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Sign #1: The Overcommitted Volunteer

Every church or non-profit has a group of volunteers that sign up for everything. They often say ‘yes’ to every opportunity out of guilt or because of the belief that the more they do the better. Adding an overcommitted volunteer to your team can negatively impact everyone involved because they will fail to show up, under deliver, or burnout and bail.

Before adding volunteers to your team, find out where else they are serving and if they really have the time to commit. To find out, ask their other team leaders as they will never admit to being overcommitted.

Sign #2: The Know-It-All Volunteer

You know the type. These volunteers seem to know everything there is to know about how your team works. If they are being honest, they think they know more than you do – and they just might.

Know-it-all volunteers often suffer from a large ego that will get in the way of your team. Instead of finding know-it-all volunteers, find volunteers with a willing heart to learn. It may take more time to train them, but they will be more willing to learn and offer unbiased suggestions on improving your team.

Sign #3: The Indifferent Volunteer

The opposite of the know-it-all volunteer, these volunteers don’t really care for anything. They tend to never commit to any task, keeping your team from being effective. Often, their attitude manifests itself into the simple mantra “Hey, I’m a volunteer. Don’t like what I’m doing? Then fire me!”

Indifferent volunteers seem dependable, but create a poor attitude that can infest you and the rest of your team. Sometimes their attitude may be as a result of burnout in the past or due to a desire to volunteer out of guilt. Deal with their heart issue first before involving them in any critical areas of your team.

Sign #4: The New Believer Volunteer

When a volunteer is a new believer, they are often “on fire” and very excited. The upside is that they are usually eager and happy to serve in any capacity as a volunteer. This is a great thing and should be part of the process. However, many new believers are still struggling with understanding their new faith and being Spirit-led in their activities.

Be patient with new believers as you integrate them into the team. Don’t be in a hurry to give them activities just because they are excited about their new faith. Encourage them to be discipled and grow into their new faith by limiting their involvement. Finally, allow them to be involved in activities that are simple and don’t involve counseling until they have time to mature.

Sign #5: The Ex-Leader Volunteer

Occasionally, a leader from another church or ex-pastor will begin to attend your church and approach your team. This is especially the case with past worship leaders or Bible study leaders, as they naturally follow their skills and passions at a new church. The problem is that you don’t have any history with them, you don’t understand their heart, and don’t understand their assumptions and beliefs.

Let ex-leaders and volunteers from other churches start slow. Allow them to learn your church and team dynamics first, before allowing them to interject their own processes. Otherwise, you may quickly lose control of your team as they start to introduce constant change and frustration to your team.

1. Recruit with enthusiasm, because people will know otherwise
2. Define the activity using a half-page job description to provide clarity
3. Put in a time limit, along with a trial period where they can bail with “no questions asked”
4. Find people who know people so that you aren’t recruiting by yourself
5. Work with other leaders to help place people, as not every volunteer will be a fit for your ministry or theirs
6. Restructure your team to make positions easier, allowing for a lower time commitment
7. Create opportunities for a one-time serve by grouping small stand-alone tasks into opportunities for non-commitment

Like these steps? Consider downloading our FREE eBook on Recruiting Volunteers, with more details on the 7 steps outlined above, a 5-step process for improving your volunteer recruiting, and job description examples.

Don’t let a difficulty of recruiting volunteers get you down! Instead, learn how to be more effective at recruiting volunteers.

More sounds better.

More resources.

More stuff.

More beautiful.

More productive.

More is the standard I have set for myself.

More outputs.

More accomplishments.

More pats on the back.

More results.

More is what I want and more is what I’m getting. In order to get more, I’m putting in

More time.

More stress.

More money.

More of my life.

In order to get more, my family is getting

Less daddy.

Less husband.

Less patience.

Less love.

I’m ready for

Less perfect.

Less outputs.

Less pride.

Less friction.

Are you doing more and sacrificing something or someone else? If so, perhaps it is time to start raising up leaders to help you. Leaders to help carry the burden.

Thank you Jeremy for the reminder.

Leaders are all around you. There are many people in your church that are leaders – you just may not give them the title. Leadership is about influence, not a title.

These leaders are telling your visitors what the church is like when they first walk through the door. They are influencing them on whether to come back or try another church.

These leaders are influencing how enjoyable or painful their volunteer time is going to be. They are the ones encouraging your volunteers or burning them out.

These leaders are influencing your church’s children while you are listening to the message from the pastor. They are making a positive or negative impact on the children in the church that will influence them for years to come.

These leaders have a calling to exercise their gifts and skills somewhere. Are you giving them the opportunity and training to lead?

When you build a team, you usually have a purpose in mind. It may be to run the sound system for your church building. Or perhaps it is to reach out to a community or into those in your church that have a specific need. Whatever it is, the team is being built by you to address an immediate need. It won’t last forever.

You may ask, “yeah, but what about the sound crew – we’ll always need one of those, right?” True. You may always have a sound team. But the team itself will take on different needs and change shape over time. The team itself is dynamic – it will change based on the technology needs, the building needs, and the culture of the team itself. At some point, every team reaches a tipping point where it becomes something new – something different than its original intent and design. It is at that point where the team becomes something new and ceases to be the team that it was.

Volunteering is dynamic. It changes constantly. Needs change. Teams change. People change. More importantly, God’s calling on the team and team members will change.

As volunteer leaders, we must be willing to be dynamic. We must focus on how God wants us to build the team today, prepare for tomorrow, and be willing to let go of it in the future. We must be willing to stop saying, “But, that is how we have always done it!” and begin to ask, “How does God want us to do it today?”

Volunteer teams don’t last forever. Be willing to become a more dynamic leader. The only other option is becoming an irrelevant leader.

Here are some ideas on how to thank your volunteers:

1. Celebrate with a team lunch at a nice restaurant (no fast food, no pizza)
2. Send a thank you card to each team member’s home, signed by yourself and other leaders/staff
3. Find out from each team member’s friend where they like to hang out and give a gift card (this may require more time to track down, but pays off through a very personalized gift)
4. Create a hand-made gift basket with personalized gifts (again, more time but very personalized)
5. Send flowers or gift basket – bonus points if you include their favorite flower

Make a decision to thank your volunteers twice as much as last year – they’ll love it!

Being a leader of volunteers, you must to find a balance between allowing volunteers to try anything and not letting them do anything at all. My experience shows that many leaders gravitate to one end or the other – all or nothing. They become the martyr and try to do it all themselves for fear of their volunteers failing, causing their volunteers to leave them. Or, they become the “do whatever” leader and let their volunteers run wild, potentially harming others.

Like parenting, we must find a way to allow them to fail while preventing them from hurting themselves or others in the process. Failure must be an option to them. This is how our Father works with us and it is how we must model leadership to them.

Beyond letting them try, we must make them try. Many volunteers are timid and are afraid to make mistakes. Create an environment where they are allowed to try – perhaps even forced to try something new or different that stretches them just a little beyond their comfort zone. You may be amazed at how they do if given the opportunity. They might even find a passion they never knew they had!

The beautiful thing is that when they try and succeed, you have done more for their confidence than words could ever do.

Ready to let your volunteers try?

The first step is the most difficult. Most people don’t take the first step of leadership. They are too scared. They doubt their ability. But taking the first step opens your eyes to an amazing new world of possibilities.

The next few steps happen pretty quick. You have successes with your team. You may have a failure or two. But overall, things are going pretty well.

Then the middle steps emerge. You must learn to balance your time. You have more demands on you than ever before. Some choose to stop or even go back down a few steps. Here your leadership is really tested.

If you are willing, you take a few more steps. You can see the top of the staircase. You have experienced some tough lessons but it was worth it. Battle worn, you are leading some amazing change for your cause.

You reach the top of the stairs, only to look and see another set of stairs ahead of you. You realize that it is time to bring someone else along. It is time to prepare another generation of leaders to join you. The process starts again.

Learning never ends. Leadership never ends. It requires sacrifice and commitment. Just remember that with each step, you will see fewer people next to you. Make sure you help and seek help from those next to you and above you on the staircase. They know what you are going through. They know the joys already experienced and the joys to come.

Keep climbing.