GUEST POST // Delegating Work to Volunteers: A Guide for Nonprofits
By Cassandra Smallman of InitLive
Over the past year, many nonprofit organizations have struggled to secure funding and keep important programs going amid the ongoing effects of the pandemic. This has resulted in a greater appreciation and reliance on volunteers.
Reliable and dedicated volunteers can be one of the greatest assets for your nonprofit, and with that comes the responsibility to ensure that each volunteer is placed in a role where they can make the most impact.
Creating a dedicated strategy for delegating volunteer work can help set your organization up for long-term success. With the help of effective tools and strategies, you can collect and store valuable information about your volunteers that will help you match each volunteer to the right role to ensure they can thrive and maximize their positive impact.
In this guide, we’ll explore the best practices and strategies for delegating work to volunteers in the following sections:
The Essential Steps of Delegating Work to Volunteers
6 Tips for Delegating to Volunteers
The Essential Steps of Delegating Work to Volunteers
There are plenty of reasons why your organization may want to delegate tasks to volunteers. For instance, you may have a major event coming up, such as a 5K or benefit concert, and need volunteers to help run the show. Or, perhaps you want to scale up your existing community support programs with more volunteers.
Whatever the project or program may be, as a volunteer leader, you may be asking yourself, how can I effectively delegate tasks to help complete the initiative?
Start off by specifying the outcomes you want your volunteers to achieve. Then, clearly define the roles and tasks you need to be done. Here are some tips to help you create your plan:
Know what should be delegated - Certain tasks can easily be completed by volunteers, while others require more specific knowledge that only your nonprofit’s team members have. Be sure to only delegate tasks that align with your volunteers’ skill sets.
Determine who to delegate to - Your volunteers have a wide variety of skills and talents. Properly utilize these skills by inviting your skilled, long-term volunteers to help with your major events or projects.
Determine how you will delegate - Create a checklist of items that need to be delegated and the skills required to perform a task.
Once you have clearly defined what volunteer work needs to be delegated, you can begin the process of matching the right volunteers to the roles and tasks.
6 Tips for Delegating to Volunteers
1. Provide proper training and support.
After you’ve taken the time to recruit passionate volunteers, you’ll want to set them up with the right tools and training they need to do their best work. Building an effective training program is an essential part of a good volunteer management strategy.
Letting your volunteers know what they will be expected to do ahead of time makes delegating tasks easier because volunteers will already have background knowledge on the task they’re expected to complete.
With the proper training and support, you can help volunteers maintain satisfaction in their roles. There are many ways you can assist volunteers, such as:
Provide a warm welcome - Create a volunteer orientation event where new volunteers can connect with each other and get to know your organization better.
Create a communication plan - Develop a training plan and determine the communication channels you will use to get in touch with volunteers.
Access to resources - Ensure that your volunteers have access to all the resources they need such as volunteer training guides, schedules, and communication platforms.
2. Define what success looks like.
Sharing your organization’s mission is a great way for your volunteers to understand what role they play in your organization. Let volunteers know all about the scope of your organization's operations and the projects and programs that you facilitate. Providing them with an overview of your organization’s goals and how volunteers’ activities contribute to that will motivate and encourage them to support you.
According to the Deloitte Volunteer Impact survey, approximately 75% of working millennials said that they would volunteer more if they had a better understanding of the impact that they were making. Giving your volunteers greater context and insights into how their efforts support a greater cause will make them feel like integral members of the team.
3. Match volunteers with roles that align with their interests or preferences.
Volunteer satisfaction is one of the most important factors in motivating your volunteers to continue donating their time to your program. To ensure they have a great experience, it is important to make sure volunteers are given roles that support their strengths and interests. There are three main reasons why you should match your volunteers with their interests:
Increase retention rates and engagement levels - When you screen and schedule your volunteers, you can match shifts and roles with their interests and abilities. This allows your volunteers to enjoy the work they are doing and stay engaged.
Volunteers create more meaningful work - Once your volunteers know that they have an important role to play due to their strengths, their passion will show in their work.
Fill gaps in service - Every volunteer comes in with their own set of skills, and these skills will allow you to determine which volunteer is suitable for which services. Each volunteer will fill the gap of a required role.
Matching your volunteers with roles that suit their interests starts by having all the necessary information about them. Data management is the practice of gathering and assessing volunteer data to get to know volunteers on a more personal level.
When you have a strong data management strategy in place, you can minimize any potential errors from occurring by establishing standardized processes for data entry. Effective data management provides you insights on how to delegate the right tasks to the right people.
4. Provide a peer-to-peer fundraising guide for volunteer fundraisers.
Peer-to-peer fundraising is any fundraising effort that relies on your supporters reaching out to a broader audience and raising money on behalf of your organization. In other words, individuals can create fundraisers on your organization's behalf and share these donation pages with their personal networks. Providing your volunteers with clear guidelines on how to conduct their campaigns will be highly effective since you can encourage more people to get involved.
Peer-to-peer fundraising is a great way for your existing volunteers to share all the great work your organization is doing with their own networks and encourage their friends and family to support the cause. People are way more likely to donate when the ask comes from someone they trust.
Many organizations raise approximately twice as much with peer-to-peer fundraising compared to traditional fundraising.
There are different kinds of peer-to-peer fundraising campaigns, such as:
Online Peer to Peer Campaigns - Volunteers can create fundraising campaigns online to promote to their family and friends and set personal fundraising goals.
Peer to Peer Fundraising Events - Volunteers can create activity events such as races and walk-a-thons to boost fundraising power and easily share campaigns.
Team Fundraising - This is when many individual fundraisers come together and form a group to work towards a common goal.
5. Use volunteer management software to stay organized.
Volunteer management software (VMS) is a tool that helps you recruit, screen, schedule, manage, and communicate with your volunteers with ease. This allows you to stay organized and create a positive experience for your volunteers.
A good VMS should help you keep track of your volunteers’ progress. Your volunteer management software will help you keep track of volunteer schedules, check-ins and check-outs, emergency contact information, and other essential information.
Why are effective volunteer management strategies important for your volunteers? They keep volunteers informed, engaged, and committed to your organization, increasing long-term volunteer retainment. Investing in a robust volunteer management software benefits you in many ways, helping you:
Recruit - A VMS allows your volunteers to see all your opportunities and roles listed on your website. From there, volunteers can quickly sign up through a simple online registration process.
Qualify - You will be able to assess your volunteers quickly and make sure that your team has the right qualifications to get the job done.
Schedule - Through a VMS, you can quickly build out your schedule with shifts and roles and then share it publicly. Then, volunteers will be able to view available opportunities and sign up for the most suitable roles for them based on their qualifications.
Simplify Administration - Investing in an efficient VMS will ease all your administrative work and free your time since the software has features to collect and store information.
Create a Communication Hub - Your volunteer management solution should offer a platform for you and your volunteers to have immediate connections through text messages, emails, or push notifications.
6. Track volunteer data.
Tracking volunteer data eases your delegation processes because it allows you to delegate the right tasks to the right volunteers. Maintaining volunteer data logs in your volunteer management software will let you track information such as attendance, project progress, and volunteer feedback. This data is beneficial in improving your outreach the next time there is a volunteer opportunity.
The key to effective delegating starts with understanding your volunteer’s strengths, passions, and experiences, then tracking that data.
You can also use your volunteer database to track specific types of volunteers, such as long-time volunteers or new volunteers. You can search your database based on volunteers’ start dates. This allows you to segment your volunteer communications and send relevant information to each group. For instance, you might send a welcome email to new volunteers and a thank-you email to long-term volunteers.
7. Thank volunteers frequently and genuinely.
Now that your volunteers have put in a lot of hard work in your program, how can you make them feel appreciated? Thanking your volunteers immediately after all opportunities can go a long way!
You can show appreciation through follow-up emails or posting a social media post about their contribution. You can also post volunteer shout-outs on your social media pages to make them feel recognized and appreciated.
A comprehensive appreciation strategy will contribute to retaining volunteers and motivating them to stay involved. You can also prove your commitment to creating a positive volunteer experience by requesting feedback from volunteers. Asking for their feedback will inspire your volunteers to continue serving. They’ll feel like their voices are being heard, and your organization will be able to create volunteer opportunities that appeal to their interests and preferences.
It is important to ensure that your volunteer program runs efficiently with help from your skilled volunteers. Your recruitment process will allow you to understand the skills and abilities of your volunteers, allowing you to match volunteers with the right roles and delegate tasks efficiently.
Once you have conducted proper training to set up volunteers in their roles, you must step back and trust that they will successfully manage their tasks. As a leader, you will be there to support your volunteers when needed, but rest assured that your volunteers will be able to handle all their responsibilities.
This guest post was written by Cassandra Smallman.
Cassandra is a passionate content creator dedicated to fostering positive impact through thought leadership in both the Nonprofit sector and live events industry. You can find her work at www.initlive.com or on Linkedin and Twitter.
