Charities Face Trouble Keeping Volunteers and Attracting New Ones, Study Finds
By MARTY MICHAELS
Contributor
May 3, 2007 | Read Time: 6 minutes
Nonprofit groups face significant challenges
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ALSO SEE: TABLE: Volunteering in the United States |
in keeping their volunteers loyal and attracting new people to help their causes, according to a government study released last month.
Of the 65.4 million adult Americans who volunteered in 2005, 20.9 million — nearly one-third — did not continue to donate their time in 2006, according to a report by the Corporation for National and Community Service.
Although overall volunteerism rates remain high, the report’s authors say their findings illustrate the need for charities nationwide to improve their recruitment and management of volunteers.
The study, which analyzed data culled from annual surveys of approximately 60,000 households, also found that:
- The number of Americans age 16 and older who donated their time to charitable causes last year was 61.2 million, nearly 27 percent of the population. That figure marked a slight decline from 2005, when 65.4 million Americans — or almost 29 percent — volunteered.
- Nearly one in three baby boomers, or 32.2 percent, contributed volunteer hours last year, followed by 29.6 percent of college students.
- The largest percentage of Americans — 35 percent — volunteer for churches and other places of worship and religious groups.
- Women were more likely than men to donate time, with 31.6 percent of American women volunteering, compared with 24.3 percent of men.
- The most popular volunteer activity was fund raising for charitable causes, including selling items to raise money, followed by efforts to collect, prepare, and distribute food.
People living in the Midwest were the likeliest to have donated their time — 32.1 percent — followed by those in the West, 26.8 percent; the South, 24.5 percent; and the Northeast, 24.2 percent.
In a state-by-state review of volunteering, the report found that residents of Utah were more likely to volunteer than people elsewhere, with nearly 46 percent contributing time at some point in 2004 to 2006. Nevada residents were at the opposite end of the scale, with slightly fewer than 18 percent volunteering during those same years.
Minnesota’s charities had the best success in keeping volunteers loyal: Seventy-six percent of people who volunteered in 2005 returned to serve again in 2006.
Rethinking Volunteer Jobs
Robert Grimm Jr., the Corporation for National and Community Service’s director of the office of research and policy development, says that many groups don’t put enough effort into managing volunteers and showing appreciation for the unpaid work people do. What’s more, they don’t provide appealing opportunities that entice people to return year after year, he says.
Mr. Grimm says that charities, especially those facing a loss of volunteers, should consider overhauling how they engage volunteers, and that organizations that do so “will reap substantial rewards” in coming years.
He says that baby boomers, many of whom are at a stage where they want to volunteer more, look for opportunities to use their skills, and in general are not interested in activities like cleaning parks, delivering meals, or answering phones.
“One could imagine an organization where you paid people to do some of the general labor activities that you used to have volunteers do,” says Mr. Grimm, “and have this group of healthy, highly educated older adults who have a lot of skills to bring improving your organization’s strategic planning or finances or other things consultants and staff members have traditionally been paid to do, resulting in significant cost savings.”
He adds that people who volunteer are also more likely to contribute money, so building ties with volunteers could result in financial windfalls for savvy nonprofit groups.
Online Service
In conjunction with issuing the report, the Corporation for National and Community Service is providing a free online resource guide designed to help stanch the number of people dropping out of volunteering, including live discussions with experts in recruiting and keeping volunteers.
This year’s report also provides statistics from 1974 and 1989, which Mr. Grimm says were recently discovered and “resurrected” to provide a broader historical context, including state-by-state data that show how volunteer behavior has changed over time.
For example, in Idaho, 20 percent of volunteers in 1989 gave their time to civic, political, and professional groups such as Rotary International or the Lions Clubs; by 2006, that figure had plummeted to 6.7 percent, a trend seen across the nation (The Chronicle, January 11).
The report also includes new data designed to help gauge civic engagement in a broader sense. Researchers worked with Robert D. Putnam, the Harvard professor who wrote Bowling Alone: The Collapse and Revival of American Community, to add questions to the survey that can measure and track 12 “social capital” indicators, including not only volunteering but also voting rates, attendance at public meetings, and the number of nonprofit groups and religious institutions per capita.
In a state-by-state comparison, Montana ranked highest on the Civic Life Index, while Nevada ranked the lowest.
Mr. Grimm says that there is a correlation between states with high volunteering rates and those that scored the highest in the percentage of residents voting in the 2006 mid-term elections as well as on other measures.
“When people volunteer today, they not only help solve tough problems in their communities,” he says, “they also create tangible benefits that lead to healthier communities where neighbors know each other, are more engaged in government, and so on.”
Missed Opportunities
The Nationwide Mutual Insurance Company, in Columbus, Ohio, recently released a survey that reinforces the Corporation for National and Community Service’s findings about volunteers dropping out.
The Nationwide survey, based on online interviews with 462 adults, found that 57 percent of respondents do not plan to increase their volunteerism over the next year.
Moreover, 42 percent of people who don’t volunteer say it isn’t a lack of interest that prevents them from donating their time, but rather difficulty finding opportunities where they feel they can make a difference, use their skills, or act on personal values.
Meanwhile another recent survey, conducted for the McDonald’s Corporation, by Kelton Research, found that 45 percent of its sample of 1,000 Americans age 18 and older say they currently volunteer to benefit charity.
Yet when asked how they prefer to spend their free time, respondents were far more apathetic, with 63 percent saying they would rather read, watch television, visit family, or clean than volunteer during their free hours.
The survey also found that 93 percent felt it was important to promote volunteerism among young people.
The Corporation for National and Community Service report, “Volunteering in America: 2007 State Trends and Rankings in Civic Life,” is available free online. For information on the Nationwide survey, contact Mike Switzer at (614) 249-4092. The McDonald’s survey is not currently available to the public.
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VOLUNTEERING IN THE UNITED STATES
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