iCarol system just as the manual exports, or you can set a path to a S/FTP that you’ve provided for this data to be delivered to.
Each iCarol customer is allotted one free monthly scheduled export to use in their system.
This feature is also available as a subscription — you may add on several scheduled exports to your iCarol system for a nominal monthly cost. When you subscribe to this feature, you may choose from multiple time frames for the scheduled exports to occur: Weekly, Monthly, Quarterly, or Annually. If you find yourself needing to export information on a repeat basis throughout your reporting cycles, having these files exported automatically is a convenient and time-saving solution.
To add your free monthly scheduled export, log into iCarol and navigate to the Help area to read our detailed Help Articles with step-by-step instructions (simply search for “Scheduled Export”).
And, if you want to save even more time and have more exports automatically delivered on a recurring basis, open a case with the Support Team to get started!
Happy Pi Day! What’s that exactly? Remember geometry and learning about finding the area and perimeter (aka circumference) of circles? To get your calculation correct, you need Pi in your equation. You might also see pi as the Greek letter “π”. It’s the ratio of the circumference of a circle to its diameter — which is always approximately 3.14159… (it’s actually been calculated to over one trillion digits beyond the decimal point!).
In the US and some other countries we write our dates in a MM/DD/YY format so today, March 14th, is 3/14 — Pi Day! And even though most other countries write their dates in a DD/MM format, today is generally accepted as Pi Day worldwide since there are only 12 months. If you’re nerdy like me, you can read more about Pi Day here. Yes, it’s a real thing. Yes, it has its own website.
In honor of Pi Day, here are 3 interesting uses of pie charts in iCarol.
1. A Bird’s Eye View
Use Pie Charts to give you a sort of broad overview of how the numbers or percentages are shaping up for a certain sub-category of your contact form. Or, use it as an overview of your location breakdowns.
In the Analysis tab of Statistics, when selecting Chart Type, you have two Pie Charts to choose from, either Caller Issues and Demographics (which will start by showing you all the Categories on your contact form) or Caller Location.
The resulting charts are below. If you selected the Caller Issues and Demographics chart you get this broad overview of your contact form Categories.
And if you selected the Location pie chart you’ll see a high level look at the geographic location entries.
2. Drill down to get more detail
Once you’ve got that high level pie chart available, you can click on pieces of the pie to drill into the data below. Drilling into a Category will then show you the sub-categories that are available. These sub-categories are the Groups or questions asked within each category on your contact form. On a location chart, drilling into the State or Province piece of the pie will show you the county level information.
If we take our Caller Issues and Demographics chart above and drill into the mauve colored “Issues” category, we’ll see the Issue choices of sub-categories.
If we click on the “Mental Health/Counseling” piece of the pie, we’ll drill down to the lowest available level, which are the field choices or answer options within that sub-category. These are the items you may find in the drop-down or list of check box choices on the contact form.
As mentioned, if you drill further down into the location pie chart, you’d get the counties breakdown. So if I click on Nevada, I’ll see the Nevada counties chosen.
Clicking on Eureka county shows me how the city numbers shape up for that county.
3. Percentage vs. Count
Remember if percentages aren’t really your thing and you’d like to see a count instead, just click the “Total Count” option for any of the pie charts shown.
Now that I’ve told you a bit more about pie charts in iCarol, I suggest you go celebrate Pi Day in the truly best way possible — enjoy a piece of real, edible pie.
Do you want to write more compelling reports for funders and investors? One way to do that is to turn intangible outcomes into measurable financial quantities so they can learn what kind of return they can expect to get for their investment.
To learn more on this topic, you’re invited to attend an upcoming free webinar, “Introduction to Calculating Social Return on Investment” on November 15th at 1pm EDT.
We’re delighted to welcome Dustin MacDonald as our presenter. Dustin is a Registered Social Service Worker (RSSW) who has been involved with helplines including Distress Centre Durham for the previous 5 years, as well as performing quality assurance, producing analytics and forecasting for the Ontario Online & Text Crisis Services program of Distress and Crisis Ontario. He brings to these roles an understanding of statistics and experience performing a variety of program evaluations and assessments.
Happy Pi Day! What’s that exactly? Remember geometry and learning about finding the area and perimeter (aka circumference) of circles? To get your calculation correct, you need Pi in your equation. You might also see pi as the Greek letter “π”. It’s the ratio of the circumference of a circle to its diameter — which is always approximately 3.14159… (it’s actually been calculated to over one trillion digits beyond the decimal point!).
In the US and some other countries we write our dates in a MM/DD/YY format so today, March 14th, is 3/14. If you round Pi to it’s ten thousandth decimal place you get 3.1416 which means this year today is the ultimate Pi Day! And even though most other countries write their dates in a DD/MM format, today is generally accepted as Pi Day worldwide since we only have 12 months. If you’re nerdy like me, you can read more about Pi Day here. Yes, it’s a real thing. Yes, it has its own website.
In honor of Pi Day, here are 3 interesting uses of pie charts in iCarol.
1. A Bird’s Eye View
Use Pie Charts to give you a sort of broad overview of how the numbers or percentages are shaping up for a certain sub-category of your call form. Or, use it as an overview of your location breakdowns.
In the Analysis tab of Statistics, when selecting Chart Type, you have two Pie Charts to choose from, either Caller Issues and Demographics (which will start by showing you all the Categories on your call form) or Caller Location.
The resulting charts are below. If you selected the Caller Issues and Demographics chart you get this broad overview of your call form Categories.
And if you selected the Location pie chart you’ll see a high level look at the geographic location entries.
2. Drill down to get more detail
Once you’ve got that high level pie chart available, you can click on pieces of the pie to drill into the data below. Drilling into a Category will then show you the sub-categories that are available. These sub-categories are the Groups or questions asked within each category on your call form. On a location chart, drilling into the State or Province piece of the pie will show you the county level information.
If we take our Caller Issues and Demographics chart above and drill into the mauve colored “Issues” category, we’ll see the Issue choices of sub-categories.
If we click on the “Mental Health/Counseling” piece of the pie, we’ll drill down to the lowest available level, which are the field choices or answer options within that sub-category. These are the items you may find in the drop-down or list of check box choices on the call form.
As mentioned, if you drill further down into the location pie chart, you’d get the counties breakdown. So if I click on Nevada, I’ll see the Nevada counties chosen.
Clicking on Eureka county shows me how the city numbers shape up for that county.
3. Percentage vs. Count
Remember if percentages aren’t really your thing and you’d like to see a count instead, just click the “Total Count” option for any of the pie charts shown.
Now that I’ve told you a bit more about pie charts in iCarol, I suggest you go celebrate Pi Day in the truly best way possible — enjoy a piece of real, edible pie.
We’d like to introduce you to an extremely versatile new feature with tons of potential uses: Online Forms. Watch our short video for more information, and contact our support team with questions or to get started.
The truth is that anyone can create a report using all the tools we now have available via the computer. But there are several key areas to focus on if you want to create a report that not only gets a funder’s attention but also results in increased funding opportunities.
Here are some tips to think about as you set up your reports to produce awesome outcomes:
The report is visually appealing and professional looking — before sending your report out to a funder, have someone who has not seen the report take a look at it and see what their first impression is. Is it a report format that catches someone’s attention? Ask the person reviewing the report to describe their first impression and what words they would use to describe the report format. If the words are not what you would expect (i.e. “wow, this looks really professional and really caught my eye”), spend more time polishing the format. You want your report to be the one that stands out from a stack of many others.
Data is displayed in a way that is easy to read and understand — assume your reader does not know your field of expertise so your data has to be presented in a way that makes sense, is easy to follow and does not rely on someone’s knowledge of the field to understand what the data represents. Avoid using acronyms or terminology that someone outside of your field may not understand.
Interpret the data for your reader — data alone is powerful but data that includes narrative which explains what the data means, particularly how it relates to what your funder is wanting to know, is more compelling. Data can be interpreted in many different ways, depending on the perspective of who is looking at the data. Be the one to offer the perspective of how the data should be interpreted by telling the story with a narrative. Answer the questions that someone may have in looking at the data so as little as possible is left open to interpretation.
Use the tools available to you — Microsoft Word and Excel are your best friends when it comes to report formatting and data display. Use the tools built in with both of these products (or other similar products) to create a report format that gets that “wow” factor. As examples, you can create spreadsheets and charts in Microsoft Excel that are easy to export into Word. A product like Excel is a better tool to use for data display and data accuracy. You can create formulas in Excel to ensure all your totals are accurate. Microsoft Word, on the other hand, is a better product to create your report in as the intent of Word is to allow the user to visually create a document that allows for both data display and narrative formatting.
Your report answers the questions your funder is asking — to do this, you need to know your funder and what your funder is wanting to spend money on. Only include the pertinent data and information that will help the funder make their decision. It’s easy to include data and information that we think is important but the intent of your report should be to answer the questions that are important to your funder.
As you create and write your reports, always remember that you want your report to be the one that gets a funder’s attention from among many others who may be vying for the same funding that you are. Data tells a story and your report can be the mechanism that explains that story and ultimately leads to increased funding for your agency.
Call report exports in iCarol contain a lot of data, and it can be challenging to understand what is being shown or where to find the particular data you are looking for. This article will review how to request a call report export, the different files one receives when they complete a call report export, and what data is shown in these files.
Requesting a Call Report Export
To request a call report export, users with Admin security will click Admin Tools, in the left hand menu, then the Tools tab, then the link “Extract all of your data” in the Data Export section.
On the data export page, the right hand column will be used to request a call report export.
The first drop-down menu, which shows “7 days ago” in the screenshot above, is a quick suggestion list you can use to denote what time frame you want to use for the resource export. If you would like to indicate a specific time frame for the export, use the two date field to denote a start and end date. Next, there are 3 check boxes to indicate what kind of export you would like to request; place a check mark next to “Call Reports”.
Under the title “Call Report export options”, you will see some information that says “Custom field columns will be ordered alphabetically. If you prefer a specific form’s fields to be first, please choose it below”. This is referring to the custom categories, groups and field that are in your call report. In the call report export, there will be one column for every custom group in your call report form, and these will be identified in this format: Category Name – Group Name. For example, Demographics – Gender. These columns will be arranged alphabetically by Category name. If your export will contain data from several different call reports, all categories from all call reports will be listed alphabetically. To say this another way, the columns, representing Categories, will not be in the order you see in the call reports, and categories from different call reports will follow each other, instead of all Categories from one call report first, then followed by the second call report, and so on. By choosing a particular call report with this option however, you can have all the categories from that call report come first, in alphabetical order, then followed by all the rest of the categories from all the rest of the call reports.
In the next section, you will choose which call reports you would like to export. By default, all call reports in your system are checked. If you would only like to export certain call reports, you will uncheck those you do not want to export. For those clients that only have one call report in their system, you will not see a list of call reports.
Finally, to run the call report export, you will click the “Start creating” button, found under the list of call reports.
As indicated in the note above the “Start creating” button, you will get an email when the export is ready. At that time, you will return to this page and you will find a link, on the right hand side of the screen, which you will click to download the export files. Usually, exports will be ready in an hour or two, but sometimes will take longer. Exports that contain a lot of data and cover a large period of time will take longer to generate, and if you request an export at a time when many other clients are requesting exports (for example, at the beginning of the month), your export will take longer to generate.
Call Report Export Files Received
When you return to the exports page after receiving the email that your export is ready, the export will be found on the right hand side of the screen as below.
Click on the download you would like to open. When it opens, you will see you have received several different files, as shown below.
Call Report Export Files Explained
CallReports
This is the most often referred to call report export file, as it contains all the data collected for every call report submitted in the time frame indicated for the call report export. This file has a column for every field in the call report, both “standard” iCarol fields, and custom categories, groups and fields. Some highlights of this export are outlined below.
Click on the image above to see a larger version
Column C, LinkedToCallReportNum, will only have data in it if you are using embedded call reports. Embedded call reports are call reports that are related to each other. Many clients embed separate risk assessments to call reports, and other clients embed follow-up forms, for example. If there is an embedded call report linked to the call report shown in the row in the export, the call report number of the linked call report will be noted in this column.
Column G, CallerNum, will only show something different than -1 if a caller profile was chosen for the call report. iCarol gives a number to all caller profiles which will be noted in this column.
Column K, PhoneWorkerNum, will show the number iCarol assigned to each of your users.
Click on the image above to see a larger version
Columns M through R refer to an old way of tracking non-transactional calls that we are not using for newer clients. Older clients may still be using this tool, which places a horizontal list of checkboxes just below the Contact Information section at the top of the call report, as shown below.
If you are not using this tool, you will always see Yes in column M, and No in columns N-R. If you are using this tool, No will be shown in Column M if Yes is shown in in one of the columns N through R, indicating that the call was a hangup, obscene, prank, wrong number, or silent call.
Columns U-AA indicate the caller’s location as noted in the location fields in the Contact Information section (shown in the screenshot above). Each iCarol client can determine which of these location fields appear; some clients choose to turn some or all of these location fields off. Even if these fields are turned off in all your call reports, these columns will still appear in the export, they will just be blank.
Click on the image above to see a larger version
Columns AF-AP all refer to fields in the Contact Information section of the call report. Again, some clients choose to turn some or all of these fields off. Even if they are turned off, they will still appear in the export, but will be blank.
Click on the image above to see a larger version
Column AQ is first default text field on the Content Tab of the call report. By default, this field is called “Call Description”, though this name can be changed.
Column AR is the “Worker’s Comments” text field on the Content tab. This field can be turned off; even if it is turned off, this column will still show on the export, but will be blank.
Column AS is the “Feedback from supervisors and staff” text field on the Content tab. This field, and therefore, the feedback function, can be turned off but again, the column will still appear in the call report export.
Column AT is the “Caller’s Feedback” text field on the Content tab. This field can be turned off but again, the column will still appear in the call report export.
Columns AU-BC are additional text fields that can be added to the Content tab. These additional text fields are added via the “Overall settings for this call report form” page when editing call reports using the call report editor. Again, even if these additional fields are not used, they will appear in the call report export.
Click on the image above to see a larger version
Column BD will contain a number other than -1 if the worker who entered the call report is not a deleted user. iCarol assigns a Worker Number to all users in your system.
Column BH refers to the “reviewed for accuracy” function that clients can turn on via the Calls tab in Admin Tools.
Columns BI-BK refers to the feedback function in iCarol. If feedback is being given on call reports, there will be data in these columns.
Column BL will show all the referrals given to the caller, both those found in the resource database and linked to the call report, and out of database referrals, if that functionality is turned on. Please note that if more than one referral was given, the referrals will be separated by semi-colons in this column of the export.
Column BM refers specifically to instant messaging call reports where the IP address of the visitor is recorded in the call report.
Click on the image above to see a larger version
The custom categories and groups added to the call report begin at column BN. All columns before this point were “standard” iCarol fields, some of which can be turned off in the call report. All custom categories and groups, as stated earlier, are arranged alphabetically by Category name, then Group name. In the example call report export shown in the screenshot above, you can see the first 5 custom groups in the call report listed by their Category name, then Group name. The data you find in each row for these columns will indicate what Field was selected in the Group if it is a drop-down or checkbox Group, or what text was entered if the Group is formatted as a text Group.
CallReportCustomFields
This report shows the selections made in custom categories, groups and fields for all call reports submitted in the time frame of your export. Each block of color in the screenshot above represents one call report, as indicated by the call report number in column A. Please note that column F is labeled “SubCategoryName” which is also known as the Group, and column G is labeled “Answer”, also known as the Field. If a Group is formatted as text, the text entered into that group will be shown in column I.
CallReportFollowups
This file will show follow-up activities created or edited during the time frame of the call report export. Please note, a follow-up activity created outside of the time frame indicated will not be included in this file, but if that same activity was edited in the time frame, it will be shown in this file. The columns in this file refer to the fields found in the “Schedule a Follow-up activity section” on the Finish tab of call reports. Each client can control which fields appear in this section via the Calls tab of Admin Tools. However, all of the columns will appear in the export even if you have turned off a specific field, they will just be blank.
Please note columns J-L. These fields will be populated if the client has turned on, via the Calls tab in Admin Tools, the function to note follow-ups with a purpose (assistance, advocacy or survey). If this function is turned on, the follow-up purpose will be selected from a drop-down menu that will appear at the top of the “Schedule a Follow-up activity” section.
CallReportNeedsMetAndUnmet
Click on the image above to see a larger version
Click on the image above to see a larger version
Click on the image above to see a larger version
This export only applies to those clients using the Needs by Taxonomy function, where each call report notes a need, and any referrals made are noted as meeting the need or not. This file includes:
the referral made (columns D and E)
the Need noted (columns F and G)
the caller’s location and phone number (columns H-N)
if the Need was unmet, and if so, the reason (columns O-P)
the breakdown of the taxonomy term chosen as the need (columns Q-Z)
the AIRS Need Category the need falls into (column AD)
the parent agency the referral belongs to (columns AF and AG)
CallReportsLinkedTogether
This very small export (only 2 columns of data) only applies to those clients using embedded call reports. As noted earlier, embedded call reports are a way to link two different call reports together. Two common ways this is being used is for separate risk assessment call reports, and follow-up call reports. This report will show the call report numbers of those call reports that are linked together, or related.
CallReportsOutofDatabaseReferrals
For those clients using the Out of Database Referrals functionality, this file will contain the details of the out of database referrals made during the time frame of the export. Any details of the resource that the call taker included (Agency name, Program name, phone number, address, website, etc.) will be shown in this file.
Analysis of Export Files
The files are exported in .csv format, which can be displayed by Microsoft Excel. It is highly recommended that one have some knowledge of how to use Excel and its various functions to aid in analysing the data in the export files. There are many books, websites and courses that can teach one to use Excel.
One particularly helpful function is filtering. Using filtering, one can find very specific call reports. For example, you could use filtering to find all call reports from male callers (assuming, of course, that the gender of the caller is recorded in the call report). You can add an unlimited amount of filters to find increasingly specific call reports, such as male callers over the age of 60 who lives in Beverly Hills and discussed physical health concerns during their call.
In some cases, the particular data you might like to analyse will be contained in separate export files. For example, details on follow-ups are not contained in the same file as selections made in custom Groups. In this case, learning how to create pivot tables in Excel is very useful. In this way, you can link two files together to get a full picture of the call itself and the follow-up.
One last note – if you would like to save an export file to your hard drive, ensure you save it as an Excel file extension (.xlsx or .xls for example).
September is considered the peak of hurricane season in the Atlantic, but disaster can strike all year ’round and in all regions. Earthquakes, wildfires, blizzards, tornados, floods, super storms – all areas have seen their share of destructive events.
Non-profit helplines play a large role in any community’s disaster plan. Local governments often partner with these helplines and advertise their contact information during disasters as a place to contact for non-emergency information and referral. Information about shelters, emergency food or water drops, road closures, and shelter-in-place tips, are just a few examples of the information that these helplines can relay to the public in a local emergency.
The availability of such services in times of disaster is crucial – they serve as a way for residents to get much needed information and listening support, while also reducing the burden on local government and diverting non-emergency calls away from 9-1-1.
Providing this service presents unique challenges to helpline staff, but iCarol offers a number of solutions to reduce the stress of being there for your community during emergencies.
Benefit from Partnerships
During a disaster helplines in a region often need to work together to coordinate response. Some disasters may force one or more local helplines to close entirely, or at a minimum a helpline may be short staffed. Using iCarol you can easily share responsibility for managing call/text/chat volume and resource maintenance by using our collaborative options.
We’ve discussed in previous posts how you can build chat or text networks using iCarol, and such a collaboration would come in extra handy if your center needs to shut down or simply offload some traffic during a disaster. And most phone systems allow for the easy transfer or forwarding of calls.
With Call Report sharing capabilities, forms used by one center can be set up for use by another helpline in the event calls, texts, or chats are being routed elsewhere. By setting up these shared forms, the original call center can be certain that the center answering calls is filling out all the necessary information and collecting the essential data as if the call was being handled by the original center. You’ll still be able to review the forms and collect statistics on those calls handled by your partner.
Collaboration is not just limited to call reporting forms, however. Helplines can also share a database of community referrals and resources with other helplines so that in the event of an emergency, these helplines can access resources not just in their own community, but elsewhere in the region. Further, helplines can partner together to not only access this database to give referrals to help seeker, but can also share in the responsibility of editing these resources.
Collect Essential Data
In the event of a disaster, helplines will likely have specific data they wish to collect on those disaster-related calls, as well as needing a way to separate those calls, chats, or texts from others that may ring through to the center. It’s also very common for local governmental and other agencies to request this data from the helplines so they can monitor the needs of the community and respond accordingly for this and future events.
The key to collecting data in iCarol is found within the customizable report forms you fill out for each client interaction. Using the robust form editing tools, staff can add necessary questions and other fields for data collection when needed, so as soon as the disaster-related calls come in they are ready to collect the necessary information on the form. Staff can also use this capability to create a simple checkbox where call takers can note that the call was related to the disaster event, which will help identify these calls during statistical reporting later.
When it’s time to report on the helpline’s calls, staff can run various spreadsheets, reports, and charts. Results are available in real-time and can be filtered based on whether or not the call was related to the disaster, making it easy to run reports specific to the event, excluding unrelated calls.
Offer Alternative Channels
Offering alternative channels becomes especially important during a disaster. Phone lines may be down or it may be easier for people in need to text you during these trying times. Plus the mobility of texting means that someone can reach out to you from anywhere, even if they’ve been displaced from their home.
With iCarol you have complete control over when your messaging service is available, so you can very quickly create a shift and open up your channels as needed. You could even have a special portal specifically for disaster that has its own special report form that collects all the necessary information. And remember with Messaging you can offer all the same referrals and run the same statistical reports as you would for phone calls.
Increase Your Bandwidth
An emergency in your community means your volume could increase, so reaching your volunteers and staff is important. Inside iCarol you can promptly send out an email blast or mass text to alert your staff and volunteers of information they need to know, or ask for additional staffing. Quickly adjust your shift calendar to accommodate more open spots and assign your workers to shifts on the fly.
If you’d like to specifically track disaster staffing, consider creating new shifts and naming them accordingly for easy reporting. Analyze the hours worked for use in future planning, or to apply for future grants or compensation that may be offered by local governments and other organizations.
iCarol can be reached from any internet connected device, so you could explore work-from-home options for disaster staffing. You may wish to temporarily turn off any restrictions in place for which computers can access iCarol, or grant certain staff the ability to certify their home computers.
Provide Critical Information and Referral
During any sort of emergency, information could develop rapidly and change throughout the event. As your resource managers receive information from the various community agencies or collect information released by your local government, they can respond quickly. Update resource records accordingly, or create new ones with just a few clicks. Use the iCarol News area to post the most up-to-date information; it’ll be front and center when your volunteers first sign on so they won’t miss the latest updates.
Much like we mentioned earlier with alternative channels, a disaster could mean that even more people are seeking information in alternative ways. Help seekers likely want self-service options to find resources. This is where your Public Resource Directory comes in. Visitors to your website can use an embedded search of your live resource database right on your website to find what they need.
You can even quickly add highlighted resources during a disaster event to point your visitors right to the information and resources they need. You can also set up advanced, guided searches that are both visually appealing and direct your community to the right resources
Our API is another option for referral sharing, giving you and your developers access to your resource data so it can be used in whatever ways you see fit, such as creating a home built web directory, mobile apps, and more.
Providing assistance to your community during a disaster is a lot of work, but having so many time-saving tools integrated in your helpline software will take some of the stress out of the event, and your seamless response will prove that your helpline is an invaluable resource in your community. And even if your center doesn’t use iCarol, I hope this blog has sparked some ideas for how your helpline can plan ahead and more easily provide services when your community needs it most.
