Leaders naturally emerge from the group when people get together in a crisis to achieve a common goal. However, if you are trying to build a lasting strong community that creates impact, fostering leaders within it is essential.
In Qela, our mission is to help community and volunteer coordinators build lasting relations with their volunteers, so they can change the world together. Let’s explore how you can encourage your supporters to step into volunteer leadership!
Why You Should Foster Volunteer Coordinators Within Your Community
Growing leaders within your group rather than bringing volunteer coordinators from the outside is a much more sustainable solution. Yesterday's volunteers, they understand the intricacies and the inside works of the organization, guaranteeing a shorter onboarding. Besides that, they are familiar with the volunteer community of your movement, knowing the strong sides of your supporters and their areas of development.
Moreover, promoting volunteers to a leadership position ensures a higher motivation for growth among them and other community members. And finally, recruiting people within the existing community is more cost-efficient than external hiring.
What Leadership Skills to Develop in Your Volunteers
Communication Skills
Volunteer coordinators need to convey information clearly, and be able to express the organization’s mission and goals to their community and the outside public.
Sensitivity and Interpersonal Skills
Volunteer coordinators should be able to maintain good relationships with their community. They should be trustworthy enough for the volunteers to come to them with their problems.
Flexibility
Volunteer coordinators need to know how to manage unexpected changes and be adaptable to change the course of action if there is a need for it.
Organization & Delegation
One of the main tasks of a volunteer coordinator is to make sure that volunteers know what to do. Thus a good volunteer coordinator needs to be a good organizer and planner, be proficient at knowing their volunteers’ strongest skills, and assign tasks accordingly.
Strategies to Help You Turn Supporters into Community Leaders
Create a Space for Growth
The most important thing you can do to foster volunteer coordinators within your community is to create a culture within your movement that encourages personal and professional growth and development. Talk about volunteer leadership opportunities with your supporters, celebrate those who take more responsibility or exhibit a proactive position, deter from micromanagement, and learn how to assign tasks to your community. This way you will naturally create an environment in which your volunteers will want to develop and grow into your future community leaders.
Share The Inner Works of The Organization With Your Community
Most of your supporters have no grassroots organizing or community building experience. Thus they have no idea what is happening behind the curtain of your operation. Organize sharing sessions, share reports, and other inner workings of your movement with your community. Nudge them to give you advice or insights they might have about the problems you are facing. There is a high chance many of your supporters already possess leadership skills they use at home or work. You just need to show them that they can use them while volunteering with you as well.
Share Responsibility for its Development
When you share responsibility for the development of your organization with your community members, you allow them to showcase their grassroots leadership skills and increase your volunteer retention rates.
Qela offers its clients a unique methodology — the Vote Weight. It is a sum of a supporter’s influence points that grows with every task they complete. The more points the person has, the more power over the final decision in the vote they will have. This way you can encourage your supporters to stay active and allow the most active of them to grow to coordinator roles. Learn more about our solution here: https://www.qela.app/
Educate Your Volunteers
It’s not enough to only motivate your volunteers to take on coordinator responsibilities. You need to also make sure that they are ready for the job. Organize capacity-building sessions with your current volunteer coordinators. Arrange lectures with leaders from other organizations as speakers. Create a leadership library — online or offline — where volunteers can borrow books from. Regularly share educational materials on leadership with them — podcasts, articles, interviews, etc.
In Qela you can invite your supporters for in-app lectures, send them articles to read, and even create quizzes based on their contents to see whether the information was clear and helpful for your volunteers. Sign up for a free 30-day trial here: https://www.qela.app/register
Movements can’t survive without leaders. And the more rooted within the community the coordinators are, the more sustainably the movement will develop. In Qela, we understand the importance of volunteer coordination and growing leaders within your local community. Therefore we offer innovative solutions to empower coordinators in their efforts and help them foster leaders of tomorrow. Currently, we offer free access for communities with less than 100 members. Explore our offers here: https://www.qela.app/register
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