The recruitment and selection of volunteers not only involves choosing the most suitable recruitment methods. It also involves meeting legal responsibilities in relation to ensuring that the volunteers you recruit are suitable for the roles they will fulfil within your group or organisation – particularly if they will be working with children or other vulnerable people.
Planning for the recruitment of volunteers is a necessary requirement in finding the right volunteers for your group. There is no one magic solution or guaranteed answer, however taking the time to plan will hugely increase your chances of a successful recruitment. As well as looking at different recruitment methods
Before you start recruiting, ask yourselves:-
- what do you need your volunteers to do?
- who is going to deal with any enquiries about volunteers in your organisation and how will this be done?
- what information are you going to give potential volunteers?
- consider what you need to tell them about your organisation
- what policies do you think volunteers need to know about before they apply, for example, do they require to be disclosure checked because this post involves working with vulnerable people?
- do you have a budget for volunteer recruitment?
- revisit your Equal Opportunities policy and seek to meet the same objectives as you would for the recruitment of staff
- have you considered the timing of your recruitment?
- have you thought about how you will manage and evaluate demand?
The Ayrshire Community Trust is responsible, as part of the Third sector Interface, to promote and support volunteering. If you would like us to promote your volunteering opportunities please complete our Opportunity Form and return to us. A development worker will then be in touch to offer you support to advertise your opportunities on a range of formats such as through our website, the national database and through face to face contact with potential volunteers.
Information in this section includes:
Screening Potential Volunteers