In our wired world, everything that happens offline, happens online and vice versa. People write a reviews about movies, electronics, restaurants and apartment complexes. Doesn’t it make sense that when a person considers volunteering precious time for a nonprofit organization, that they’ll turn to their friends and rely on the old word-of-mouth for recommendations?

A nonprofit’s volunteers are your organization’s ambassadors in the community. A million dollar marketing campaign is worthless if your volunteers aren’t speaking favorably of you. In the world of social media, every relationship counts. This makes volunteer management crucial to your organization.

Volunteer management is a popular topic. There are conferences, organizations, books and consultants dedicated to running good programs. I’m by no means an expert but below are some of the top mistakes that have personally happened to me, family or friends.

Volunteers should be empowered not ordered.

In recent years, there’s been a change in the way volunteers approach an organization. It’s no longer “tell me what I can do to help,” but rather “Here are my skills. These are the ways that I can strategically aid your organization. Let’s discuss what I can do.”

1. It’s ok to be disorganized. Volunteers understand that people at nonprofits are busy.
This is the number one sin. I hear this over and over again. People who volunteer have a limited number of hours to help out. They have busy jobs and families too. Would you like your time to be wasted? My friend, Raee wrote:

…a lot of the past experiences I’ve had deal with two or three major issues:
Lack of organization. Not meaning that the event itself isn’t disorganized but that they’ve done little (or no) organizing of the volunteers themselves — what each group is responsible for; what tasks are assigned. Overall it means that you have a people not understanding what they should be doing and milling around. A waste of everyone’s time and a totally lack of efficiency.

A lot of the AmeriCorp run events I worked at had this problem. Sometimes the cause isn’t enough — you need to really focus and find ways to use people correctly.

When your volunteer program is disorganized, it’s telling your volunteers that they aren’t important. You don’t respect their time, effort or dedication to your cause. Chances are, they’ll give up and go spend their time somewhere else. When someone is willing to work for you for free, why make them angry?

2.Treat professional volunteers as envelope stuffers.
There are many levels of volunteering. From the people who help with administrative tasks to board members. When someone invests time in your organization take the time to find tasks that match their background.

This is a growing problem in not-for-profit organizations. While organizations must run by decisions from executive staff, seek out highly-trained volunteers to help. As more and more Boomers retire, they’ll be going to nonprofits to offer their skills and experience. These are no longer your grandmas wanting to stuff envelopes or answer phones. These are people who have led successful careers and now want to give back. If a person has a skill or talent, use them. Don’t assign them a menial task.

Furthermore, Millenials are entering the workforce in greater numbers every year. This generation puts in more volunteer hours than any other one combined. They grew up with an intense focus on community and giving back. Find these people and nurture them. They may be young, but have a passion for your cause, time and critical skills. Age and maturity aren’t necessarily the same things.

Finding the right fit for your volunteers is crucial. That can be the key to a long-time volunteer or someone who drops off your list.

3. Why interview volunteers? They’re not employees.
Every single person that helps your organization should sit down for an interview and orientation. Don’t grill him or her, but inquire about backgrounds, current jobs, previous volunteer experience and education. You may uncover some jewels and you may raise a red flag.

This is critical if your organization works with kids. Always run a background check and a drug screen. If volunteers are working directly with children with no supervision, they need a training component. People may have a desire to work with children but have no experience.

4. It’s ok to fire volunteers.
Unless there’s a red flag with backgrounds, or the person clearly isn’t doing their job, don’t call someone up and fire them. That person has made a commitment to your organization and is doing work for free. Why ruin the goodwill? If there is a problem, take the time to sit down and find a better fit for them. While sometimes you do need to trim dead weight, every single relationship counts. You never know who that person knows or what they will do in the future.

5. Don’t trust your volunteers. It’s ok to micromanage.
There’s a balance between not enough supervision and micromanaging. No one likes to be constantly monitored. When you have a highly-skilled volunteer taking over a task for you, empower them. Again, this is a growing problem as professionals enter the volunteerforce. If someone knows what they are doing, trust them.

From personal experience, I admit this can be hard to do. Programs run on shoestring budgets and tight deadlines. Things have to be done right the first time. However, finding and trusting volunteers with professional skills can over a lot of responsibilities. Set guidelines and create a system that works.

This entry was posted on Saturday, June 21st, 2008 at 9:56 am and is filed under Uncategorized. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.