Planning and organising

Having someone in charge of managing volunteers will almost certainly result in a better quality of experience for your volunteers. This will result in better retention and hopefully a steadier supply of new volunteers when you need them.

A volunteer coordinator can be a volunteer themselves, and in sports clubs and groups they often are. You can find out more information from the National Council for Voluntary Organisations about this role. Additionally, the Rugby Football Union website also has some useful information about club volunteer coordinator roles to further guide you. 

Support might involve arranging volunteer inductions, training, ongoing mentoring and making sure volunteers receive appropriate thanks for the work they do.

In some organisations a volunteer manager will directly support each and every volunteer. In others, another individual will oversee a volunteer’s work and provide support with guidance from the volunteer manager.

A big part of a volunteer manager’s job is ensuring that people within the organisation treat volunteers fairly and appropriately. They also need to make sure that volunteers understand their roles and entitlements properly. This often means putting a volunteering policy and volunteer agreements in place and making sure these are actively used.

Additional resources

The role of a volunteer manager or coordinator is a hugely important one in a sports club or group, because very often a club is run entirely by volunteers. You can learn more about the role of volunteer manager by visiting the National Council for Voluntary Organisations’ website and reading the National Occupational Standards for volunteer managers.

It’s important to remember that these have been written for people who are in paid volunteer management posts. If you’re a volunteer yourself who helps your club in your spare time, remember that these are professional standards.

Don’t worry if you think you don’t meet them because they don’t apply to you: you contribute what you can, and this is very valuable. However, they might be a useful reference to help you understand the potential scope of your role.

There are a few potential sources of support like this in the sports sector and voluntary sector, depending on your sport and where you are in the country:

• If your national governing body has a volunteering programme, they might have someone responsible for volunteer engagement. Visit your national governing body’s website or call them to find out if they offer help of any kind to coordinators
• Locally within your Active Partnership there will also be someone who supports volunteering, although it may only be a small part of their role. Visit your partnership’s website or give them a call to find out if there’s any support like this available in your area.

The wider voluntary sector also offers support to volunteer managers. Here are some groups that you could join:

• The Association of Volunteer Managers is a lively, friendly and participative networking and communication resource for all volunteer programme managers working in the UK
• You might also contact your local volunteer centre, which will have contacts with all the agencies they recruit through in your local area – they may have an established network.

• The volunteers you already have
• The skills they bring
• The time they commit
• What you’re currently missing in terms of skills and capacity
• What your plans are for developing your club.

If you’re a volunteer coordinator, it’s a good idea to talk to other people at your club and get their views on this – their insight can help you get it right.

It’s best to start with the tasks you need doing first, then looking at the skills of your existing volunteers and working out where the gaps are. This will help make sure you only recruit volunteers that you genuinely need. For instance, there’s no point recruiting five new coaches if your club doesn’t need them.

Volunteers who don’t feel needed generally have a poor experience and often leave, but a bit of time and thought before you go out recruiting can stop this from happening.

Some of the roles you need at your club will depend on how your club is structured. To help you with this, Club Matters has detailed guidance, including a handy skills matrix template.

While all clubs are different, there are some roles that most clubs have in common. Check your national governing body’s website to see if they have template role descriptions.  

Does the role involve formal responsibilities?

The chair of your club and the person who makes the tea on Saturday mornings are both volunteers. However, the chair is responsible for the overall running of your organisation, while your tea-maker is not. If a role involves formally conferring responsibilities onto somebody (which could be to do with health and safety, safeguarding, managing money or enforcing the rules of the club), then it’s good practice for them to have a role description.

Is your volunteer helping with a one-off task or will they be working with you for the long-term?

If you ask someone to help with your accounts once, then they may not need a job description because they’re an accountant and already know how to do the task, and once the task is complete, they’ll stop volunteering for you in this way.

However, if you’re asking someone to be your treasurer, then a role description will serve as an ongoing reminder of the scope of their role.

Is the volunteering role at a one-off event?

If the answer is yes, a role description will be useful when you advertise for and train your volunteers. Your volunteers only have a limited time in which to understand their role, so writing it down will help with this.

When you write a volunteer role description, it’s important you make it clear it’s not a paid job description and that the volunteer is in no way contractually obliged to perform any of the tasks.

Click here for more information on the differences between employees and volunteers.

Additional resources

• Volunteer Scotland – Volunteer role descriptions
• National Council for Voluntary Organisations – Writing role descriptions
• Club Matters – Templates for key volunteer roles.

This is because it may result in a volunteer being viewed as an employee in the eyes of the law, which should be avoided as it will entitle them to the same rights as one. Find out more on the differences between volunteers and employees by clicking here. 

For more information on writing role descriptions, we recommend paying a visit to the website of the National Council for Voluntary Organisations and reading Volunteer Scotland’s downloadable guide.

• They give guidance as to how volunteers are encouraged to behave in their roles and references to the club’s policies and procedures
• They clarify what sort of support the club will aim to provide to volunteers in return for their commitment.

If you do have agreements in place, it’s very important that they don’t suggest or imply that volunteers have any contractual obligations to your club or vice versa.

Unlike employment contracts, volunteer agreements shouldn’t create any contractually binding obligations. Any agreement which reads like a contract may result in a volunteer being viewed as an employee in the eyes of the law, which should be avoided as it will entitle them to the rights of an employee. You can find out more on the differences between volunteers and employees by referring to question two in our volunteering and the law Q&A section. 

Additional resources

• National Council for Volunteer Organisations – Volunteer agreements
• Volunteer Scotland – Volunteer agreements.

Defining your overall strategy

Finding out what those goals are should be the starting point of your strategy. Is your group looking to grow numbers of participants, attract people from more diverse backgrounds, or upgrade its facilities?

If your club doesn’t have an overall strategy written down, talk to the club management about what their aims are for both the immediate future and the longer term. By identifying these you’ll then be able to think through what sort of volunteers the club needs and whether you already have skills in the club.

For example, if your club is aiming to build a new junior team, you might need the following volunteer support:

• Promoting new participation opportunities through local schools, youth groups and social media
• Coaches to deliver the sessions
• A driver to take the team to away matches
• Admin support with collecting subs, communications to parents, etc.
• Catering support to provide refreshments at training sessions
• Qualified first aider to attend training and matches
• Help seeking sponsorship for the team.

If you break down each of your club’s goals in this way, you can work out exactly what sort of volunteering resource you need and how much of this is already in place.

Your current volunteering experience

As part of your volunteering strategy, also look at the volunteer experience at your club and compare volunteer management with best practice standards. An ‘audit’ of your current volunteering programme might include:

• Volunteer numbers
• Diversity across your volunteers
• Skills your current volunteers have
• Policies and procedures that relate to volunteering (if any)
• Current recruitment strategies and their effectiveness
• Systems you already have set up to support volunteers
• Training and development opportunities
• Current approach to thanks and recognition
• Current approach to managing volunteers who leave.

It’s a good idea at this stage to also get feedback from those at your club on how they think volunteering is working. You could ask your management and your members what they think works and what doesn’t. Most importantly, you should ask your volunteers what the experience has been like for them and what they think could be improved. You might be able to draw on your most recent volunteer survey if you conduct them regularly, or set one up if you don’t.

Objectives and activities

From here you might want to write some further objectives that relate to improving the volunteering experience. It’s important that your strategy identifies what volunteers themselves need and not just what you need from them, as a better volunteer experience will help you to retain them.

Next, break down each objective in your strategy into activities – what activities will have to happen to make sure you achieve your objectives? Set out a timeframe for achieving these activities and define a measure that will help you to identify when you have completed each objective.

Identifying resources

Then, identify the resources you’ll need to achieve these objectives.

For instance, will you need funding to buy a volunteer management system? Does the volunteer coordinator need some administrative support from another volunteer? Securing these resources is very important to the success of your strategy and you’ll need the rest of your club to be on board.

It might fall on you to recruit someone to help with admin, but setting the club’s fundraising priorities is a wider responsibility and you should make a case for any extra financial resources that might be needed.

A volunteer strategy should probably cover the same sort of timeline as your overall club strategy as it will support its aims. Set a date at which to review it and start preparing a new strategy.

Additional resources

• National Council for Volunteer Organisations – Volunteer strategies
• Wales Council for Voluntary Action – Volunteer strategies.

The following links are useful resources designed to help you include everything you need in your volunteer policy:

• National Council for Volunteer Organisations – Volunteer policies
• Wales Council for Voluntary Action – Creating a volunteering policy
• Volunteer Scotland – Developing a volunteer policy.

For example, you should ensure you have:

• A clear idea of how many volunteers you need, what sorts of roles need fulfilling and what skills these require
• A plan for how you will recruit these volunteers
• A budget to pay for volunteer travel, uniform/clothing and refreshments on the day
• A plan for how your information about volunteers will be stored securely and shared appropriately
• Insurance that covers your volunteers as well as your participants.

In addition to this, there are a few other things worth considering when you’re managing event volunteers.

Recruitment

• Not everyone who signs up will turn up. You should over-recruit and allow for about 25% of your volunteers not to show up on the day
• If you’re over-subscribed, it’s worth having a reserves list and letting people know they’re on it
• If you need a lot of volunteers, then an application process is a good idea
• Select volunteers for the roles with the person who oversees that aspect of the event. Make sure you communicate your decisions to people who have applied as soon as possible
• Communicate regularly with your volunteers in the lead up to the event – it helps to keep them engaged.

Training

• Think about your volunteers’ training needs. Some may need training in advance of the event. Others performing very simple tasks could receive a briefing before their shift
• Whatever the role, all volunteers need to be given a clear understanding of their tasks, the conduct you expect, health and safety information, information on what to do in an emergency, an understanding of the site and what is happening at different times, and an introduction to their team leader.

Organising volunteers

• Unless it’s a very small event that requires few volunteers, put your volunteers into teams
• A team might be a group of volunteers all located in the same area or a group who are all doing the same job that are able to communicate with each other (e.g. via radios or phone)
• Try to have a mixture of new and experienced volunteers on each team, and ensure that team leaders are aware of volunteers who may need extra help (e.g. those who are very young or who have disabilities)
• Assign team leaders to each team – these will ideally be people who have experience of volunteering and of the tasks their team will be performing. They'll keep each group of volunteers motivated and on-task, ensure they get their breaks and refreshments, solve problems, answer volunteer questions, and say thank you at the end of the shift. They'll also communicate any major issues on the day to you
• Set up a roster so that your volunteers all get breaks during their shifts and so that you have the cover you need throughout. Tell volunteers what their shifts will be as soon as you have planned them
• Think about where volunteers will be able to store their valuables and take their breaks. It’s good to have a designated volunteer area or room.

Saying ‘thank you’

• Thank people. Make sure team leaders thank volunteers at the end of their shift and that you thank your team leaders
• You should also email everyone after the event to thank them. You could even think about a ‘thank you’ party
• If your event has sponsors, then perhaps you could ask if they can donate products for a volunteer goody bag you can hand out at the end of the event.

Additional resources

• National Council for Volunteer Organisations – Volunteer policies
• Wales Council for Voluntary Action – Creating a volunteering policy
• Volunteer Scotland  – Developing a volunteer policy  
• Sport England - Volunteering Q&A: Getting started
• Sport England - Volunteering Q&A: Volunteering and the law.

The National Council for Voluntary Organisations has a useful page on what to consider, while organisations such as Volunteer Kinetic offer a ‘freemium’ service so you can test out their system.

• Feedback from volunteers on the support they’ve received from you can help improve your volunteer management
• Feedback from event volunteers can help you plan events more effectively in future
• Volunteers can offer suggestions that will help you run all aspects of your organisation better.

Surveys, questionnaires, evaluation forms and interviews are all useful ways of collecting feedback. Collecting information anonymously will encourage your volunteers to respond honestly, so where possible you should do this. Our Volunteer Survey Guidance is designed to help you run the best possible survey – click here to find out more. 

Likewise, if you’re interviewing volunteers about their experiences of being managed, it could be worth getting someone who isn’t the volunteer manager to conduct these interviews.

Collecting feedback could be something you schedule in regularly to help with your planning, so you might think about conducting a survey every six or 12 months. Getting the views of volunteers who are leaving is also worthwhile, as it can help you further develop your volunteering programme.

Additional resources

• National Council for Volunteer Organisations – Getting volunteer feedback
• Volunteer Scotland – Measuring the impact of volunteering.

Not all training needs to be accredited. Accredited training is often most appropriate for volunteers in roles where there is a defined national standard (e.g. coaching qualifications). It’s also useful when volunteers are looking for formal recognition of the work they've put in through volunteering, which is often the case if they’re developing their CVs.

If a volunteer is on an externally-provided course (such as a coaching qualification), the training will already be accredited. If you’re developing your volunteers through your own efforts, there may be ways you can get your volunteers’ inputs externally recognised.

Additional resources

The National Council for Voluntary Organisations feature a useful guide to accrediting volunteer learning on its website.  

Asdan has programmes that enable volunteering to be accredited, while vInspired runs schemes that enable 16-25 year olds to get certificated awards for their hours of volunteering. 

Additionally, Volunteer Now has also produced a detailed fact sheet on accrediting volunteering. While it’s specific to Northern Ireland, many of the principles it refers to are relevant to schemes in any location. 

Once you become a member, for every hour you volunteer you’ll get a time credit that you can exchange for an hour of another member’s time. So, if for example you do an hour’s book-keeping for an organisation, you’re entitled to an hour’s help with something else.

Timebanking could be a great way for your club to get skilled help with an ad-hoc task. There are over 290 local timebanks set up throughout the UK – click here to find your nearest timebank.