The Nonprofit Squeeze

Nonprofits unprepared for what appears to be a historic influx of volunteers risk sending those folks home underappreciated and losing them forever--not just as volunteers but also as cash donors when the economy revives, says John Power, executive director of the Volunteer Center in San Francisco. Power is seeing more volunteers turned back to him by agencies that can't handle the larger numbers. Furthermore, he says, a chief concern now is that as nonprofits look to cut their budgets, the first heads to roll may be the paid staff that oversees volunteers. Suddenly volunteers won't get the training they need, and their whole experience goes downhill from there. One in three volunteers does not return, according to federal data, and a bad experience is a factor in low volunteer retention.