How to Measure Volunteer Success

Most nonprofit professionals recognize the difficulty of applying corporate standards of success to charity efforts. The products offered by nonprofit organizations are ideas and action instead of cars and televisions. You need to find a multitiered approach to measuring volunteer success to keep your organization running efficiently.

Instructions

Difficulty: Moderate

1. Look at the longevity of individual volunteers as a primary measure of success. A volunteer who has worked with your organization for years has achieved fund-raising goals and adopted your group's mission as a personal crusade.
2. Analyze week-to-week improvements in fund-raising to measure the success of volunteers. The raw data for funds each quarter does not reveal the growing confidence volunteers feel when asking strangers to finance your organization.
3. Glance out of your office occasionally to make an informal judgment of the interpersonal skills of volunteers. A volunteer who brings in checks for your organization but disrupts the rest of your staff needs to be placed under greater scrutiny.
4. Compare the number of volunteers and your recruiting efforts to successes by similar nonprofit groups. Peruse charities and nonprofit organizations in your industry with the help of websites like Idealist (see Resources below).
5. Write out an evaluation form that will help you work with volunteers to evaluate their successes. A sample form available at CASAnet will help you determine the correct format for your organization, though it is important to stay flexible in the assessment process (see Resources below).
6. Follow the number of volunteers referred by your experienced veterans to measure success. A volunteer who can convince friends and family to invest free time in your organization is aiding your efforts.
7. Request a daily log of tasks completed by each volunteer to measure success on a day-to-day basis. A volunteer who can finish mundane tasks while working hard on fund raising and outreach projects should be considered successful.
8. Search for evidence that your volunteers are advocating for your organization outside of office hours. A review of local blogs, newspaper editorials and other community press outlets can show which volunteers are exerting the greatest effort.

Tips & Warnings

• Review the demographic diversity of your volunteer force to measure the success of your organization. A group of volunteers moving beyond your core constituency into different age, income, race and gender verticals shows the growth of your organization.