Volunteer Retention: How to Keep Your Team On Your Team

I’ve been dabbling in volunteer teams since before my high school principal (not affectionately nicknamed Scrappy) pushed a diploma into my hand. So while some enviously crafty people have endless shelves of scrapbooks, I have walls of folders crammed full of  learnings about how to nurture great teams. The notes, and more so–the experiences–are worth their weight in gold.

One of the trickiest areas in volunteer management is retention. Below is a quick list of reminders for how to keep your team on your team.

Volunteers stay engaged and increase devotion when they:

• Can see their task/role made a difference.
• Are publicly and privately praised.
• They feel like they are appreciated.
• Get to be part of setting goals and solving problems.
• Feel the organization has the time and energy to resource them well for the task.

And two more at the TOP of my list:

• They believe they belong to your tribe.
• They have opportunity to grow themselves and test their wings.

My post on The Perfect Volunteer and other fresh takes on volunteer teams can be found here.

[[For more learning, check out:
Fisher, J. & Cole, K. (1993).  Leadership and Management of Volunteer Programs.  San Francisco: Jossey-Bass Publishers.
Morrison, E. K. (1994).  Leadership Skills, Developing Volunteers for Organizational Success, Fisher Books, Tuscon, AZ.]]