Enhancing Volunteer Engagement to Achieve Desirable Outcomes: What Can Non-profit Employers Do?

Abstract

Engagement is a positive psychological state that is linked with a range of beneficial individual and organizational outcomes. However, the factors associated with volunteer engagement have rarely been examined. Data from 1064 volunteers of a wildlife charity in the United Kingdom revealed that both task and emotion-oriented organizational support were positively related to volunteer engagement, and volunteer engagement was positively related to volunteer happiness and perceived social worth and negatively related to intent to leave the voluntary organization. Consistent with theory, engagement acted as a mediator between these factors. The implications for future research and the relevance of the findings for voluntary organizations are discussed.

“Don't you want to stay?” The impact of training and recognition as human resource practices on volunteer turnover

“…HR practices can be vital tools for mitigating turnover in the context of paid employees. To date, we do not fully understand the mechanism between HR practices and volunteer turnover (Alfes, Shantz, et al, ); this paper, therefore, provides an important step toward this endeavor. Our findings show that HR practices play an essential role in volunteer retention; consequently, this study contributes to existing literature and research in multiple ways.…”

“…Aside from individual volunteer motives and dispositions, effective management within the organization also contributes to volunteer retention (Gazley, ; Hager & Brudney, ). Scholars have also examined volunteers' perceptions of the organizational context impacting retention success such as organizational climate (Nencini et al, ), the design of volunteer roles (Alfes, Shantz, & Saksida, ), organizational support (Alfes, Shantz, & Bailey, ), and job resources (Presti, ). Rather than relying on individual perceptions of volunteer management practices, this study builds on these findings and adopts a management perspective by drawing on objective measures of human resource (HR) practices that impact volunteer retention.…”

Struggling with Meaningfulness when Context Shifts: Volunteer Work in a German Refugee Shelter

“…Assumedly decoupled from the market logic, volunteer work is seen to celebrate the ideals of work autonomy, free choice, community, and social impact (Cnaan et al, ; Kelemen et al, ). Moreover, volunteer work constitutes an important site for identity work (Alfes et al, ; Cunningham, ; Grönlund, ), as it allows individuals to pursue altruistic values and political positions (Chen et al, ; Clary et al, ; Wilson, ). Furthermore, research points out how volunteering can satisfy individuals’ needs for social interaction and belonging (Hustinx and Lammertyn, ; O’Toole and Grey, ; Prouteau and Wolff, ; Wilderom and Miner, ).…”

Promoting volunteer engagement in the heritage sector

“…Heritage volunteers may adopt a wide range of different roles and have different patterns of attendance; they also bring different previous experience and skill sets to their role. Partly as the result of the non-contractual nature of their roles, managers and researchers have sought other ways to develop commitment (Alfes, et al, 2016) and retention (Garner and Garner, 2011), and have identified the pivotal role of volunteer engagement.…”