Many association leaders learn quickly that a thriving and fast-growing organization often becomes a demanding work environment. A big workload with not enough staff can be a recipe for burnout — which is something everyone wants to avoid. Here’s what to know about balancing work load between staff and volunteers in your organization.
Implement Clear Expectations for Each Group
The intricacies of running a small organization are unique for each department and may be difficult at times. Luckily, solutions exist that can help. A lot of nonprofit organizations encourage supporters to contribute by volunteering their time in order to support them. While this allows people to get to know your organization, it can also help your staff.
Establishing a sense of community and teamwork between paid workers and volunteers for an organization is important. Without doing so, resistance and distrust of an institution can occur which harms the overall morale. Differentiating between responsibilities of the two groups will clear any confusion regarding responsibilities, thus leading to better productivity.
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Responsibilities of Organization Volunteers
Avoid giving volunteers monotonous and unfulfilling tasks. This will encourage them to stay with the organization and will help with work in a demanding environment. By assigning valuable duties to volunteers, you can ensure a better sense of loyalty and enthusiasm.
Clerical work can provide a more fulfilling experience for those who have the extra time to work for free. Another great example of a volunteer’s responsibility can be a volunteer coordinator or grant writer. Assigning volunteers grant-writing tasks can offer valuable experience and learning opportunities in the organization’s industry.
The following are some additional roles that can be filled by volunteer work:
- creating newsletters
- training other volunteers
- helping with fundraising
- planning and organizing events
Responsibilities of a Staff Liaison
After designating roles to volunteers, a staff liaison will facilitate communication and transparency between staff and volunteers. The staff liaison is given a more hands-on approach to completing projects by their deadlines. By implementing a protocol for how jobs need to be finished, the staff liaison can offer further advice, direction, and knowledge for volunteers.
This can entail tasks such as:
- coming up with agendas
- creating deadlines
- organizing projects to execute for the rest of the team
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Having a clear understanding that volunteers and staff liaison are working together with mutual respect for each other will be a key ingredient in successfully reaching a goal. The most important outcome of volunteers and staff is to achieve a shared vision in a balanced and efficient approach.
If you need further consultation on how to bring volunteers and staff together in order to reach success, then contact Dennison & Associates today. Our professional staff can help give you guidance and support on reaching your unique goals and overcome any problems within the workplace.
