Public Sector Volunteer Management

In order to effectively and consistently provide services to citizens, local governments have had to come up with creative ways for offering services demanded by their citizens. One popular approach became the creation of volunteer programs as local governments became increasingly reliant on volunteers. Volunteers are one means by which local governments help to increase meaningful engagement with citizens and help meet the increasing needs for public services with limited resources. On a broader scale, volunteers in public agencies provide a variety of services to fill gaps in creating and sustaining collective societal goods that otherwise might have been limited due to fiscal stress on local governments or eliminated. Public Sector Volunteer Management: Best Practices and Challenges adds to the understanding of how management practices may affect retention of volunteers. It provides an opportunity to add much-needed data to any discussion concerning volunteering at the local government level from the perspective of volunteer coordinators and aims to provide in-depth research on local government volunteer management practices. This book focuses on best practices identified as necessary for successful volunteer management in the public sector, specifically in a local government setting, making it a valuable text for researchers, academics, and students in the fields of public and nonprofit management, leadership, and human resource management.

Volunteer management has many challenges, not the least of which is how we study it and view it. Academics examine it from a variety of disciplines and practitioners experience it in a variety of contexts. However both approaches have limitations. In academia we go to public administration schools to learn about public and nonprofit management, to business schools to apply the principles of private enterprise to nonprofit management, to sociology departments to study the phenomena of volunteerism, to psychology departments to understand the motives of volunteers, and economics departments to examine the value or economic worth of volunteerism. The liability of the academic approach is the segmentation of study and research into departmental areas. The study of volunteers and volunteerism needs to cross all of these organizational and discipline boundaries to be fully appreciated and understood as a field of interest. In contrast, practitioners view volunteer management from their own unique experiences. They try to gauge success in volunteer management based on what they have encountered in particular organizations, towns, cultures, and countries in which they work. As important as these insights are, they are difficult to generalize beyond local settings. Just because an individual has been successful in working with volunteers, it does not mean that the lessons learned in one situation can be translated to others under all conditions. The target audience for this volume is anyone who manages volunteers. The goal of the volume is to demonstrate the breadth of thought on volunteer management, both across disciplines and a wide range of settings in which volunteers work.

Abstract: Shows how private citizens and public agencies can work together to provide a wide range of public services, from neighborhood crime watch to mental health assistance. It describes effective methods for managing volunteer programs sponsored by public agencies and demonstrates how volunteer programs can enhance the quality and impact of government services.

Explore the personality traits, values, and characteristics to look for in volunteers! Volunteerism Marketing: New Vistas for Nonprofit and Public Sector Management is an excellent research tool for volunteer organizers, academic researchers and reference librarians in the disciplines of business, education administration, health care, psychology, public administration, and sociology. This book will give you a better understanding of what kind of people to look for when seeking volunteers in hospitals, hospices, for organ donation, and for public education. Through studies and tests such as the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator, this book explores the personality traits and characteristics of volunteers in various fields. In Volunteerism Marketing, you will discover the characteristics that separate volunteers from non volunteers and the segmented characteristics of volunteers for differing venues. This information will assist you in attracting, training, and retaining the right volunteers for your organization. Some of the areas you will explore include: the differences between hospice volunteers and other types of volunteers the unique characteristics of hospital volunteers, such as these three social-lifestyle variables: the average number of hours served in a volunteer’s primary organization, the number of volunteer organizations in which the volunteer serves, and the volunteer’s frequency of attendance at religious services encouraging human organ donation with financial incentives exploring research that examines volunteerism as a part of social marketing utilizing the concept of market exchange to attract non-parents and the community as a whole as volunteers in public education Volunteerism Marketing: New Vistas for Nonprofit and Public Sector Management is the single most current and comprehensive guide to the subject of volunteerism. This exceptional reference provides you with decisionmaking support in a wide variety of nonprofit settings and gives guidelines for future research. The segmented and descriptive case studies, charts and graphs found in this valuable book will assist you in understanding the characteristics of volunteers for differing fields, while giving you an edge on recruiting and retaining them!

Shows how to organize and build a "volunteer management team" and effectively accomplish the goals of a volunteer program.

Explore the personality traits, values, and characteristics to look for in volunteers! Volunteerism Marketing: New Vistas for Nonprofit and Public Sector Management is an excellent research tool for volunteer organizers, academic researchers and reference librarians in the disciplines of business, education administration, health care, psychology, public administration, and sociology. This book will give you a better understanding of what kind of people to look for when seeking volunteers in hospitals, hospices, for organ donation, and for public education. Through studies and tests such as the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator, this book explores the personality traits and characteristics of volunteers in various fields. In Volunteerism Marketing, you will discover the characteristics that separate volunteers from non volunteers and the segmented characteristics of volunteers for differing venues. This information will assist you in attracting, training, and retaining the right volunteers for your organization. Some of the areas you will explore include: the differences between hospice volunteers and other types of volunteers the unique characteristics of hospital volunteers, such as these three social-lifestyle variables: the average number of hours served in a volunteer¿s primary organization, the number of volunteer organizations in which the volunteer serves, and the volunteer¿s frequency of attendance at religious services encouraging human organ donation with financial incentives exploring research that examines volunteerism as a part of social marketing utilizing the concept of market exchange to attract non-parents and the community as a whole as volunteers in public education Volunteerism Marketing: New Vistas for Nonprofit and Public Sector Management is the single most current and comprehensive guide to the subject of volunteerism. This exceptional reference provides you with decisionmaking support in a wide variety of nonprofit settings and gives guidelines for future research. The segmented and descriptive case studies, charts and graphs found in this valuable book will assist you in understanding the characteristics of volunteers for differing fields, while giving you an edge on recruiting and retaining them!

Completely revised and expanded, the ultimate guide to starting—and keeping—an active and effective volunteer program Drawing on the experience and expertise of recognized authorities on nonprofit organizations, The Volunteer Management Handbook, Second Edition is the only guide you need for establishing and maintaining an active and effective volunteer program. Written by nonprofit leader Tracy Connors, this handy reference offers practical guidance on such essential issues as motivating people to volunteer their time and services, recruitment, and more. Up-to-date and practical, this is the essential guide to managing your nonprofit's most important resource: its volunteers. Now covers volunteer demographics, volunteer program leaders and managers, policy making and implementation, planning and staff analysis, recruiting, interviewing and screening volunteers, orienting and training volunteers, and much more Up-to-date, practical guidance for the major areas of volunteer leadership and management Explores volunteers and the law: liabilities, immunities, and responsibilities Designed to help nonprofit organizations survive and thrive, The Volunteer Management Handbook, Second Edition is an indispensable reference that is unsurpassed in both the breadth and depth of its coverage.