Motivating Volunteers (Tyler)

I interviewed Aaron Cloud on March 9th, 2009.

Aaron gave me a short list of tips that would be helpful in motivating volunteers:

1) Golden Rule: Treat volunteers the way you would like to be treated. This is the most important of the tips that were given, because it drives the other tips. If you treat the volunteers with respect then they will respect you back. If you treat them with disrespect, then how can you expect respect back from them? Treat others the way you wish to be treated.

2) Time Off: Do not overwork volunteers. Even the volunteers who claim to desire to want to work really hard, don't allow them to burn themselves out. A volunteer who is burnt out is a volunteer who is useless. So, regardless of their desire to work, allow them to have time off. Force them to have a vacation and go enjoy themselves.

3) Face-To-Face: In large churches, especially, it is easy for a pastor or full-time staffer to organize volunteers without actually ever seeing them. They go from phone call to phone call signing people up for volunteer voids and then before you know it, they haven't seen a single person face-to-face. The personal contact is a necessity in order to create relationships between people. Meet people face-to-face.

4) Work Alongside: This goes with the face-to-face contact, but more importantly, you must serve with the volunteers. You have to do what the volunteers do in order for them to respect you and feel motivated. By showing them that you care about what they do, you are showing them that you care about them. Get your hands dirty. A supervisor that never gets his hands dirty is someone that isn't respected.

5) Schedule: If you give volunteers a schedule they will feel more in control of their time. If they know when and where they have to volunteer next, they will be more reliable and willing. So often, churches will call volunteers in the last minute, and they will not be able to come. Or, if they can come, they will not be effective. It is a bad situation for the church and the volunteer. So, motivate them by letting them know when they are supposed to volunteer next.

These are just a few of the many tips that Aaron had. Essentially, you just need to respect volunteers and view them as people and not tools.