The Universal Benefits Of Volunteering

With its unique ability to fulfill personal and professional goals, social needs and corporate objectives, volunteering is much more than its own reward. But just how much more depends on the thought and planning that go into the process. That's why, as more and more nonprofits and for-profits pool their resources in volunteering partnerships, the development of an effective approach to the design and management of these programs is essential. This comprehensive book/disk set provides not-for-profit leaders, for-profit business executives, individual volunteers, community leaders, and others with the systematic, hands-on guidance they need to maximize the benefits of volunteering for everyone involved, from front-line volunteers to community members. Focusing on the crucial concept of "return value," the workbook offers solid practical advice on recruiting, training, and retaining today's volunteers. It examines volunteer program planning and implementation for both not-for-profit and for-profit organizations. And, most importantly, it ex-plores how these entities can forge strategic alliances that match the nonprofit need for motivated, business-wise volunteers to the corporate desire to boost staff teamwork, time management, and other key skills. The workbook comes complete with easy-to-follow procedures and checklists, plus worksheets and sample documents that are also included on the IBM-compatible disk. Simple to use and ready to implement, The Universal Benefits of Volunteering is an invaluable how-to tool for tackling a full range of volunteering challenges. "A practical, well-designed publication that can help to increase volunteering and philanthropy through educating individuals on both the joy of serving others and the significant personal value that can be derived from the experience." —Patricia F. Lewis, ACFRE President and Chief Executive Officer National Society of Fund Raising Executives "The Points of Light Foundation applauds the work set forth in The Universal Benefits of Volunteering. It is a valuable tool to help people connect through volunteer service." —Robert K. Goodwin President and Chief Executive Officer The Points of Light Foundation "A practical publication that can assist individuals, not-for-profit leaders and business executives to increase volunteer participation through enhancing the full value of the experience." —R. William Taylor, CAE President American Society of Association Executives The Universal Benefits of Volunteering offers a practical approach to designing, managing, and participating in today's volunteer programs. From recruiting, training, and retaining volunteers to establishing meaningful nonprofit and corporate volunteering partnerships, this comprehensive book/disk package contains essential hands-on guidance for not-for-profit leaders, corporate executives, and others who are working to make a difference through the field of volunteering.

Overseas volunteering has exploded in numbers and interest in the last couple of decades. Every year, hundreds of thousands of people travel from wealthier to poorer countries to participate in short-term volunteer programs focused on health services. Churches, universities, nonprofit service organizations, profit-making "voluntourism" companies, hospitals, and large corporations all sponsor brief missions. Hoping to Help is the first book to offer a comprehensive assessment of global health volunteering, based on research into how it currently operates, its benefits and drawbacks, and how it might be organized to contribute most effectively. Given the enormous human and economic investment in these activities, it is essential to know more about them and to understand the advantages and disadvantages for host communities. Most people assume that poor communities benefit from the goodwill and skills of the volunteers. Volunteer trips are widely advertised as a means to "give back" and "make a difference." In contrast, some claim that health volunteering is a new form of colonialism, designed to benefit the volunteers more than the host communities. Others focus on unethical practices and potential harm to the presumed "beneficiaries." Judith N. Lasker evaluates these opposing positions and relies on extensive research—interviews with host country staff members, sponsor organization leaders, and volunteers, a national survey of sponsors, and participant observation—to identify best and worst practices. She adds to the debate a focus on the benefits to the sponsoring organizations, benefits that can contribute to practices that are inconsistent with what host country staff identify as most likely to be useful for them and even with what may enhance the experience for volunteers. Hoping to Help illuminates the activities and goals of sponsoring organizations and compares dominant practices to the preferences of host country staff and to nine principles for most effective volunteer trips.

This book (VOLUNTEERING: PERSONAL, SOCIAL AND COMMUNITY BENEFITS) will help you to understand all aspects of volunteering. It highlights strongly many benefits of volunteering for both volunteers and volunteer-seeking organisations. There are many valuable benefits for volunteers that nobody can take from them; benefits such as respect, confidence, learning and, best of all, the love and care of fellow human beings. Voluntary work is achieved by people willing to give up their free time and willing to take a risk on achieving a nice experience through, for example, helping destitute people. Further it is a work that demands love, affection, patience, dedication and courage, which means volunteering will teach us new things that change our lives. Although nobody can earn and get money from volunteering, but it produces a feeling of self-worth and earns them respect and favour which are for more valuable. One guarantee of any volunteering experience is that you are likely to meet lots of new people and, more significantly, people that share many of your ideas and interests.

A comprehensive and original overview of evidence about the patterns and impacts of volunteering. A rigorous, novel and realistic assessment of the contributions of voluntary action to British society, and of the scope for expanding them.

Written by over 200 leading experts from over seventy countries, this handbook provides a comprehensive, state-of-the-art overview of the latest theory and research on volunteering, civic participation and nonprofit membership associations. The first handbook on the subject to be truly multinational and interdisciplinary in its authorship, it represents a major milestone for the discipline. Each chapter follows a rigorous theoretical structure examining definitions, historical background, key analytical issues, usable knowledge, and future trends and required research. The nine parts of the handbook cover the historical and conceptual background of the discipline; special types of volunteering; the major activity areas of volunteering and associations; influences on volunteering and association participation; the internal structures of associations; the internal processes of associations; the external environments of associations; the scope and impacts of volunteering and associations; and conclusions and future prospects. This handbook provides an essential reference work for third-sector research and practice, including a valuable glossary of terms defining over eighty key concepts. Sponsored by the International Council of Voluntarism, Civil Society, and Social Economy Researcher Associations (ICSERA; www.icsera.org), it will appeal to scholars, policymakers and practitioners, and helps to define the emergent academic discipline of voluntaristics.

The Care & Feeding of Volunteers has evolved from a series of successful seminars attended by thousands of people across the United States and into Europe. In these sessions Bill has presented unorthodox ways of working with volunteers. They have attempted to change the paradigm of how America thinks about managing volunteers. In this book, Bill will challenge you to consider applying many of the leadership strategies that are working in corporate America to your non-profit arena. The Care & Feeding of Volunteers will show you how to find and attract today's volunteers into your organization. It's a new millennium and tomorrow's volunteers will not respond to yesterday's management thinking, but will be looking for an agency that respects their energy, passion and talents.

The idea of the gap year has taken hold in America. Since its development in Britain nearly fifty years ago, taking time off between secondary school and college has allowed students the opportunity to travel, develop crucial life skills, and grow up, all while doing volunteer work in much-needed parts of the developing world.