The open day greeter is very important. The space is not typically available to non-members unless they know a member who is willing to accompany them as a guest. Open days are an opportunity for someone new to come in and look around, so many open day attendees will be unfamiliar with makerspaces in general, or unfamiliar with Machspace in particular.
The greeter helps outsiders to immediately feel welcome in a niche space, provide any information needed, and encourage all attendees to fill in feedback forms. (Feedback forms help us in funding applications and improving Machspace for visitors and members.)
Purpose
The open day greeter’s job is to:
- welcome everyone who comes in;
- be available as the first point of contact when people enter the makerspace;
- give each attendee a feedback form when they arrive, and ask them to fill it in at some point while they’re there and hand it in on the way out;
- ask the attendee to sign in and out on the sign-in/-out form on the clipboard, for health and safety reasons and to help us to count attendees;
- be available to answer questions and help attendees to access the information that they need about Machspace and about makerspaces in general.
Guidelines
- If the greeter needs a break or needs to attend to something else, they can be temporarily replaced by someone else who understands the role. The important thing is that there is always someone there to greet people as they enter, prompt them to sign in, give them a feedback form, etc.
- It’s okay for them to be working on a project or to be sitting with other people at the entrance, but it’s important to remember that:
- The main focus should be on greeting attendees and making sure they sign in, have a feedback form, etc;
- They should be obviously the clear point of contact when entering and leaving and if an attendee has any questions;
- Some attendees may have social anxiety and may find it intimidating to be immediately greeted by someone who is sitting with a lot of other people. The greeter’s table should not be an “activity table”.
- The greeter may need to turn attendees away if they are below the lower age limit or not accompanied by the appropriate number of guardians/parents in line with our code of conduct;
- The greeter may need to turn attendees away if they are under the influence of alcohol or drugs, or if they clearly intend to be;
- The greeter may need to turn attendees away if they are accompanied by a dog that is not an appropriately-behaved assistance animal.
The volunteer
This role may be appealing to someone who:
- is friendly, comfortable with meeting new people;
- is happy to work on projects that can be easily put down without warning;
- can answer questions and recall and communicate a lot of relevant and interesting information;
- is comfortable being assertive.