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Sport clubs can now measure the impact of their volunteers thanks to a new set of tools available from Volunteering England and the Institute of Volunteering Research. The web-based tools are available for sport organisations to use and are the first of its kind specifically designed for sport organisations.
The project, which tested the current Volunteering Impact Assessment Toolkit with 100 volunteers and players across three sports, has produced both sport specific tools, and a final report about the methods and findings behind those new tools.
The report: A winning team? focused on sports clubs from rugby union, hockey and Riding for the Disabled Association groups, found that benefits enjoyed by the volunteers included making new friends, and improving confidence and skills, particularly among young volunteers: there were strong positive impacts on the skills and social awareness of players and the community. However, it also revealed opportunities for improving the experience of volunteers in sport: with frustrations about volunteer shortages, excessive reliance on key individuals and lack of training emerging as areas of concern. These experiences are not new: similar results were reported in the 2002 research by Sport England into sport volunteering. The difference with this project is the new tools now allow individual sport organisations to assess their own volunteering impacts, enabling them to shout loudly or make any improvements.
A winning team? makes a number of recommendations to address these experiences, including:
- Encouraging clubs to create a volunteer co-ordinator position rather than spreading responsibility too generally
- Promoting “softer” management practices such as mentoring and buddying
- Developing links between sport organisations and volunteering infrastructure bodies such as Volunteer Centres
- Better monitoring of individuals’ workloads, delegation and division of tasks
- Reimbursing volunteers’ expenses to enable people on low incomes to volunteer
Laura Ferguson, Head of Sports Volunteering at Volunteering England, said:
“These are the first ever tools designed for sports organisations to demonstrate the difference their volunteers are making, and it is fantastic to see those who have already used them promoting the positive impacts of their volunteers and making positive changes to their clubs.
“The report will hopefully show other sport organisations how they can assess the impact of their volunteering, and give them a method of finding out how to improve their volunteering. Unless attention is given to volunteering, and ultimately investment is made in sport volunteering, sports organisations run the risk of their volunteers becoming unhappy, and they may even lose volunteers.”
Jennie Price, Chief Executive of Sports England, said:
“Community sport couldn't happen without the thousands of people volunteering as coaches, referees, club administrators and treasurers in over 100,000 voluntary sports clubs across England."
A further poll on Volunteering England’s website asking readers to name the most important impact of sports volunteering found that the majority voted for “increased community cohesion” (38%) and “enabling people to gain new skills” (35%). Twenty two per cent chose “getting people fitter” and just 5% opted for “encouraging involvement with the 2012 Olympic and Paralympic Games”.
Organisations wishing to measure the impact of their volunteers can download the tools from www.volunteeringengland.org.uk/sport
Case study
Glenn Chapman, 23, from Leicester
Volunteer 1st XV Manager and Under 16’s coach/ manager, Aylestone St James RFC and research participant
I have always enjoyed being part of the rugby team since I was a junior player and was always happy to help with things that needing doing for the team. As I got older I started to take on more responsibility and took on the position of manager. It can take up a lot of time – although there’s Tuesday and Thursday nights at training I have to do some sort of work related to the club every week day.
It is hard work at times but it’s satisfying to be able to giving something back to the club that helped me so much when I was a kid and I know how difficult it can be to find coaches for junior teams.
The main challenge is education. I don’t believe the majority of members at the club realise just how much hard work and dedication are needed from its volunteers to help keep the club running week by week. A lot of time it’s the little things that need to be done around the place that go un-noticed. We have a good core of volunteers at our club, but I think a lot of people would be surprised to know just how much work some of those people have to put in each week.
You just have to keep asking for more volunteers and more help, this way the people who are already doing all these jobs would have less to do, may enjoy it more and therefore it may just increase the amount of time are willing to commit themselves.
Notes to editors
- Volunteering England aims to improve the quality, quantity, impact and accessibility of volunteering throughout England. For more information please visit www.volunteering.org.uk
- Volunteering England has been funded by Sport England since 2005 to improve partnership working between Volunteering England, Volunteer Centres and the community sport sector. This partnership working could provide the sport sector with suggestions for improving volunteering, for example, through better volunteer management. For more information about our work with sport please visit www.volunteering.org.uk/sport
- This Impact of Sport Volunteering Project was funded by capacitybuilders through the Volunteering Hub from April 2007 – March 2008.
Sport volunteering fact and figures*
- Up to six million people volunteer in sport
- Volunteers contribute 1.2 billion hours each year to sport, with a value of over £14 billion and equivalent to 720,000 additional full time workers
- Major sporting events attract large numbers of volunteers. More than 10,000 at the Commonwealth Games in Manchester, 6,000 at the London Marathon, 5,000 at Wimbledon and 1,200 at the Golf Open
- Male volunteers outnumber female volunteers in sport by two to one
- 45% of all youth volunteering takes place in sport
*Statistics collated from a variety of sources
