Why Do People Volunteer? Understanding Volunteer Motivation and What Drives Engagement
By Nonprofit Learning Lab
Why do people volunteer?
People volunteer for different reasons, including supporting a cause, helping others, learning, developing professional skills, building relationships, gaining leadership experience, and making a meaningful contribution.
Understanding why people volunteer can help nonprofit organizations recruit the right volunteers, create meaningful volunteer roles, and improve volunteer engagement and retention.
Research shows that there is no single reason people choose to volunteer. Volunteer motivation can include personal beliefs, helping others, learning, career development, social connection, and personal growth (Clary et al., 1992; Clary et al., 1996).
What Is Volunteer Motivation?
Volunteer motivation refers to the reasons, needs, interests, and goals that influence a person's decision to volunteer and continue participating in an organization.
People may be motivated by their values, opportunities to learn, career development, social connection, personal growth, or a desire to contribute to a cause.
What Motivates People to Volunteer?
One way to understand volunteer motivation is the functional approach to volunteerism. This approach identifies six different functions that volunteering can fulfill: values, understanding, esteem, career, social, and protective (Clary et al., 1992).
These motivations help explain why different people may be interested in the same
volunteer opportunity for completely different reasons.
1. Values: “I Want to Help”
Some people volunteer because they care about a cause or believe in helping others. Their motivation may come from personal values, beliefs, or a desire to make a meaningful contribution.
Example:
Someone volunteers with a food access organization because they believe everyone should have access to nutritious food.
For organizations: Match volunteers with roles where they can directly serve the people or cause they care about. Create volunteer roles that allow people to see and experience the impact of their contribution.
2. Understanding: “I Want to Learn”
Some people volunteer because they want to learn something new. Volunteering can provide opportunities to expand knowledge, understand different communities, and gain new experiences (Clary et al., 1992).
Example:
Someone volunteers with a refugee support organization because they want to learn more about resettlement and the experiences of newcomers.
For organizations: Create volunteer roles that allow people to learn through training, hands-on experiences, and exposure to your programs and community.
3. Career: “I Want to Develop Skills”
Volunteering can also support professional and leadership development. Some people volunteer to gain experience, strengthen their skills, develop leadership abilities, or build professional connections (Clary et al., 1992; Weiner, 2011).
Example:
Someone interested in nonprofit management volunteers to coordinate an event so they can develop project management and leadership skills.
For organizations: Identify volunteer roles that provide opportunities to practice skills, take on responsibility, lead projects, or build professional connections.
4. Social: “I Want to Connect With People”
For some volunteers, relationships are an important part of the experience. They may want to meet new people, develop friendships, or become part of a community.
Social interaction can influence volunteer engagement. When volunteers join an organization to build relationships but do not have opportunities to connect with others, they may become less engaged (Weiner, 2011).
For organizations: Create opportunities for volunteers to work together, meet other volunteers, and build relationships.
5. Esteem: “I Want to Make a Difference”
Some people volunteer because they want to feel useful, capable, and valued. Meaningful responsibilities can help volunteers see the impact of their contribution.
Example:
A volunteer takes responsibility for organizing a community project because they want to use their skills and see the results of their work.
For organizations: Give volunteers responsibilities that allow them to contribute, accomplish something meaningful, and see the results of their work.
6. Protective: “I Want to Contribute to Something Larger”
The protective function relates to personal concerns and the desire to address feelings such as guilt or discomfort about one's circumstances (Clary et al., 1992). This motivation may be less obvious than wanting to support a cause or develop a skill, but it is one of the functions identified in research on volunteer motivation. The important point is that people can volunteer for more than one reason, and their motivations can change over time.
Example: Someone volunteers at a community meal program because they want to give back after receiving support during a difficult period in their own life.
For organizations: Offer meaningful ways for volunteers to give back, such as serving meals, assembling care packages, or providing direct support to community members.
How Can Nonprofits Understand Volunteer Motivation?
Understanding volunteer motivation starts with a conversation about what the person hopes to get from the experience. During recruitment or onboarding, ask questions that help uncover their interests, goals, and expectations:
What attracted you to our organization or this volunteer opportunity?
What skills would you like to use or develop?
What would you like to learn?
What types of volunteer activities interest you?
Would you be interested in leadership or networking opportunities?
What would make this experience meaningful to you?
These conversations help organizations better understand what volunteers are looking for and match them with roles that align with their interests, strengths, and motivations (Buckingham, 2005; Clary et al., 1996).
How Do You Match Volunteer Motivation to the Right Role?
Volunteer motivation becomes most useful when organizations connect it to actual opportunities.
Volunteer Motivation | What the Volunteer Role Could Provide |
Values | A meaningful way to support a cause |
Understanding | Opportunities to learn |
Career | Skills, leadership experience, or professional connections |
Social | Opportunities to meet and work with others |
Esteem | Responsibility, accomplishment, and recognition |
Protective | Opportunities to contribute to something larger |
The goal is not to create a different volunteer position for every motivation. Instead, look at your existing roles and consider which needs they can meet.
Why Does Volunteer Motivation Matter for Retention?
Volunteer recruitment and volunteer retention are connected.
The volunteer experience begins before a person starts the work. When volunteers enter roles that match their interests and understand what is expected of them, organizations have a stronger foundation for engagement and retention.
If someone volunteers because they want leadership experience but spends every week completing repetitive tasks, the opportunity may not meet their expectations. If someone volunteers to build relationships but rarely interacts with other volunteers, they may not find the experience meaningful.
Research on volunteer-led organizations has identified meaningful work, training, appreciation, social connections, and opportunities for professional development as practices that can support volunteer retention (Weiner, 2011).
How Can Organizations Learn What Motivates Their Volunteers?
You do not need a complicated assessment process.
Start by building questions about motivation into the existing volunteer experience.
Recruitment: What interests you about volunteering with us?
Onboarding: What would make this experience meaningful for you?
Check-ins: Are you getting the experience you hoped for?
Supervision: What would you like to do more of?
Project debriefs: What did you enjoy? What would you change?
A volunteer intake form can also help organizations collect information about volunteers' interests, skills, and motivations and use that information to make better volunteer placements (Buckingham, 2005; Clary et al., 1996).
What Happens When Volunteer Motivation and Roles Do Not Match?
A mismatch can occur when the organization needs one thing from a volunteer but the volunteer is looking for something else.
For example:
The organization needs: Someone to complete administrative tasks.
The volunteer wants: An opportunity to develop leadership skills.
Or:
The organization needs: Someone to work independently.
The volunteer wants: An opportunity to build relationships with other people.
Neither side is necessarily wrong. The problem is that the opportunity may not meet the volunteer's expectations. Understanding motivation gives organizations another way to evaluate whether a volunteer opportunity is a good match.
Reflection: What Motivates Your Volunteers?
Take a step back and think about what your volunteers may be looking for when they get involved. Consider:
What brings people to your organization? Think about the reasons volunteers give for getting involved.
What motivates them to stay? Look for patterns in what keeps volunteers engaged.
Do your roles match those motivations? Consider whether volunteers have opportunities for learning, leadership, connection, contribution, or other goals.
Where are the gaps? Identify opportunities to adjust or create volunteer roles that better meet what volunteers value.
What could you ask? Consider adding a few questions during recruitment or onboarding to better understand each volunteer's interests and goals.
Quick Reflection
If you asked your volunteers, “What do you hope to get from this experience?” what do you think they would say?
Frequently Asked Questions About Volunteer Motivation
What are the main reasons people volunteer?
People volunteer for many reasons, including supporting a cause, helping others, learning new skills, developing professional skills, building relationships, gaining leadership experience, and making a meaningful contribution (Clary et al., 1992; Clary et al., 1996).
How can nonprofits understand what motivates volunteers?
Organizations can ask questions during volunteer recruitment, onboarding, supervision, and check-ins. Asking about interests, skills, goals, learning opportunities, relationships, and what would make the experience meaningful can help organizations better understand volunteer motivation.
Does volunteer motivation affect volunteer retention?
Yes! When volunteer opportunities align with what people want from the experience, organizations can create stronger conditions for volunteer engagement and retention. When volunteer expectations and organizational roles do not match, volunteers may become dissatisfied or seek other opportunities (Jamison, 2003; Weiner, 2011).
Should nonprofits try to motivate volunteers?
Rather than trying to create motivation, organizations can learn what already motivates their volunteers and design volunteer roles and opportunities that align with those motivations. This approach can support a stronger volunteer experience.
Can a volunteer have more than one reason for volunteering?
Yes! A volunteer may want to support a cause while also developing skills, meeting people, or learning something new. Volunteer motivation can also change as a person's circumstances and goals change, so organizations may benefit from checking in with volunteers over time.
The Key to Understanding Volunteer Motivation
There is no single reason people volunteer. Volunteer motivation can include a desire to support a cause, learn new skills, build relationships, gain experience, or make a meaningful contribution. Many volunteers have multiple motivations, and those motivations can change over time.
For nonprofit organizations, understanding why people volunteer is an important part of effective volunteer management. Understanding volunteer motivation can help organizations strengthen volunteer recruitment and placement, create more meaningful volunteer roles, and develop effective volunteer engagement and retention strategies.
When organizations understand what volunteers want from their experience, they can better design volunteer opportunities, match people with appropriate roles, and create a volunteer program that supports both organizational goals and volunteer needs.
The better you understand what motivates your volunteers, the better you can recruit, engage, support, and retain volunteers while creating a more meaningful volunteer experience.
Additional Resources
For organizations seeking deeper support, our training on Effective Volunteer Management: Recruitment, Training, Retention, Committees & Managing Difficult Volunteers covers recruitment, onboarding, retention, committee leadership, and strategies for managing difficult volunteer situations.
Volunteer Management Resources
