What Motivates Someone to Volunteer?

By Daniel W. Trathen, D. Min. Ph. D.

When I volunteered to serve our country through military service I remember being confused when other service personnel warned, "whatever you do, never raise your hand to volunteer for anything." After all I had freely joined the military to serve and fight to preserve freedom and the American way of life. I volunteered and freely chose to be involved because it was something I wanted to do. There was an inner sense of personal pride and satisfaction in serving. I wanted to do my duty like those who served in generations before me. Like many others, I still feel that same way today. It is important that we know why we are volunteering and why a specific task or service is important to us. What motivates someone to volunteer within schools, churches, civic and service groups, chambers and local government positions? Typically, we chose to volunteer ourselves in positions and organizations that share similar values or convictions as our own. Hopefully, as we invest our time, we observe good results and receive appreciation, purpose and meaning through helping others. In addition, there may be other more tangible motivating rewards. Some of us begin volunteering as a way to explore potential career choices, work experiences, or further training in a given field. Others may not feel challenged in their life and seek to be stimulated and stretched through different situations. Still other volunteers enjoy being with new people and expanding their circle of friends and acquaintances while experiencing a change of scenery as they do new tasks or projects. Whatever the motivation, most people volunteer because they get a good feeling in helping others.

Another motivating factor for volunteers is that they realize they are making a difference. Some of us work in vocations where we are managing change everyday. Who doesn’t want to make a difference in the lives of people? What keeps us volunteering is the emotional, psychological, and social "payoffs" from doing the work and seeing good results. Volunteers are usually motivated by a combination of these factors; a sense of duty for some, a chance to be creative for others, doing interesting work, a chance to learn and grow, and good working conditions are becoming increasingly important.

Along with making a difference, people want to be appreciated for who they are as well as what they do. Receiving a thank you note, telephone call, a personal visit, or a small token of appreciation goes a long way in making volunteers feel that their investment of time counts and that they are important to the organization and it’s constituents. Small, consistent gestures of thankfulness never fail to produce positive feelings and results.

Our country has been founded on great principles. Many of us volunteer to preserve these principles by freely offering our talents, goods, or services in order to "do good" and help others. We volunteer and freely choose to be involved because it is something important to us. We receive an inner sense of personal pride and satisfaction in serving. As we invest our time, we observe good results and receive appreciation, purpose and meaning through helping others. These are some of the reasons that motivate many of us to volunteer. These are some of the reasons why I continue to "raise my hand and volunteer" for those situations that are close to my heart.