Volunteer Management Capacity in US Charities

New 2019 Study Report!

In 2003, the Urban Institute conducted a national (U.S.) study of volunteer management practices and the readiness of nonprofit organizations to take on more volunteers. In 2019, in the months before the COVID-19 pandemic rearranged life in the country, Hager and Brudney conducted a second snapshot. How far did we come in 16 years? The brief below documents their findings. 
 
Take a look! Inside, you will find details on their major conclusions, including:

• The nonprofit sector remains extremely diverse in the scale at which its organizations engage volunteers 
• Nonprofits rely largely on older volunteers, raising questions about technology use in reaching them
• Long-term volunteering was already eroding by 2019
• Less than a quarter of nonprofits that engage volunteers have a staff member who spends at least half time on volunteer administration
• Nonprofits still vary widely in adoption of standard volunteer management practices
• Regardless of capacity, volunteer managers love their volunteers and do not dwell on the challenges of engaging them