Volunteers

What Are Your Volunteers' Stories?
March 16, 2016 at 11:25 am

Recently, we were preparing a collection of stories to share with a campaign steering committee—profound stories of mission impact that moved the heart, and stressed the importance and urgency of the fundraising campaign’s end results...

Baby Boomers to Give $8 Trillion to Charity in Next 2 Decades
March 9, 2016 at 10:52 am

The Baby Boomer cohort is entering retirement, but they’re not done leaving their marks. Boomers are set to give $8 trillion to charity, in the form of money and volunteer hours, over the next two decades, according to a Merrill Lynch study. Giving by retirees will account for half of all giving by 2025, said…

5 Tips to Screen Your Volunteers
March 2, 2016 at 11:06 am

More and more organizations are screening all of their volunteers—not just those that work with children, the elderly or the disabled. That’s because they understand that failing to screen everyone means they are risking their organization’s assets, reputation and safety....

Enthusiasm: Essential for Fundraising Success
March 2, 2016 at 10:47 am

Super Tuesday results are in. Candidates and prognosticators are busy spinning the results. The candidates, regardless of where they may fall and what the future may hold, have one thing in common: enthusiasm....

The Unfortunate Separation of Mission and Fundraising
February 24, 2016 at 11:00 am

Separating mission work from fundraising work is a deeply rooted practice in nonprofit. I challenge that. I challenge the idea that there is any scenario where a complete separation is necessary or more productive than collaboration. Here is a good illustration of what could be....

Is Volunteering in Decline?
December 16, 2015 at 10:14 am

It’s no secret: Donors are a nonprofit’s lifeline. But money isn’t the only thing worth giving ... or getting. Yes, cash keeps the cause funded (and the office lights on), but the contributions of volunteers are worth their weight in gold. When volunteers give their time, they take an active role in the organization’s mission and pledge their support to the cause. Clearly, volunteers are valuable. But they aren’t always easy to come by...

Volunteer Leadership Means Big Money
November 13, 2015 at 8:36 am

Relay for Life sprang from nothing in 1985 to more than $400 million per year at its height. In spite of that gargantuan success, no other nonprofit has been able to put the volunteer-driven model to work in the same way. Why is that? Why have no other organizations been able to get volunteers to handle events in the same way or fundraise at the same levels?...

Are Employees and Volunteers Motivated the Same Way?
October 9, 2015 at 9:33 am

According to a recent Gallup study of 230,000 full-time and part-time workers in 142 countries, only 13 percent of people feel engaged and fulfilled by their jobs. In other words, nearly nine out of 10 adults spend half their waking lives doing things they would rather not be doing at places they would rather not be. It’s not rocket science to figure out what keeps them showing up (the paycheck) even though for them, work is more a source of frustration than fulfillment...

The Hidden Cost of Control
July 31, 2015 at 6:00 am

I was consulting with an executive with a major health-care nonprofit. She mentioned a concern about the way that organization’s staff interacted with volunteers. She felt like staff members were being too prescriptive in their instructions about fundraising, and that was probably a bad thing, although she couldn’t tell me exactly why...