A new report by the Institute of Fundraising recommends that charities should involve senior volunteers in fundraising because it can lead to “remarkable income growth”.
The report, The Perfect Fundraising Partnership, published today by the IoF’s Volunteer Board Special Interest Group calls on large fundraising charities to get senior volunteers more involved in their fundraising efforts, as it can yield “remarkable income growth and the transformation of philanthropy programmes”.
The report, produced for the IoF by consultuancy Solid Management, said that involving senior volunteers in fundraising “brings access to new prospects” and, as a result, leads to increased income. The report said this is because volunteers help “build a pool of prospects for charities that have no history of relationship fundraising”.
For the report 12 fundraisers and 12 volunteers were interviewed between April and June of this year.
The report also recommends that charity fundraising teams must be prepared to support volunteers when it comes to raising money, as volunteers inherently “don’t always enjoy asking for money”.
Many senior volunteers ‘concerned about succession’
The report also found that many senior volunteers and indeed fundraisers are concerned about where the next generation of volunteers is going to come from, particularly in terms of volunteer fundraising.
“Senior volunteers found succession planning particularly challenging,” said the report. “Some felt that the task of finding peers willing to be involved in fundraising created too much pressure and others noted that they couldn’t step away from their responsibilities because there was no ‘next generation’ of senior volunteers”.
The report said that “younger philanthropists” also appear to be “less willing to engage their networks and help with asking, which could have serious consequences for charities’ ability to fulfil their missions in the future”.
Commenting on the report, Edwin Drummond, chair of the IoF’s volunteer board SIG, said: “We felt strongly that a report in this area would help to support our fellow fundraisers and offer guidance in an area that may be new to people or organisations.
“We are therefore very pleased to launch the report having had the opportunity to draw on the perspectives of both charity professionals and the volunteers themselves, giving us unique insight from some of the sectors leading philanthropists.”
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