ARTICLE

3 Things Churches Can Teach Nonprofits About Volunteers

Both nonprofits and churches struggle consistently with recruiting and effectively utilizing volunteers. People are increasingly more and more busy and too consumed with work and family to volunteer multiple places these days

Studies show that most Americans support a very small number of causes annually (with one typically being their church), so nonprofits have to manage their donors carefully and volunteers carefully.

Many churches solely rely on the internal support of their members. Their structural makeup requires it, and if churches don’t master the art of maintaining volunteers, they might have to shut their doors – while nonprofits can hobble along for awhile without volunteers, but will rarely thrive.

Here are three things nonprofits can learn from churches about volunteers:

1. Have someone influential ask.

We’re all a little vain, aren’t we? I hate to say it, but when my pastor calls me and asks me for my help selecting a new church database management system, it’s a lot harder for me to say no than it would be to just about anyone else.

If you’re struggling to line up volunteers, get your ED to make a phone call. Ask the CEO to go visit someone with you. You will be amazed at how people’s availability changes when they are made to feel more important. In much the same way that Tom Ahern tells us to make the donors the star of the show in your acknowledgment letters, I’m urging you to make your volunteers the stars!

2. Don’t overwhelm your group of prospective volunteers.

One thing I’ve learned from working on big projects at my church is that prospective volunteers sometimes assume the worst. They think they are going to have to run the whole program, be in charge of a lot of people, be at the whole event all night, etc.

That fear can cause them to avoid volunteering.

Break it down into small chunks for them, let them know you only need them for a couple of hours, just one small task and so on.

3. Ask them what they want to help with!

My wife teaches Head Start, so naturally people assume she would want to volunteer in some child care capacity. And she subs in sometimes during Sunday school and is happy to help. But sometimes she might rather enjoy interacting with adults a little more. Yes, I have a (relatively) technical background, but I too would rather work with other adults and not just computers.

You will get a much better response if you ask your volunteer pool what they would like to help with. It may not always be what they do in their day job. The responses may surprise you and teach you something you didn’t know about the person.

All three of these suggestions really involve you being engaged with your volunteers. Get to know them, and keep getting to know them (people’s wants and needs evolve!).

One of your big focuses should be on donor retention through better donor engagement; volunteer retention through better volunteer engagement can be just as rewarding!

How does your organization maintain a healthy volunteer program? Let me know in the comments below!

James Goalder

With almost 20 years of experience working in nonprofit technology and sales and relationship management, James brings the perfect blend of experience for his role as Partnerships Manager at Bloomerang. In his 7 years at Bloomerang, James has enjoyed helping nonprofits and those who work with them find success with Bloomerang, utilize software to increase their effectiveness, and ultimately achieve their missions

Comments

Joseph Cole

If it's not a word, than it should be! While every nonprofit leader feels awkward bringing up the financial issues, I think that awkwardness is compounded in faith based organizations by a misunderstanding of humility, which is more to us than a good character trait. It's a virtue. The faulty idea is that anything dealing with money is somehow attached to greed or some other vice. Then, every conversation around money becomes a necessary evil. I feel nonprofit leaders of faith based organizations are acting with more humility when they strive for transparency (because this serves the donor's interests, not ours).
James Goalder

Thanks Joseph, great points! My experience in churches has always been that there is a perceived "uncomfortableness" (just made up a word, I think) when it comes to budgetary issues, but in reality, most volunteers want to know more about the financials because it helps them become better stewards. Thanks again!
Joseph Cole

So right on! When I was a pastor, we never got anything done at my church without volunteers. One thing I would add to this list—something that really boosted my volunteer response—was to tell my volunteers up front what the budget for the project was. Even if I asked them to contribute financially to the project, knowing that the church was willing to put resources into it went a long way to show them that we were committed to the project. Our church suffered from the poor funding policy that each department head was responsible to raise all the money they needed for their program. This effectively killed our volunteer response. Don't make that mistake! Give them a budget.