CHAPTER 4-4: Volunteer Recognition and Retention

SPEC has successfully built a network of national/local partners and volunteers who help meet individual taxpayer’s needs for tax education and assistance during the tax filing season. Partners have effectively recognized their volunteers by designing and maintaining control over volunteer recognition events. Recognizing volunteers for significant milestones, outstanding commitment, and dedication is extremely important to the SPEC organization.

Volunteer Milestone Recognition Process

SPEC honors partner, volunteer, and site dedication by providing certificates of recognition for those partners, volunteers, and sites whose years of service are in increments of ten. SPEC recognizes significant milestones of 10, 20, 30, 40 and 50 years of service in the volunteer tax preparation program. Partners may find other ways to recognize milestone accomplishments for intervening years.

SPEC has established a new submission process for milestone achievements. Your local SPEC territory office will be soliciting VITA partners annually between the months of October and February for partners, volunteers, and sites that have reached a milestone in their participation in the VITA program. Partners are to follow the guidance provided by their local SPEC territory offices and timely submit the names they would like recognized. Form 15380, Stakeholder Partnership, Education & Communication (SPEC) Milestone Recognition, will no longer be used to submit milestone requests.

Partners must check spelling and accuracy for all recognition requests and submit them to their local SPEC territory office.

SPEC recommends recognizing partners, sites, and volunteers in an alternate way when the milestone forms submitted do not meet the deadline. Partners are asked to contact their local SPEC territory office for any questions.

Volunteer Retention SPEC and our partners share the goal of effective volunteer management, which includes cultivating quality volunteers and strengthening volunteer retention. This section details best practices partners implemented for recruiting, supervising, and recognizing their volunteers. Effective volunteer management leads to volunteer retention.

Build Relationships

Partners stated the importance of building relationships; getting to know their volunteers is their top priority.

• “Get well acquainted with volunteers so they feel connected.”

• “There has to be nurturing.”

• “Develop camaraderie and cultivate personal satisfaction among volunteers at the site and for the people they assist.”“Provide a supportive environment for them to derive their own personal satisfaction by helping others and interacting with a great group of fellow volunteers.”

• “Volunteers need to be reminded regularly, and in the off-season, how important they are.”

• “Volunteers should be made to feel the importance of their contribution to the community.”

• “Host a ’welcome back breakfast’ for new and returning volunteers. Also host an ‘end of filing season picnic’ to present awards and certificates.”

• “Add volunteers who are friends or relatives and want to help taxpayers.”

30 CHAPTER 4: Volunteer Recruitment, Training and Certification

Foster Effective Leadership

Partners found effective site leadership contributed to the satisfaction of their volunteers.

• “Site coordinators make or break a site. When you change site coordinators you change the entire culture of the site.”

• “The positive and negative satisfaction comes from the site coordinator.”

• “An energetic and motivated leader communicates well and frequently with the volunteers, soliciting their input for improvement and making it happen immediately. Make them feel empowered and valued.”

• “Treat volunteers with respect, never forget they are volunteers and could be doing anything else with their time and instead chose VITA.”

• “Partners should visit each site throughout the filing season to bring them treats and just say ’thank you’ to the volunteers.”

Make Community Connections

Several VITA/TCE sites share how they cultivate connections in their communities to build cadres of volunteers. These community connections may include employers, colleges, and universities.

• “Many of the volunteers are retirees from large companies who are very dedicated to returning year after year.”

• “Form partnerships with employers whose employees operate a site. Some employers allow their volunteers to do tax preparation on site during their normal business hours.”

• “Encourage volunteers to return each year. Recruit students from the nearby high schools and universities.”

• “Distribute public service announcements in the community about the benefits of VITA/TCE volunteering. Promote the various forms of available credits (college, CPE, and volunteer graduation/scholarship) and opportunities (internships, tax preparation education).”

Communicate with Volunteers Year-Round

Successful partners communicate with volunteers before, during and after the filing season. Effective communication can be as unique as the partners themselves, such as newsletters, social activities, emails, meetings, mini-training sessions, and volunteer web-portals.

Most partners emphasized the importance of off-season communication to keep volunteers engaged with the VITA/TCE program. Keeping in touch with volunteers throughout the year promotes camaraderie and provides

a way to share technical knowledge, keeping volunteers’ skills sharp.