Ever seen those ads by the Sierra club or nonprofit groups on college or high school campuses saying they pay “$425-625 a week” for summer work? Well, that’s what I was doing for the past three weeks, except I was not working for the Sierra Club. To give a background on how I got this temporary job, I had just graduated from college and resumed looking for work through monstertrak, the RBS networks, and even on monster.com. The position I searched on monstertrak were for entry-level positions for nonprofits based in NJ and the organisation came up on my search. I then submitted my resume via email and I received a call from their staff member who promptly scheduled an interview for the following Friday.
At the first round interview, I was asked how I felt about the working hours, which were from 2:00 PM to 10:00 PM. The first 2 hours would be spent on training and staff meetings, while the next 5 hours would be spent on the field and the final hour is spent on paperwork. This didn’t seem like an issue since I was spending my days exercising in the gym and playing Gran Turismo at night in between dropping resumes. I was then asked if I did any activism, which I responded by telling the interviewer that I help co-found the now-defunct RUNASA and worked in volunteer clubs in High School. Two items that appealed to me were mainly the emphasis on training the organisation would provide and their use of carpools to move in the field.
I was then scheduled for an “observation day” where I would shadow an experienced staff member to learn what they do in the field and later have the opportunity to do hands-on work myself. On that observation day, I found out what canvassing really was: it involved being randomly dropped into a neighbourhood called a turf, and spending 5 hours fund-raising and gathering grassroots support through signatures and letters. The pay scheme is also very different: your pay is essentially based on half of what you are able to raise during the days worked and 40% of amounts exceeding the weekly goal. In theory, you should be able to be paid half of meet the weekly fund-raising standard and would be paid minimum wage based on the hours worked in the even of failure. In practice, you basically are only paid half of what you raise during the week, which means you can either get $425 of the 850 raised or get only $100 of the $200 raised (this does not include earnings taken from taxes). Canvassers are on straight commission with opportunities for bonuses based on performance. The money is everything, although securing letters and signatures are also emphasized.
After shadowing the senior staff member, I was given one hour to canvass by myself, knowing nothing about the trade and with no training at all. I managed to make enough money and letters to get a recommendation to join the team. For the first two-weeks I was on a 10-day training program where I learned to properly present the organisation’s “Rap (overview)”, respond to objections, deal with rejections, and how to close a successful contribution. During my 10-day training, I saw one member quit for issues over being dropped in towns that are in rural/surburban areas, one person quitting because she did not like it, and a teenage couple having sex in the middle of the street inside a Honda Prelude. The turnover is pretty high and this is the reason why members who survive the 10-day period are considered “senior staff”. The long-time staff members invested a great deal of time training me by correcting any mistakes I made, doing lots of role-playing in under every imaginable scenario, and basic advice on body language and word usage.
In many ways, canvassing is very similar to sales: I had to sell myself as someone that they would want to listen to, sell the organisation as something that they would want to support, and most of all selling the idea that contributing and writing letters can make a difference. This was also a purer form of sales because we had no existing leads, our turf is randomly determined by the field managers, and we are directly marketing the organisation by going door-to-door talking to neighbours. Because there is no data on leads and turf assignments are random, this means the “numbers game” is always in play. The numbers game is an explanation on how your night will normally work out based on statistical data and past experience from canvassers. For example, if you are assigned on a turf with 100 houses, chances are only 50 of those houses will have contacts, only 25 of those contacts will be interested, 12 of those interested contacts will sign the support statement and only 6 contacts will either contribute, write letters or do both. Therefore the challenge in the turf is to make every door-to-door visit count and getting those handful of strong supporters to contribute as much as possible and write letters.
From my 3-weeks on canvassing, I saw repeating patterns of behaviour among demographic groups based on income and ethnicity. As we all know, people are people, but occassionaly living stereotypes spring to life. During my 3-weeks at work I saw the following from various groups:
Upper-Income groups: They are individuals who have achieved a level of success and have a false sense of entitlement because of this. They perceive canvassers merely as leeches who are just out to get their money. They are generally hostile to canvassers and stingy in contributions unless they are informed that it is tax-deductible. Many of these people forgot who they were before they achieved personal success. Most of all, these people lack manners: they would often tell canvassers to come back at a later time only to avoid answering the door out of arrogance, cowardice, and to make canvassers feel extremely unwelcome. Well, just so you know their houses are not fully soundproof and when I do return, I often hear someone screaming “Don’t Answer the door” and see kids and adults running around through the door windows. These people are just embarassing themselves with their lack of manners and childish behaviour. Just say you’re not interested instead of wasting your “rich” time and those of canvassers.
Middle-Income groups: Will contribute if the pitch is made in a way to show them that there is progress and as a way for them to get involved without interfering in their normal lives. The highest levels of contributions have come from this group from my short experience so far. They know where they were from and are able to appreciate what canvassers are doing. Usually, they would show their appreciation by writing letters, contributing high amounts or offering support in kind such as water bottles or umbrellas (for bad weather). I enjoyed talking to people from this group as they are able to understand that we are there to get funding to “fight the good fight” and inform them of relevant issues in their lives.
Working-class: They are the most direct people I have met. They will tell you if they can help, contribute of if they just don’t care. Most of the time, they want a way to express themselves and how they feel about the issues. This is where I feel my work counts the most despite the lack of contributions. I often tell people in this group who feel that they can’t contribute that there is no limit on contributions and that everyone is doing what they can to help out, which they most certainly do. I once came to a contact who appreciated that I came to talk to him about local issues. After giving him the rap, he said that he would proudly sign the support statement and contributed to his capacity when I told him “neighbours were doing everything they could. Everything adds up in the end”. It’s hard to find people like this when canvassing in about 50-200 doors a night and with half the contacts blowing me off; but it sets the right attitude when you do meet them. It is reinvigorating and lets me know that what I am doing out there actually means something to the right people. Just very active people who want to be informed of options to express themselves to the government or the establishment.
East Asians: For the most part come from countries where political activism was suppressed for many years and are unfamiliar with the concept of grassroots campaigning. 9 out of 10 times they will express a lack of interest. The only support I got from Asians were when A) I talked about tax-deductions and B) when I met Mainland Chinese in their 30-50s who understood the importance of what I was doing.
South Asians: They give a zillion excuses on why they can’t do it. Even after I shot down every single one of their objections, they still make up new excuses. It would be great if they just gave a direct answer instead of throwing me a dozen or so lame excuses. The only groups of South Asians that I received support were those who were well-educated, appreciate the quality of life they have and want to continue living in comfortable lifestyle.
I left the organisation in good-standing after three weeks by honouring my commitment in completing the 10 days of training and providing two-week notice to the supervisor. I met a lot of interesting people and I look forward to keeping in touch with them. There is also the possibility of working part-time on weekends during election season.
