8 Tips for Recruiting and Retaining Volunteers

Whether you have a handful or an army of volunteers, they’re the lifeblood of your charity. From helping at fundraising events and manning helplines to collecting cheques on your behalf, without them, many organisations would be unable to cope.

They’re your (unpaid) advocates, champions, ambassadors, and worker bees. So, it pays to treat them well.

With this in mind, here are a few top tips to help you recruit and retain volunteers.

1. Consider the reasons why people volunteer

Taking the time to consider why people volunteer can inform your recruitment campaign and the way you structure your volunteer roles. Some of the common reasons include:

• Giving back to the community and/or a cause they feel passionate about

• Wanting to be part of an event that excites them

• Looking to meet new people

• Hoping to learn new skills

• Wanting to build up experience for their CV

• Building their professional network

Think about each of these motives and build your volunteering programme around them. And be upfront about asking each of your prospective volunteers about their motives, so you can better match them with an assignment. When meeting with volunteers, ask what their motivation is and find a way to satisfy their needs and deliver on their expectations within the role they take on. This will ensure they stay motivated.

2. Prioritise volunteer inductions

You only have one chance to make a good first impression, so make sure you give volunteers a warm welcome and a great onboarding process.

For the uninitiated, ‘onboarding’ is the mechanism through which new volunteers acquire the necessary knowledge, skills, and behaviours to become effective organisational members.

A few tips to create a good onboarding process:

• Create a volunteer handbook containing all the key information about the organisation, the cause and the people behind it

• Set up 1:1 meetings between volunteers and key managers/senior members of staff

• Offer substantive training

For a more in-depth look at how to onboard volunteers, check out this article by Rosterfy

3. Help them develop new skills

Anyone who is willing to volunteer is likely to have a healthy curiosity and willingness to try new things. Indeed, many volunteers get involved specifically to develop new skills.

Consider your volunteers as extra staff who are capable of performing complex tasks using their experience and skills.

Consider running initial training workshops and doing refreshers every six months to allow volunteers to come together to share their ideas and experiences.

Provide leadership opportunities to those who want to shoulder responsibility and guide others. Help them connect with people they may not otherwise interact with. Understand their skills and background, as they may be able to do more than you’re currently offering them.

You can find out more about training volunteers in this blog post by markel.uk.

4. Support, don’t manage

You’re not paying your volunteers so you can’t manage them as paid staff. It’s a balancing act, negotiating what you need against what a volunteer wants to do and gain from the experience.

Get the balance right and you’ll have volunteers for life, but if the balance shifts in either direction, things can go horribly wrong.

Like any relationship, regular communication is key, but don’t forget it’s your organisation. If things aren’t working out, you’re well within your rights to call time on the relationship.

5. Implement regular catch ups

Regular meetings are vital as they’ll give your volunteers a sense of direction, especially at the beginning of their tenure. Make sure you give volunteers a chance to have their say and provide support and supervision when they need it.

6. Be accommodating

Try to be as flexible as possible with your volunteers. After all, they’re offering up their free time to help your charity, so be as accommodating as you can if they need to take time off or are unable to work their usual hours.

7. Acknowledge their contributions

Gratitude is a powerful thing. It can change a person’s outlook on just about any situation. Maintain morale by showing gratitude and demonstrating it openly. Don’t overlook the power of those small, simple gestures like taking your volunteers out to lunch, giving them a small gift, or sending a thank you card to their home.

8. Shout about their successes

Include volunteer case studies and quotes in your internal/external communications. Ask volunteers if they’d be happy to share their experience on film as a short video or in a case study to use in your recruitment and training collateral.

You could also recognise volunteers’ contributions publicly by highlighting their work in your newsletter/blog, or at an award ceremony.

With our extensive database of contacts, we’re in a strong position to help you find talented volunteers and paid fundraisers. Give us a call on 0203 750 3111 to get the process started.

What is a trustee?

Looking for an exciting and rewarding role in the charity sector with a ton of responsibility?A trusteeship might be just the thing you need.

A trustee is a volunteer who serves on the governing body of a charity, as part of a board of trustees.

The board has overall control of a charity and is responsible for making sure the charity is doing what it was set up to do.

Most boards meet monthly or quarterly, and trustees carry out their responsibilities alongside their full-time jobs.

Who can become a trustee?

As a general rule, anyone aged 18 or over can become a trustee. However, applicants will be disqualified if they’ve:

• been declared bankrupt, or had an individual voluntary arrangement (IVA)

• got any unspent convictions

• on the sex offenders’ register

Responsibilities of trustees

Trustees aren’t involved in the day-to-day running of the charity, but they are responsible for making sure it runs sustainably, effectively, and fairly.

The Charity Commission outlines six main key responsibilities:

1. Making sure the charity benefits the public.

2. Ensuring the charity follows the law and its own governing documents.

3. Holding the charity to account.

4. Making and supporting decisions in the charity’s best interests.

5. Managing the charity’s resources responsibly. This includes making sure the charity’s money, reputation, and people are managed properly and ensuring the charity has the resources needed to achieve its mission.

6. Acting with “reasonable care and skill”. This means using their knowledge and experience to make the right decisions.

Why do charities have a board of trustees?

They provide a crucial failsafe to keep the senior leadership on track and accountable.

Also, charities can’t be registsered with the Charity Commission without a board of trustees.

You can spend hours scouring the job sites for the perfect trustee role, or let us do the hard work for you. Its your choice.

Want to take the stress out of the search? Call us on 0203 750 3111 or email info@bamboofundraising.co.uk to get started.

How to deal with rejection from a candidate

You’ve shortlisted CVs, interviewed candidates, and chosen ‘the one.’

The only thing left to do is tell the lucky candidate they’ve got the job.

But what if the conversation doesn’t go your way, and the candidate rejects your offer?

It’s not uncommon. After all, some people only apply for jobs to try and get more from their current employer. Others may have several interviews and receive a better offer from another charity.

Either way, you need to handle the situation carefully.

Here are some tips.

1. Be polite

Sure, rejection is frustrating, but if your irritation comes through in your response, it’ll reflect badly on you.

The chances are, the candidate will badmouth you on social media for the world to see.

Your reputation is everything, so keep your communication polite and professional.

2. Ask for feedback

Applicants turn jobs down for many reasons. Maybe your offer wasn’t up to scratch, or the candidate was put off by something you said during the interview. Or they may have spotted some negative reviews about your charity that raised red flags.

Either way, feedback will enable you to adjust your recruitment process to ensure it doesn’t happen again.

3. Revisit your offer

If a great candidate rejects your offer because of the package, revisit it. Candidates hold a lot of power in the current market. And they know it. For that reason, they aren’t afraid to push back.

If you’re convinced they’re the right person for the job, ask them what you can do to make the offer more attractive.

Then revisit your offer.

Are you willing/able to pay more, offer more holiday, or tweak the benefits?

It goes without saying, you’ll need to consult your budget and/or company policies before adjusting the package.

A word of warning: Regardless of how keen you are to have a candidate on board, don’t push them into accepting the role, as it could backfire spectacularly. Think about it. If they reluctantly take the job and leave after three months, you’ll be back at square one.

4. Don’t be disheartened

Just because you offer someone a job, it doesn’t mean they’re going to accept it. It’s not ideal, especially when you’ve put a lot of time and effort into your recruitment process, but remember, it works both ways – you reject candidates too!

Need some help recruiting top-tier fundraisers that are in it for the long haul? Give us a call on 0203 750 3111 to get the process started. 

When Fundraising Goes Wrong

In an ideal world, all your fundraising campaigns would go off without a hitch. You’d smash your fundraising targets, attract loads of new donors and everything would run seamlessly.

But that’s in an ideal world. In reality, things go wrong.

Unsurprisingly, charities tend not to broadcast when something goes badly. But this is a shame, as mistakes offer great learning opportunities.

With that in mind, here are three examples of fundraising fails, and the lessons you can learn from them.

1. Concern Worldwide’s money mistake

Back in 2016, things were going well for Ireland's largest aid and humanitarian agency, Concern Worldwide. And then, all of a sudden, the amount of money coming in shot up.

You’d think this would be a success story, but the increase was not due to an influx of donations, but a catastrophic financial blunder.

The charity accidentally charged donors 100 times their chosen direct debit amount. i.e., donors that had set up a monthly payment of £5 a month, had £500 taken from their account. Those that committed to £20 a month, were charged £2,000.

ThirdSector reports that this was due to a new Bacs system which “had not been sufficiently tested and staff had not followed the charity’s internal control procedures”.

As a result, the charity not only had to refund all the donors but cover the charges they incurred as a result of the overcharge.

While neither the exact amount of money the fiasco cost them nor the amount of donors who jumped ship because of it was revealed, the charity was no doubt significantly affected on both counts.

What we can learn:

Don’t go live with new software until it has been checked and tested thoroughly with a control group. Then double-check and test it again. You can’t afford not to!

2. Women’s March email fail

In November 2021, the Women’s March USA sent out a call to their supporters, asking them to donate.

This is pretty standard practice, but what stuck out to recipients was the amount they were asked for: $14.92.

To those of us in the UK, the number might not have any significance. But to an American audience, 1492 is the year that Christopher Columbus arrived in America, marking the beginning of the genocide of indigenous people.

The charity received a barrage of complaints from left and right-wing audiences and was forced to put out the following statement in response:

“We apologise deeply for the email that was sent today. $14.92 was our average donation amount this week. It was an oversight on our part to not make the connection to a year of colonisation, conquest, and genocide for Indigenous people, especially just before Thanksgiving.”

The charity didn’t disclose how much was raised as a result of the email campaign, but it goes without saying, criticism and donations don’t generally come hand-in-hand.

What we can learn: Think about the implications of your fundraising campaigns. Could anything be misconstrued or offensive to your audience? Run the campaign past as many people as you can before going live, just to be sure.

3. Garden Bridge Trust’s catastrophic collapse

The Garden Bridge Trust was established as a charitable company in 2013, to deliver Transport for London’s high-profile “Garden Bridge” project (a footbridge and public garden over the River Thames, linking Temple with the South Bank.)

Between government grants and donations, over £50 million was given to the Trust for the project.

But in 2017, London Mayor Sadiq Khan withdrew funding for the project as he was concerned the Trust wouldn’t be able to raise the remaining £185 million needed to complete the project. This would have resulted in a partially constructed bridge in the centre of London or a massive bill on the doorstep of the government.

Either way, it would have hit taxpayers.

Once the Mayor of London withdrew support, the project was cancelled. But the chaos didn’t end there. Around £7 million was donated on a “restricted” basis, on the understanding that it would be paid back if the project wasn’t completed.

By December 2018, donors hadn’t seen a penny. This was particularly frustrating given how much money the Trust had received and how little transparency there was when it came to how they’d spent it.

A spokesperson for the Garden Bridge Trust said: ‘In all cases where the advice confirms funds as returnable under Charity Law, it is the intention and expectation of the trustees that they will be, and funders have been advised accordingly. The process of repayment is certainly taking longer than anticipated, for reasons that are beyond the control of trustees, but we continue to work towards resolution with Transport for London; and in the meantime, thank our funders for their support and continuing patience.’

The whole thing was a sham. The Trust was bailed out by TFL, but still, it cost the public a whopping £43m.

What we can learn: Although this is an extreme example, the lesson is simple: Never over-promise. Exaggeration or overconfidence in your ability to deliver can lead to your funders losing confidence and withdrawing support entirely.

And whatever you do, don’t start a project if you don’t have the funds to complete it.

When it comes to fundraising, you need a competent, capable team who won’t lead you into these kinds of mess-ups. We can help you find them. Give us a call on 0203 750 3111 to get started.

Five of the most successful fundraising campaigns ever

Every fundraising campaign aims to make a difference. But some achieve their fundraising goals - and then some.

Here are five campaigns that made it into the record books.

1. Most money raised in a week: Disasters Emergency Committee

The Disasters Emergency Committee (DEC), which is made up of fifteen British aid charities, started fundraising to support Ukraine, in March 2022.

The charity promoted the appeal heavily across mainstream media and social media, recruiting high-profile actors such as Kit Harrington and David Tennant to deliver the message.

Donations flooded in, including sizeable ones from the royal family and the UK Government.

The appeal raised a whopping £61,997,547 in seven days - the most money that’s ever been raised for a single cause in a week.

2. Most participants in a charity run: Run for The Pasig River

From the London Marathon to your kid’s school fun run, mass participation events are a great way to rally support for a good cause.

But Run for the Pasig River took mass participation to another level.

In 2010, the Manilla-based event attracted a whopping 116,086 participants.

Although that number hasn’t been topped since, it attracts a huge number of participants each year - united by a desire to make their environment a cleaner, healthier place.

3. Most money raised by a charity livestream: Z Event

Wondering if virtual fundraising is worth the effort? French-born Adrien Nougaret and Alexandre Dachary (better known by their online pseudonyms ZeratoR and Dach) would say so.

The pair have been running ‘Z Event’ (an annual virtual gaming event), on Twitch since 2016. But it hit new heights in 2021.

In an effort to refresh the event, the streamers brought together a series of famous French creators for a fifty-hour+ video game marathon. The influential creators encouraged fans to donate throughout. And by the end of the mammoth gaming session, they’d raised €10,065,480 – that’s £8,498,890 – for Action Against Hunger, making it the most successful live-streamed gaming event in history,

4. Most individual donations of all time: George Floyd Memorial Fund

After a police officer in the United States murdered George Floyd in 2020, a memorial fund was set up on GoFundMe to help his family cover his funeral costs and pursue justice.

The story went viral online, leading people across the globe to speak out and share their support.

More than five hundred thousand individuals donated – the most the platform has ever seen.

5. Most viral fundraiser: The Ice Bucket Challenge

Most of us will remember this viral campaign from 2014, which saw 17 million people pour buckets of ice-cold water over themselves to raise awareness and funds for amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS).

The videos received over ten billion views and increased mentions of the disease by 1,000%. And the challenge raised more than $115 million for the ALS Association. And the money raised through the fun, shareable challenge is still making a difference today.

Want your next campaign to be a record-breaker? We’ve got the talent to make it happen. Give us a call on 0203 750 3111 to get started.