This list is NOT exhaustive, and has been passed around the internet many times. Take a look, and see some of the MANY ways you can motivate your volunteers to continue doing such wonderful work to help save animals! These tips can be so helpful in environments where paid staff members work with volunteers!

101 ways to motivate volunteers

My ways to motivate volunteers
• Smile
• Put up a volunteer suggestion box
• Treat to a soda
• Reimburse assignment-related expenses
• Ask for a report on progress
• Send a birthday card
• Arrange for discounts
• Award certificates of appreciation
• Give service stripes and recognition pins
• Maintain a coffee bar
• Plan annual ceremonial occasions
• Invite to staff meetings
• Recognize personal needs and problems
• Accommodate personal needs and problems
• Be pleasant
• Ask them to help with an emergency in the organization
• Provide childcare
• Post Honor Roll in reception area
• Award them with photos of rescue animals
• Respect their wishes
• Give informal teas or a pizza party
• Keep challenging them
• Solicit input and reactions about recent events
• Allow them to DO the job they’re been assigned
• Send a Thanksgiving Day card to the volunteer’s family
• Properly describe all volunteer positions and time required
• Say “Good Morning”
• Greet by name
• Give them a t-shirt with the group’s logo on it
• Follow up on events, review successes and failures
• Provide good pre-service training so they know how to do their jobs!
• Help develop self-confidence
• Award plaques to sponsoring groups
• Take time to explain; explain their jobs, the impact it has on the organization.
• Be verbal
• Motivate agency VIPs to converse with them
• Hold rap sessions
• Give additional responsibility
• Invite participation in team planning
• Respect sensitivities
• Enable to grow on the job
• Enable to grow out of the job
• Send newsworthy information to the media
• Have wine and cheese tasting parties
• Ask client/public to evaluate their work/service
• Say “Good Afternoon”
• Honor their preferences
• Create pleasant surroundings
• Make the job a FUN thing to do
• Welcome to staff coffee breaks
• Enlist to train others
• Have a public reception
• Take time to talk
• Defend against hostile or negative staff
• Make good plans
• Ask them to serve on other boards as well
• Commend to supervisory staff
• Send a Valentine
• Give them updates on their performance
• Make thorough pre-arrangements
• Persuade “personnel” to equate volunteer experience with work experience
• Admit to partnership with paid staff
• Recommend to prospective employer
• Provide scholarships to attend volunteer conferences or workshops
• Offer advocacy roles
• Utilize as consultants on projects
• Write them thank-you notes!
• Invite participation in policy formulation
• Surprise with coffee and cake or pizza and sodas
• Celebrate outstanding projects and achievements
• Nominate for volunteer awards in group, in community and nationally
• Have a “Presidents Day” for presidents of sponsoring groups
• Carefully match volunteer with job!
• Praise the volunteers to their friends and employers
• Provide substantive in-service training
• Provide useful tools in good working condition
• Say “Good Night”
• Plan staff and volunteer social events
• Be a real person
• Rent billboard space for public appreciation
• Accept their individuality
• Provide opportunities for conferences and evaluation
• Identify age groups
• Maintain meaningful file
• Send impromptu fun cards
• Plan occasional extravaganzas
• Instigate client-planned surprises
• Utilize purchased newspaper space
• Promote a “Volunteer-of-the-Month” program
• Send letter of appreciation to employer
• Plan a “Recognition Edition” of the agency newsletter
• Color code name tags to indicate particular achievements (hours, years, jobs, etc.)
• Send commendatory letters to prominent public figures
• Say “We missed you”
• Praise the sponsoring group or club
• Promote staff smiles
• Facilitate personal development
• Distinguish between groups and individuals in the group
• Maintain safe working conditions
• Adequately orient to job
• Award special citations for extraordinary achievements
• Fully indoctrinate regarding the agency; explain your group’s beliefs and policies
• Send Christmas or Chanukah cards
• Be familiar with the details of job assignments
• Conduct community-wide, cooperative, inter-agency recognition events
• Plan a theater party
• Attend a sports event together
• Have a picnic
• Say “Thank You” frequently
• Smile! (It is so important, hence the double-listing)