It’s Easy & It Works

I love stuff that works and is easy.  This week I got my butt in gear to do some phone banking, which is traditionally my thing.  The last time I phone banked pre-covid I had a few friends and we’d meet at this rented out storefront filled with tables and landlines. I’d check in with the nice volunteers and get a paper list of names and numbers, find a spot, and dial til someone picked up.  

A lot of the time it would ring and ring, or an answering machine would pick up, or the person would hang up on me before I finished saying “hello”.  Every once in a while I’d get someone who didn’t know whether or not they were registered to vote, didn’t have a plan for how to get to the polls, or wasn’t sure their vote mattered.  

Doing what I can to turn non-voters into voters is an amazing high.  It gets me through the hang ups and don’t call me’s, and sometimes (rarely, but regularly) the rude folks.  I keep dialing.

So between calls, or every twenty minutes or so, I’d chat with my friends about whatever and then get back to it. I’d try to go for two hour sessions.  My friends were more hardcore and would basically go all day.

This year it’s pretty different.  I log onto my computer from my house and there’s an auto-dialer that does the dialing for me.  I just hit a button and all of a sudden a person is there and I’m reading the script on my screen, “Hello my name is Sascha and I’m a volunteer ...” then click click click and on to the next call.

With this system I think I probably make a lot more calls in the same amount of time, but I still need breaks.  It’s harder to remember to take breaks when I’m alone at my desk with the auto dialer than in a big room full of like-minded folks. 

But I’ve figured out that I can do more if I take breaks.  If I don’t take breaks I burn out faster and have to quit for the day after an hour.  If I do 1/2 hr sessions separated by 5-10 minute breaks I can do 4 sessions and still feel pretty human.  

I have one phone bank buddy who I FaceTime with between calls, and there’s an online real-time chat community that is actually pretty great at making me feel part of a team while I work. 

It feels like my calls are generally 95% hangups, 2% nasty, and 3% are people who maybe my call will help get them to vote or volunteer. It’s pretty easy and it works. I’m gonna keep going. 

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