Many associations run on volunteers — committee members, event helpers, the people who give their evenings and weekends because they believe in the cause. And too many organisations quietly treat that goodwill as an endless free resource. It isn't. Volunteer energy is finite, precious, and surprisingly easy to burn out through neglect.
Volunteers don't give you their time for money — they give it for meaning, connection, and the feeling that their contribution matters. So they leave when those things dry up: when they feel taken for granted, when their effort disappears into a void with no thanks, when they're handed the jobs nobody else wants and never told what difference they made. Losing a good volunteer is as costly as losing a good staff member — you just don't see it on the payroll.
Valuing volunteers well isn't expensive. It's mostly respect: clarity about what's being asked, genuine thanks, showing them their impact, and not treating "they're a volunteer" as a reason to expect more for less. Treat their time as the gift it is.
A board worth its salt asks: are we stewarding our volunteers' goodwill, or quietly spending it down?
How to build and sustain a strong volunteer base is part of What Every Association CEO Needs to Know.
Explore the Association CEO course
Free first step: the Stakeholder Engagement Plan builder.
Annie
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