Supporting Volunteers by Computer

How well do you know the volunteers that help in your Extension programs? As we rely more and more on volunteer staff, increasing pressure exists to do a better job of volunteer management. Research has shown that the "personal touch" is what counts when it comes to motivating and retaining volunteers. Your volunteers want to know that you, the Extension professional, care about them and appreciate what they're doing. But how to you keep up with the 200 or more volunteers in your program and give them that "personal touch"? The answer: Computer files and ingenuity!

Today's technology has given us the freedom to manage large amounts of data. With a little effort, you can soon have a computerized volunteer management system up and running in your office.

Begin by creating personnel files for each volunteer. The files don't have to be extensive, but should contain the following information: name, address, phone numbers, spouse's and children's names, birthdays of volunteer and family members, interests and hobbies, brief job description, and length of time as a volunteer.

Here a couple of ways that the computerized system can help you with your volunteer management.

• Personal Touch. Each month sort your database by birthday. Print out a list of every volunteer or volunteer family member that has a birthday that month. Send them a card from the Extension office. This simple act brings more positive response from volunteers than almost anything else you can do.
• Target Mailings. Your job description data can be labeled as to type of job (club leader, activity leader, project leader). When you need to send announcements to one particular group of volunteers, you can sort and have mailing labels printed for that specific group. No more mass mailings to all volunteers - a savings of time and money.

The list of possible uses goes on and on. As volunteer managers, we need to treat our volunteers with the same "personal touch" that we expect from our boss or co-workers. The computer provides the means by which we can do this in even the largest volunteer system.