Valuing and enhancing episodic volunteerability for sustainable volunteer management

Research on evidence-based volunteer management, especially regarding episodic volunteering, is limited. Thus, we examine the influence of individual traits of event volunteers and the management practices employed by non-profit organisations on their likelihood to engage in future events. First, we revisit the value of episodic volunteering within the framework of regenerative volunteer management. We then compare factors affecting the inclination of event volunteers to re-volunteer for the same or for a different organisation based on a path analysis of 10,148 survey responses from event volunteers in 19 countries. Previous episodic volunteer experience, responsiveness, appreciation from supervisors and satisfaction with the event experience increase the probability that event volunteers will re-volunteer for both the same and different organisations. Moreover, assistance, service quality and comfort contribute indirectly by enhancing satisfaction with the volunteer experience. Effective management of event volunteering replenishes a valuable volunteer resource for both event organisers and other non-profit organisations

ФАКТОРЫ УДОВЛЕТВОРЕННОСТИ ЭПИЗОДИЧЕСКИХ ВОЛОНТЕРОВ

The article relies on the thesis of the importance of the satisfaction of occasional volunteers for their future participation in volunteer activities. The research focuses on those volunteers who occasionally participate in various volunteer activities and leave after their completion. This form of volunteer participation is quite widespread and replaces regular volunteering in nonprofit organizations, which indicates a transformation of the “nonprofit organization — volunteer” interaction paradigm. Based on the survey of episodic volunteers in Russia (n = 2,494; 2018), the authors give a characteristic of episodic volunteers for the first time. The article answers the research questions regarding (1) how satisfaction amid other possible factors influences the intention of future participation of episodic volunteers and (2) what the satisfaction of episodic volunteers depends on. Satisfaction is more significant for episodic volunteers’ intention to volunteer in the future than other variables. Meanwhile, the event’s organization and how other team members treated the volunteer significantly impact satisfaction. The results show that perceived NGO affiliation is important for occasional volunteers, and they are not significantly different from regular volunteers on this criterion. It is a mis-take to reduce the role and management of episodic volunteers to the simple function of performing uncomplicated work tasks