Spreadsheets are brilliant.
They're familiar, flexible, inexpensive and easy to adapt. For many organisations, they're exactly where volunteer coordination begins.
A spreadsheet for volunteer contact details. Another for availability. Perhaps another for roles, qualifications or rosters.
It works.
Then the event grows.
100 volunteers become 200.
200 become 300.
Ten roles become 30.
One location becomes several.
And the spreadsheets grow with it.
More rows. More columns. More tabs. More versions. More information.
Before long, spreadsheets that once provided a simple way to keep track of information are being asked to support a complex operational process.
Availability. Qualifications. Experience. Preferences. Locations. Shifts. Responsibilities.
Then someone cancels.
A role changes.
A volunteer needs to move.
And one seemingly simple change creates a ripple effect across allocations and communications.
The spreadsheets haven't failed. The event has simply outgrown what they were originally being asked to do.
That's when they can start adding to the workload rather than reducing it.
At some point, adding another tab, formula or colour-coded column isn't the answer.
As volunteer numbers, roles and requirements increase, so does the time needed to keep everything accurate and up-to-date.
That's when a different question needs to be asked:
Could some of this process be automated?
That's the question that ultimately led to TaskWiz.
For the Bondi to Bronte Ocean Swim, the volunteer information already existed. So did the spreadsheets and processes that had successfully supported the event for years.
What had changed was the scale and complexity.
TaskWiz was developed to work with the volunteer information organisations already have. Instead of coordinators manually working through that data to allocate roles, TaskWiz automatically matches volunteers based on availability, preferences and qualifications.
The people who know the event and its volunteers best still make the decisions that matter.
Allocations can be reviewed and changed, allowing coordinators to apply their own experience and understanding of the people involved.
Because there are things a coordinator knows that data alone can't tell you.
Perhaps someone is particularly good at welcoming nervous participants. Another volunteer works exceptionally well with a particular team. Someone else may have the right qualification on paper but be better suited to a different role.
That knowledge matters.
The role of automation isn't to replace that judgement. It's to reduce the manual effort required.
Spreadsheets are an effective way to record, structure and access information. And for many organisations, they will continue to play an important role.
The opportunity is in what happens next.
Rather than relying on people to manually interpret that information, work through countless variables and turn it into volunteer allocations, automation can take on much of that processing.
Spreadsheets aren't the problem.
It's about reducing how much manual intervention is needed to turn the information they contain into action.
The less time coordinators spend on administration, the more time they have for the decisions and responsibilities that genuinely need their experience, knowledge and judgement.
Think about how many logins and passwords you already have. Now imagine being asked to create one because you've volunteered to help at an event. Volunteers are already giving something incredibly valuable: their time.
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People often ask us how TaskWiz began. The truth is, it wasn't the result of market research, a business plan or a grand ambition to build software. It started by being part of a community.
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One cancellation rarely creates one problem - it creates a multitude. Volunteer coordination isn't difficult because volunteers are difficult. It's difficult because plans change, availability changes, life changes.
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