Volunteers in Community Archives

If you find you are losing volunteers, it's worth thinking about why.

Sometimes it's just normal for people to move on, and regularly accepting new volunteers can help bring in new ideas and increase diversity.

Volunteers moving on is only a problem if you think people are leaving you when they'd rather not, or because they feel unsatisfied. Having some one-to-one meetings, occasional group meetings, or email conversations, could help you find out if and why volunteers are unhappy.

Some concerns you might come across could include:

• It's not meeting their needs - recap on how well you understand their needs, were they realistic?
• It has become boring or repetitive - can you mix up the tasks better? Do you need a new project?
• They feel that the management is too much or not effective - review processes, use technology, and make it easier for people
• Their circumstances have changed - can you help? Be more flexible? Or do they need other support in their lives?
• It was just the right time for that volunteer to move on - sometimes it is

It's increasingly common for volunteers to come in and out of organisations more frequently. Accepting this helps to accommodate new and more diverse sources of volunteers.

Various things can drive these comings and goings:

• Working on cyclical events - for instance a seasonal programme
• Project based working, where the timescale is set at the start
• Student life, which has its own annual rhythm and course length restrictions
• Family life - the need to care for children/grandchildren in the summer holidays for instance
• Changes of the seasons - more people want to volunteer in January, and in spring. Fewer people do in high summer and in cold wet weather.

Cycles and replacement

Seasonal or project-based working, or the requirements of student or family life, can create a natural cycle of volunteers coming and going. The important thing is not to treat this as a negative.

Plan for recruiting to replace volunteers in advance - use internal and external recruitment:

• Recruit to a timetable, starting well ahead of your need
• Train well in advance, but not so far ahead that people forget the induction
• Make the best of your time by training volunteers in groups
• Provide everything as a takeaway resource: The Volunteer Pack
• Sign off on skills as you train them
• If your volunteers are jobseekers or students, you could consider adding a Customer Services qualification, delivered with a partner

Consider this project-based approach, and how it might relate to the work your group does. There may be some parts of your work which you could think of as individual projects. It may be worth thinking a bit about quiet periods throughout the year, and whether they represent time that everyone needs to recover and plan, or whether you need to fill them with additional projects.