Search

Planning: Assessing Your Organization’s Volunteer Needs

Planning: Assessing Your Organization’s Volunteer Needs



Have you come into an organization that already has volunteers? Perhaps you have been directed to engage volunteers or maybe you’ve never worked with volunteers and think now is the perfect time!

To set yourself up for success, it is important to look at your organization’s needs (even if you already have volunteers) and ask - why volunteers?

dialogue bubbleFeedback from the Field

How volunteers enhance our work:

  • Build community
  • Raise awareness of the literacy issue
  • Increase our capacity to offer services
  • Extend limited resources (time, people and dollars)
  • Wouldn’t be able to run programs without them
  • Dedicated to the work
  • Long-term volunteers can provide continuity for an organization
  • Become advocates, supporters, donors, even staff

Consider these questions:

First, will engaging volunteers enhance the work of your organization? How?

That means thinking about:

  • Your vision/mission/mandate (Would volunteers further these?)
  • Your reach in your community (Would volunteers help you engage differently or with more people?)
  • Your services (Would volunteers extend your reach and resources?)

"Without [volunteers] our program would come to a screeching halt! They do 100% of our one-on-one tutoring and 95% of our classes...they are a wealth of information...with great ideas on how they can better meet student needs...Don't underestimate your volunteers."  - CALP Practitioner

 

dialogue bubbleFeedback from the Field

 Meaningful Roles volunteers have filled for CALPs:

  • Tutors
  • Adult Program Facilitators/Assistants
  • Family Literacy Program Facilitators/Assistants
  • Childminders
  • Administrative/Reception
  • Board members
  • Fundraising Committee
  • Creating/maintaining program materials
  • Editor
  • Newsletter writer
  • Advocate/Recruiter
  • Data collection
  • Special events
  • Interpreter

Second, what meaningful roles could a volunteer fill?

So now think about:

  • What types of roles would help enhance your work?
  • What is something that never gets done because you don’t have enough time?
  • What are things you need help with once or on an ongoing basis?

 

"Meaningful for me is being able to genuinely help and make connections; I don't want "make-work" type of projects. It needs to actually help the organization." - Volunteer

 

And lastly, what is your capacity to manage volunteers?

This is a big one. Think about your own capacity, as well as your organization’s capacity to manage volunteers.

  • Does the benefit of having volunteers outweigh the time investment to find and manage them?
  • Can you spend time putting good processes in place at the start to make sure it is not time-consuming later?
  • Do you have a team that can spend time on this
    or are you by yourself?

"Very few of our volunteer tutors, facilitators, assistants come to our office regularly as they are at programs or meeting their learners off-site. This takes time to keep track and gather information from them. In our procedures, we have different staff supporting different volunteers and have shared the communication pieces. - CALP Practitioner 

Question Mark Did you know? 

“Meaningful” is something different for every volunteer. It could mean sharing skills, gaining experience, new connections or making a difference, to name a few. For an organization, "meaningful” should mean that the volunteer role you have serves a real purpose that helps your work.

    

dialogue bubbleFeedback from the Field

Capacity to Manage as an Organization:

  • “Think of volunteers as employees - they represent your organization in the same way as staff do. Whatever you would do to hire, support, or even terminate an employee could be done with volunteers. Your policies and procedures should reflect that.” 
  • “It’s really important to know how you are going to manage your volunteers so you can tell them when they start.
    It clearly outlines your expectations, communication paths, etc.. It takes a little more time in the beginning, but pays off in the end in not having to troubleshoot as much!”
  • “Know who in your organization is doing what for volunteers – who is supporting them?
    Communicating with them? If you are a one-person office or wear many different hats, what do you actually have time to do? Are there tools you can use to help?”
  • “There’s an excellent, inexpensive software package 'Volunteer Reporter' we use to help manage and track our volunteers.”
  • “If you have policies and procedures clearly in place, the benefit of volunteers completely outweighs the time invested and the few challenges you end up dealing with.”

Watch for more ideas for creating capacity with the help of volunteers as you work your way through this e-Learning.

 

   

  

As you plan your volunteer program, it is essential that you understand your organization’s needs. A needs assessment helps you plan for a volunteer position. The details from the assessment will help you speak with clarity to your team and potential volunteers about the position. That clarity is essential in placing volunteers appropriately.

Activity:

Use the following chart as a starting point for your needs assessment. Feel free to add anything that is specific to your organization. If you have a team of people in your office, do it together so everyone can start to understand your volunteer needs!

 Planning Chart image

Click on the image of the chart to download the entire document. 


Resources:

Community Literacy of Ontario (2005). Literacy Volunteers – Value Added Toolkit. Barrie, Ontario. (Chapter 2). Retrieved from http://www.communityliteracyofontario.ca/wp/wp-content/uploads/2013/08/toolkit.pdf

Volunteer Canada (2006). The Canadian Code for Volunteer Involvement: An Audit Tool. Ottawa, Ontario. (P. 13-14). Retrieved from http://volunteeralberta.ab.ca/wp-content/uploads/2017/06/CCVI-audit-tool.pdf