Dissertations / Theses on the topic 'Volunteer Management'

Volunteers are necessary for the economy and impact the community by helping non-profit organizations provide services to those in need. The need for productive volunteers is growing and will likely continue to grow amidst nation-wide budget cuts. Finding practical, low-cost strategies to facilitate engagement within volunteer workforces is the next step in addressing how non-profit organizations can alleviate the volunteer shortage. Following social exchange theory and reciprocity norms, I propose that volunteer meetings are an avenue through which exchange relationships between organizations and their volunteers may be generated, thereby influencing volunteer engagement. Specifically, I hypothesized that volunteers’ satisfaction with meetings will be associated with their engagement and that volunteer perception of voice and role clarity will moderate the relationship between satisfaction with meetings and engagement. Survey responses from volunteers in a variety of non-profit organizations was collected. Data was analyzed using factor analysis and multiple regression analysis. Volunteers’ satisfaction with meetings was strongly associated with their engagement. However, the relationship of volunteer engagement on meeting satisfaction was not moderated by volunteers’ perception of voice nor role clarity.

This multi-case study examined interorganizational relations of co-coordinated volunteer program partnerships between select U.S. National Park Service (NPS) sites and their nonprofit partners. National parks face ongoing funding challenges, resulting in staff reductions and the inability to address many park and visitor needs. Cutbacks and more park visitors translate to greater need for volunteers. Many national parks have nonprofit partners that traditionally focused on fundraising. In 14 cases, these nonprofits expanded their activity to include co-coordination of volunteer programming with NPS partners.

Six partnerships were selected for in-depth study based on a quantitative survey. The study's research questions focus on how the partners collaborate, structures of their co-managed volunteer programs, the programs' adherence to research-based tenets of volunteer program management and interorganizational collaboration, and similarities and differences among the cases. In each case, the partnerships resulted in substantial growth of volunteer programming.

As predicted by Interorganizational Relations and New Institutionalism theories as well as research on volunteer programs managed by a single organization, the volunteer program partnerships have many similar structures, face comparable challenges, and employ many of the same strategies to address challenges. However, the partnerships developed additional practices related to their volunteer programs being co-managed, including staff co-location, daily partner communication, creating a shared volunteer program mission, use of technology for communication, longevity of key staff, and innovative ways to multiply the number of their volunteer coordination positions. The partnerships employ a combination of ad hoc, decentralized, and centralized structures for their volunteer programs as well as a combination of universal, contingent, and configurational practices for volunteer program management. The largest volunteer partnerships also use more agreements, structures, and strategies.

Despite partially adhering to New Institutional theories that suggest structures within organizational fields become more similar over time, these volunteer programs also remain distinctive based on the partners' responses to unique features, challenges, and opportunities at their parks as well as due to different management practices. The most impactful programs take greater advantage of features of their locations, surrounding populations, and available staff. Finally, 'love' for certain parks emerged as a factor that both helps ameliorate conflict among partners and serves as the primary motivator for many volunteers. Overall, these partnerships resulted in expanded volunteer programs, enhanced partner relationships, and greater ability to adapt to changing conditions and opportunities.

Volunteers for non-governmental organizations can be difficult to recruit and retain for a number of different reasons. It is, therefore, important to maximize their contributions because NGOs rely on volunteers to assist their staff members to perform the vital operations in order to accomplish the mission of the organization. However, NGOs tend to have limited staff to train and monitor volunteers and often compete with business organizations and other NGOs for the same volunteer workforce. Therefore, retaining a strong reliable group of volunteers saves NGOs valuable time, money, and labor resources that can effectively contribute to the future development of nongovernmental organizations.

This study proposed an NGO leadership model to examine the value of integrity and inclusiveness as NGO leadership characteristics that impact the leader/volunteer relationship in terms of volunteer satisfaction and retention. For two months, the study uncovered the vital elements that provided volunteers with satisfying experiences that promoted the retention of volunteers in NGOs in the Southern California area. One hundred and forty one volunteers responded to a survey that measured perceived leadership integrity, inclusiveness, volunteer satisfaction, and volunteer retention in NGOs. Thirteen structured in-depth interviews were also conducted with current and former volunteers in order to examine their experiences, perceptions, and observations about the leadership characteristics under examination.

Quantitative and qualitative methods collected data for analysis to address the five research questions and hypotheses in order to determine the relationships between: (1) leadership integrity and volunteer satisfaction, (2) leadership inclusiveness and volunteer satisfaction, (3) volunteer satisfaction and volunteer retention, (4) leadership integrity and volunteer retention, and (5) leadership inclusiveness and volunteer satisfaction. Only three of the hypotheses were supported through correlational analysis, and further supported through qualitative analysis. Two hypotheses were quantitatively unsupported but qualitatively supported. Multiple regression analysis was used to test the NGO leadership Model and revealed that Inclusiveness was a better indicator of volunteer Retention than Integrity and Satisfaction.

Key words: Leadership integrity, leadership inclusiveness, volunteer satisfaction, volunteer retention.

Retaining experienced and qualified volunteer firefighters and emergency medical technicians is a concern throughout the volunteer fire service. Significant research has been conducted on the retention of volunteers in rural settings, but there has been limited research on retention of volunteers in suburban volunteer fire departments. In this case study of three suburban volunteer fire departments in Nebraska, 17 participants were interviewed about their reasons for joining and continuing to volunteer with their local fire departments. The participants also were asked about reasons they would consider resigning from their departments. The study found that the participants joined their departments and continued to volunteer because of a desire to serve their communities and help people and because they enjoyed the relationships on their departments. The participants considered resigning from their departments because of interpersonal conflicts within their departments and because of concerns about not meeting their departments' minimum response and training requirements. Although this study is not generalizable to all volunteer fire departments, the departments in this study can use the results to consider ways to improve retention of their volunteers. Activities which may improve retention include providing supportive and appreciative environments for the volunteers, limiting the conflict and disrespect on the departments, providing mentoring and leadership training, adapting the training and response requirement to reflect the availability of volunteers, and providing non-financial incentives to support the volunteers in their departmental activities.

Volunteers provide valuable human resource assets in many areas of society and are critical to the success of non-profit organizations. The Volunteer Functions Inventory (VFI) has been used for over ten years and has received the most attention from researchers who cite the theoretical basis, the predictive nature, and the general purpose application of the inventory as major strengths. However, there are several shortcoming of the instrument which limits its value to organizations that use volunteers. Several researchers have suggested that additional functions should be included in the VFI. The purpose of this qualitative study was to identify missing functions that should be part of this inventory in order to improve its effectiveness as a tool for identifying volunteer motivations. The problem was that the VFL is an incomplete survey of functions for volunteer motivations, which limits its usefulness to practitioners and researchers. This research study was a qualitative multiple case study analysis which included interviews with volunteers, informant feedback, and focus group review of the coding of excerpts. A total of twelve volunteers from three volunteer organizations were purposefully selected for maximum variation. Questions were field tested with four experts and the researcher conducted face-to-face interviews with each participant. Informant feedback was used to verify the transcription and the analysis of the results, and a focus group performed a sorting procedure to verify the results. The analysis supported use of the six functions included in the VFI, and found considerable support for the concepts of civic responsibility and debt or obligation as functions that provide motivation for volunteerism. There were a notable number of comments by the participants that aligned with these two functions, and were validated through the triangulation methods of participant feedback and the focus group. Based on this study, the researcher concludes that civic responsibility and debt or obligation are functions that should be included in the VFI. The researcher recommends that additional studies should be conducted to develop a modified VFI including these functions. This includes creating and validating questions for the two additional functions, and a testing and validating a revised inventory.

The purpose of this qualitative explanatory single case study was to understand why Knights of Columbus (KofC) volunteers in Ontario, Canada demonstrate motivation, organizational commitment, and engagement. The scope of the study was guided by two main research questions: “Why do KofC members volunteer?” and “How do KofC members combine elements of motivation, organizational commitment, and engagement in their volunteer activity?” The triangulation of participant interviews, observations from KofC general meetings, and online archived documents supported the study’s qualitative methodology that required rich, descriptive data. For feasibility, the population of this study was comprised of KofC volunteers within three councils in Ontario, Canada and 17 KofC members were selected purposively based on age and experience criteria for face-to-face interviews. Transcribed interview data, observational field notes and archival documents were analyzed and coded using NVivo 11 to uncover three emerging themes: living one’s faith, loyalty, and flexibility. The findings indicated that KofC members have alignment between personal and organizational values, intend to follow Biblical scripture to live their faith in the public square, and feel obligated to help others in need. Fraternity and unity were welcomed benefits that KofC members enjoyed while volunteering. KofC provides volunteers with role and task variety, which allows volunteers to choose the activities that suit their interest, skill set, and time commitment. By gaining insights from these themes, organizational leaders can improve their communication to potential and existing volunteers, foster stronger relationships among volunteers, and develop programs that engage volunteers through catered recruitment and retention strategies.