Cultivating a Healthy Volunteer Team: Practical Steps to Help You Engage, Equip, and Empower Your Volunteers

By Tracy Baer CMP CFMP

Many churches, nonprofit organizations, and associations partner with volunteers as an integral part of their daily operations.
These organizations often require unpaid assistance to help paid staff complete their work. Creating a healthy volunteer program where people feel equipped, appreciated, and empowered to perform tasks—and eager to invite others to participate on the team—can mean the difference between success and failure.
Tracy Baer, a certified meeting professional and a certified faith-based meeting professional, draws on her experience planning thousands of events to provide practical tips to help organizations succeed in this book. Learn how to:
· help volunteers embrace their decision to serve;
· communicate effectively with volunteers;
· design a system to manage volunteer efforts;
· screen and develop a volunteer team.
Other topics include matching the right people with the right position, setting expectations, and creating volunteer resources.
Build a team that is sustainable and that will help volunteers as well as the organization with the insights and action steps in Cultivating a Healthy Volunteer Team.

• Language: English
• Publisher: WestBow Press
• Release date: Aug 29, 2023
• ISBN: 9798385004119

Tracy Baer CMP CFMP

Tracy Baer is a certified meeting professional, a certified faith-based meeting professional, and is certified in conference management and event planning by the International School of Hospitality in Las Vegas, Nevada. As an events manager, events director, and chief operations officer, she has planned thousands of events and writes a blog about her adventures in event planning called “Tracy’s Tidbits” at www.mstracystidbits.com. She lives in St. Charles, Illinois. Visit www.tracybaer.com to learn more.

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Copyright © 2023 Tracy Baer, CMP, CFMP.

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ISBN: 979-8-3850-0410-2 (sc)

ISBN: 979-8-3850-0411-9 (e)

Library of Congress Control Number: 2023914245

WestBow Press rev. date: 08/24/2023

Contents

Preface

Introduction

1     Why Volunteers?

• Definition of a Volunteer

• Value and Impact of Volunteers

• Rewarding Returns

2     Preparing for the Team

• Gathering the Details

• Designing the Team Structure

• Number of Volunteers

• Team Org Chart

• Designing the Team Schedule

• Scheduling by Responsibility or Shift

■ By Responsibility

■ By Shift

• Position Descriptions

• Preparing the Leader

• Watching Your Words

• Keeping Your Words

3     Building the Team

• Screening the Team

• Invite, Don’t Recruit

• Don’t Act Desperate

• Matching People and Positions

• Setting Proper Expectations

■ Volunteer Handbook

■ Volunteer Agreement

• Expecting the Team

4     Readying the Team

• Informing Them

• Be Specific

• Training Them

• Write It Down

• Welcoming Them

5     Leading the Team

• Lending a Hand

• Keeping It Together

• Making Connections

• Paying Attention

■ Observing Them

■ Listening to Them

■ Thanking Them

6     Shepherding the Team

• Keeping Watch

■ The Tried and True

■ The Talker

■ The Complainer

■ The Melancholy

7     Improving the Team

• Developing Them

• Pruning Them

• Retaining Them

Conclusion

Appendix

• Resource A: Sample Menu of Volunteer Positions

■ In-Person Event

■ Virtual Event

■ At an Organization’s Office

• Resource B: Sample Position Descriptions

■ Setup or Load-In

■ Decorating Team

■ Room Hosts

■ Data Entry

■ Website Maintenance

■ Chat Moderators

• Resource C: Sample Questions for a Volunteer Application

• Resource D: Sample Table of Contents for a Volunteer Handbook

• Resource E: Sample Post-Serve Survey Questions

Preface

As the events manager for a large church, I had the pleasure of leading a team of event planners. Our role was to support ministries as they scheduled and executed their events. One specific role of our department was to build and deploy a volunteer team to serve at each event—from preparation to execution to cleanup. Over the years, we had a thriving volunteer team with over five hundred active members, and we supported hundreds of events. Later, I served as the chief operations officer of a nonprofit organization that equipped and educated pastors. Our organization partnered with volunteers to execute our own annual event and multiply the time of our paid staff members as we worked through the planning process. I gained a new set of skills as I learned how to work with a team of volunteers who lived in a different state from both the home office where I was and the state where the event was held. During my time on staff with this organization, the largest pain point the leaders