Research on Volunteering

Adults 65 and older are an increasing demographic, with many retired from work and reinvesting some of their time into volunteering. A new challenge for volunteer administrators is managing these older adults and, eventually, managing their decisions to withdraw or retire from volunteering.

This segment of older, volunteering adults was a major concern of U.S. and Canadian volunteer administrators who responded to a survey in a study reviewed in this issue’s Research to Practice. Almost 80 percent of the respondents were concerned with volunteers retiring or aging out, and the resulting impact on their volunteers, volunteer programs, and organizations. Few indicated that their organization had policies related to this issue, which led to a logical conclusion: though a lot of attention is paid to recruitment and retention of volunteers, it is now time to add volunteer retirement to the conversation.

High school students do not often think of nonprofits as an option for career-building. Although they may have been exposed to nonprofits through volunteering or community service requirements, they are generally guided by career counselors and their parents to have career aspirations outside of the nonprofit sector.

In this issue of Research to Practice, Laurie Mook looks at a mixed-method study of nonprofit professionals from various chapters of the Young Nonprofit Professional Network and explores how students initially became aware of nonprofit careers and the connection between volunteering and career selection. The implications for volunteer resource managers and their role in fostering the next generation of nonprofit leaders are discussed. The conclusion? At a time when the need for nonprofit leadership continues to grow, volunteer resource  managers can play an important role in nonprofit career decision-making for students.

With more and more volunteer recruitment done online, it is important to take a step back and look at who has or doesn’t have the opportunity to volunteer as a result of not having household Internet access. Has digital access changed the demographics of who is being asked to volunteer or to serve in leadership positions such as on a board? In this issue’s Research to Practice, Laurie Mook reviews a study on the influence of household Internet access on formal and informal volunteering. The results confirm that “volunteer recruitment may not always be an inclusive process” and that nonprofits have a role in bridging this digital divide.

In this Voices, co-editor Tracey O’Neill reviews a new book called The Disruptive Volunteer Manager by well-known volunteer manager Meridian Swift. As O’Neill explains, the new book lays out six steps to increase awareness of volunteers and to try and elevate volunteerism by disrupting the volunteer management norm in a forward-moving way. Swift, who has more than two decades of volunteer management experience, calls it a “step by step journey to setting a new normal, one in which leaders of volunteers unleash the potential that awaits.”  And O’Neill provides an assessment of Swift’s new book that promises to “reframe, redefine, reshape, and re-imagine” volunteer management.

The voices of international hospice and palliative care volunteers come through clearly in a new book, The Changing Face of Volunteering in Hospice and Palliative Care. Published in mid-2018 by Oxford University Press and edited by Ros Scott and Steven Howlett, it presents an international perspective, history, and information on hospice and palliative care through the eyes of different country experts. And it also includes insightful volunteer narratives to illustrate and aid the reader in understanding the volunteers’ perspectives.

In this Voices, co-editor Allyson Drinnon reviews this valuable resource, with a special emphasis on the voices and stories of hospice volunteers that unfold in this publication. 

In our last issue, Research to Practice focused on episodic volunteers, as one-time or short-term volunteering is often called. This time, e-Volunteerism looks at a study of super-volunteers, defined as “individuals who volunteer 10 or more hours per week with a single organization” (Einolf & Yung, 2018, 789).

Based on in-depth interviews with 26 super-volunteers and nine volunteer managers, reviewer Laurie Mook presents the results of this research that sought to answer these four questions: (1) What characteristics and experiences of individuals cause them to become super-volunteers?; (2) What criteria do super-volunteers use in choosing an organization for which they will volunteer?; (3) What are the advantages and challenges in employing super-volunteers?; and (4) How can nonprofits best manage super-volunteers? The insights produced by this study, Mook argues, are useful for both those seeking and currently managing super-volunteers.

Volunteer Engagement Professionals (VEPs) commonly feel underpaid and undervalued and believe that their work is misunderstood. In times like these, they often turn to organizations like the Minnesota Association for Volunteer Administration (MAVA) for support, education, and connection.

To better understand the issues facing VEPs, MAVA embarked upon an important research study in June 2017, a study designed to validate the experience many VEPs described and to examine root causes. MAVA learned that: 1) there truly are equity issues in how VEPs are received, paid, included, and understood in the workplace; 2) the lack of true understanding about the essential nature of volunteers and those who lead them undermines the effectiveness of nonprofits and government entities; and 3) there are affirmative steps that can be taken to address the issues.

This e-Volunteerism feature by MAVA’s Karmit Bulman provides a comprehensive review of this important research study, “Stacking Up: How Volunteer Engagement Professionals Compare with Other Key Staff."

Episodic volunteering – as one-time or short-term volunteering is often called – is becoming the norm as times change and individuals move away from traditional volunteer roles that require consistent, long-term commitments. Technology has made it easy to find and sign up for events on the spur of the moment. It also makes it easier for organizations to organize such events and perform volunteer management functions such as recruiting, scheduling, and follow-up. Some of these events involve thousands of volunteers, and include marathons, sporting competitions, and festivals. 

One such mega event was the World Meeting of Families and the visit of Pope Francis to Philadelphia in 2015. In this Research to Practice column, reviewer Laurie Mook looks at the results of a study of the experiences of over 2,400 volunteers at this mega event in the City of Brotherly Love. Mook’s examination provides useful insights for episodic volunteer management.

What can an organization learn by examining why some people choose not to volunteer? In this issue’s Research to Practice, Laurie Mook reviews an article by researchers from Australia and the Netherlands that focuses our attention on these non-volunteers.

While we know a lot about volunteers, their motivations, and issues related to volunteer management, we know far less about non-volunteers. Using the concept of ‘volunteerability’ – defined as an "individual’s ability to overcome related obstacles and volunteer, based on their willingness, capability, and availability" (Haski-Leventhal et al., 2017, 2) – the authors in this study reviewed literature, held focus groups, and conducted a survey to understand the barriers that non-volunteers face in their willingness, capability, and availability to volunteer.

Although the article is positioned in terms of informing social policy, the findings are also useful at the organization level. Understanding the non-volunteer perspective can be helpful in attracting and retaining new volunteers to your organization.