Tracy D. Connors - The Volunteer Management Handbook: Leadership Strategies for Success

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Published simultaneously in Canada.

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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

The volunteer management handbook: leadership strategies for success / edited by Tracy Daniel Connors.2nd ed.

p. cm.(Wiley Nonprofit law, finance and management series)

Includes index.

ISBN 978-0-470-60453-3 (hardback); ISBN 978-1-118-12740-7 (ebk); ISBN 978-1-118-12741-4 (ebk); ISBN 978-1-118-12742-1 (ebk)

1. VoluntarismUnited StatesManagement. 2. Nonprofit organizationsUnited StatesPersonnel management. I. Connors, Tracy Daniel.

HN90.V64V65 2011

361.3 07068dc23

2011015869

To Faith Raymond Connors,
my beloved volunteer
resource manager for over 50 years

Preface

Nonprofit organizations (NPOs) provide the majority of human services in the United Statescollectively called quality of life. Better management and leadership within these organizations directly contribute to an improved quality of life for millions of Americans. This has been the overarching goal of the many books, articles, and training courses that have been developed in recent years focused on NPO and volunteer management (Connors, 2010 a).

It has been slightly more than 30 years since the first Nonprofit Organization Handbook was published (Connors, 1980). The handbook's organization, fulfilled by 28 contributors, established for the first time the fact that regardless of the specific public service provided, not-for-profit organizations shared seven areas of managementfrom fundraising to volunteer administration.

Volunteers: An Indispensable Human Resource in a Democratic Society was the title of the section in the NPO Handbook that covered all major areas of volunteer management and administration. All five of the chapters in that section were written by Dr. Eva Schindler-Rainman, a gifted visionary in several fields. A brief overview of her remarkably accurate predictions made in 1980 about the world of volunteer resource management provides a benchmark against which we can both measure progress and chart a course into the future:

Volunteers will be in every sector of the community, Schinder-Rainman predicted, all over the country, and they will be affecting policy making, changes, and growth.

New courses will be offered in community colleges and universities for administrators of volunteer programs as well as for volunteers themselves.

Credit will be given for volunteer work. (Agencies will keep track of what volunteers do so that volunteers can include this experience in their resumes.)

Research on values and the effect of volunteers on the delivery of human services will increase.

New collaborative bodies will emerge to utilize better the human and material resources that are available.

New, portable, interesting, participative training programs for paraprofessionals, professionals, and volunteers will be developed.

New ways to recognize volunteers will be developed (Schindler-Rainman, 1980, pp. 37).

This is probably the most exciting time in the history of the United States to be active in the volunteer world, Dr. Schindler-Rainman concluded her prescient perspective. These times offer a tremendous opportunity for volunteers to make important contributions to the quality of life and to human services in their communities. It is clear that the volunteer administrator is a key person in translating the motivation, interest, resources, and skills of volunteers into human services to the clients of our people-helping agencies and organizations.

The Present of Volunteer Resource Management

A work such as this handbook is designed for both the present and the future. As an answer book for volunteer resource management, it attempts to provide useful perspective and guidance for current issues as well as to anticipateand coverwhere possible, those trends, issues, and developments that lie ahead for this important area of management.

Despite the challenges and pressures of America's struggling economy, Americans are still volunteering in record numbers. Their generosity and willingness to serve their communities account for a significant proportion of the enormous variety of human services provided by the nation's voluntary action sector. As our economy has slowed and charities have struggled to provide services based on budgets that were ever more constrained, volunteers have become even more vital to the health of our communities and their ability to sustain quality of life for their citizens. Most charities that use volunteers to provide all or a portion of their public services and mission fulfillment report they are increasing the number of volunteers they use. This further validates how important volunteers are to any nation depending on voluntary action organizations to provide an astonishing variety of services on which many aspects of national quality of life are based. In addition to the invaluable services delivery contributions volunteers provide, they are also much more likely than nonvolunteers to donate to a charitable cause.