by Eric Goudie

Created on: February 27, 2009

Building and maintaining a strong, effective pool of volunteers is vital to the success of any non-profit organization. Whether they are paid or not, people are the lifeblood of your institution. How effectively you serve your cause depends directly on their enthusiasm, expertise and empowerment. Building on those three qualities in your volunteer core is the best way to keep your best people coming back to help again and again.

People tend to volunteer for those causes that are nearest and dearest to their hearts. Mothers Against Drunk Driving is filled with volunteers who have lost a family member or friend to a drunk driver. In their desire to volunteer they won't be easily deterred by bad weather, long commutes or unfriendly staff. For many of them the work they do is, quite literally, a matter of life and death, and they need no greater motivation for volunteering than to save as many others as possible from experiencing their grief.

But even if your organization doesn't work to alleviate such heart-wrenching human suffering you can still build enthusiasm in your volunteers. There are many ways in which you can do this, but one of the best is to show them the positive consequences of their volunteerism. Share the success stories. Show them the children who learned to read after getting some extra help. Present them with numbers showing how many people were given a hot meal, how much trash was cleaned up in just one afternoon, and how much money was raised in the silent auction. Tangible accomplishments, no matter how insignificant they may seem to a seasoned, burnt-out staff member, may be exactly what a volunteer on the verge of leaving needs to hear. Don't reserve those stories for the recruitment brochure: you can never tell a volunteer too often how important they are to your organization, and how much you value their efforts.

Hand in hand with enthusiasm must come expertise. A knowledgeable volunteer is a happy volunteer. They must be able to meet the needs of customers, clients, the public, other volunteers or whomever they interact with in the course of their duties. It's important that for every situation or problem they are likely to encounter they are given a solution, one that they can implement quickly and easily. The "no-win" and "no easy answer" situations should be left to the staff, who are being paid partially to deal with unpleasant and stressful dilemnas. Train your volunteers thoroughly, train them well, and keeping them trained through

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