Recruiting Volunteers

Recently we looked at customer service in ministry.  Some of the companies that have great customer service have great staff or good staff to customer ratios. In a ministry setting the presentation of your ministry may be as good or great as your leaders and volunteers.  So how do you recruit more volunteers to improve your leadership ratio?  Recruiting volunteers and building a volunteer team are as important to your ministry as the content of your ministry.

So here are four things to remember about volunteers in your ministry setting:

1. People do care and want to help – Australians are generous people, it is just that sometimes you just have to ask for support before you can see this generosity.  People have so many things to think about that they may not put their hand up to volunteer unless they are asked directly.  When people do care about your ministry, you need to invite those people into your ministry as volunteers.  Perhaps people start in a supportive role by helping behind the scene, leaving you to tackle the up front leadership role.

How can you move people from caring about your ministry to helping in your ministry?

2. People do have time, although limited – People are always busy and sometimes they look at how many hours you do as a ministry leader and think they could never give that much time to the Church.  So how can you break down volunteer positions to manageable amounts of time.  Perhaps you can ask people to volunteer for one session per month, or volunteer to setup the session then go home.  People do have spare time but as a ministry leader you need to understand their other time commitments.

How can you break down the volunteer jobs into manageable portions of time?

3. People are capable of a great deal – there are many talented people in your parish with skills that you need.  Perhaps they have never run a ministry before but they could do great things for your ministry.  Volunteers will give everything to a ministry if they are treated with respect.  As a ministry leader look to use people’s gifts and empower them to be the best they can be.  Don’t just delegate a task to a volunteer; empower them to use their initiative to complete a task.

How can you show more belief and trust in your volunteers?

4. People need to be thanked – we can’t pay volunteers with money but we can thank them at every opportunity.  People can tell if you are genuine in your appreciation or are just thanking them to get more out of them.  When you are sincere in your appreciate of your current volunteers and they will appreciate an future volunteers they recruit.

How can you show appreciation to your volunteers?

We can all do with more volunteers in our ministry because people move on to other things.  You can never have too many volunteers so never knock back someone who wants to help.  If you do recruit more volunteers than you need, use your experienced volunteers in leadership and training roles, again volunteers are capable of a great deal.

Please leave a comment on how you recruit volunteers.

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