Time Management Strategies for Effective Volunteer Management
If you are a volunteer coordinator or director who is looking for ways to be more efficient in your work, then this article is for you. Managing volunteers can be a difficult task when one does not have enough time to do all that needs to be done, but it becomes even more overwhelming when there are multiple volunteers. However, there is hope beyond the tired and restless feeling of constant juggling. By implementing these time management strategies, your job as a volunteer coordinator will become easier and less stressful so that you can enjoy your work again.
Yahoo! Groups: Volunteer Management
One of the best ways to spend your volunteer time is to perform administrative tasks, such as scheduling and making appointments, maintaining records and databases, as well as conducting research. When combining these tasks into one volunteer position, they can be managed with a lot of efficiency. When well-designed spreadsheets are used in conjunction with a database, volunteers will not waste their time on unnecessary tasks when they could be performing more vital duties. In this spreadsheets database try to include the information necessary for all the volunteers such as name, address, telephone number, email address and what they do in their areas of responsibilities.
It is best not to assign more than one activity at a time for each volunteer. This will allow each volunteer to perform his or her task with the utmost attention, without having to worry about something else at the same time. Some activities are better suited for volunteers, while others require specialized skills and knowledge that cannot be taught in a short time.
When it comes to selecting your volunteers, make sure that you know their skills and interests so you can be sure they are most suitable for the assignments you have planned for them. For some projects, it will be better to hire volunteers that are more skilled in certain activities. For example, if you need a person to represent the homeowners association (HOA) for events or meetings, then hiring a professional HOA representative would be most appropriate. On the other hand, if you just need someone to drive around on their days off and knock on doors at various times of the day, then not having prior experience with this type of work is not a problem as long as they genuinely want to help out.
It is important that your volunteers have a background check done before they start their volunteer duties. You should make it clear to them that you will not be responsible for any accidents that might occur during the time they are performing duties for your department. You can either have a volunteer background check done by a private company or to seek the services of your local county social services agency.
If at all possible, avoid assigning multiple tasks to one volunteer. This will not allow them to give their full concentration and effort in performing each task. Since there are many types of tasks in volunteer management, you can try delegating some of them to other department personnel even if they do not have any responsibility in the area. This way, you can save your volunteers from excessive tasks and free up some time for yourself.
Freelancer.com – Hire Volunteers or Pay Freelance Workers
Another time-saving strategy is to hire a freelancer, and not necessarily as an employee but as a volunteer who will work for his or her own benefit. You can contact freelancers through online job boards such as Freelancer.com, Guru.com and Odesk.com, or by contacting the people you personally know that are qualified in your area of work and might want to help you out once in a while on a voluntary basis.
Volunteer.com – Help People Help Others in Their Own Words
Providing the volunteers a place to work where they feel at home is another way of helping them save time and energy. A flexible location will allow them to carry out their duties in any number of places without having to be limited with the required space or equipment. The volunteers can use this space as needed, and even if they have to leave due to unforeseen circumstances, your department will not lose out on that much time you may have spent planning for completing some tasks.
Planning ahead and mapping out the tasks at hand can help you to identify which tasks are more important than others so that the most urgent ones are completed first, resulting in more effective volunteer management. When volunteers start to feel frustrated from facing too many tasks at once, you can assign them other tasks that they are more skilled in so they can keep their morale high.
For volunteers who need to perform additional tasks without the help of your department personnel, you can try to use a scheduling service like Volunteer Center and then assign each task to the volunteers as it comes up. This way, they will not be bothered by too many problems that might incur if a volunteer were handling multiple tasks for your department.
Concerns about the safety of your volunteers is another motivation for avoiding distractions in volunteer management. You should only hire volunteers who are experienced and competent in any type of work that they want to perform.
With proper planning, it will be easier to manage your volunteer program through a compassionate volunteer coordinator.
By Mike Minium, Volunteer Center (2008).
How to Be a Great Volunteer Coordinator: The Ultimate Guide , by Starla F. Shaver & Ellen P. Schacht, Ph.D.,
ISBN: 0817321461 Publisher: Independent Publisher (2008)
"This exceptional book is much more than a collection of ideas and tips for excellent volunteer management—it also covers the very real emotional and practical challenges that volunteers face in their work."--Donna L. Heitkemper, Ph.D., author of
"This is a terrific book that should be a 'must read' for every volunteer manager."--Mark Horoszkiewicz, Executive Director of the Volunteer Express Program (VITA) at the Center for Nonprofit Management, Eastern Michigan University
"Over the past 5 years I've read more than a few books on volunteer management. This one is by far the most thorough and easy to read." --Matthew Tansey, Volunteer Coordinator and Treasurer for the BC Cancer Foundation
by Libby MacNeil / Philanthropy News Digest / September 6, 2010. Volunteer Engagement: How to Make Volunteers Feel Impacted .
Conclusion:
Volunteer management is an important function of the HOA board that should not be overlooked. Volunteers are a valuable resource to your community and you must ensure that they have the proper guidance and the right tools for their work in order to help keep your community clean, safe and well maintained. While there is no such thing as a complete guide for volunteer management, this article is a good starting point for introducing you to volunteer engagement in your HOA.
References:
http://www.volunteermatch.org/
http://www.slideshare.net/volunteercenter/how-to-be-a-great-volunteer-coordinator
http://trainingzone.