7 Easy Ways to Increase Employee Volunteer Hours at Your Financial Institution

You know how it goes. You create an employee volunteer program for your bank or credit union, announce it to employees, and wait for the volunteer hours to start rolling in. 

 

But the hours don’t come.

 

And you’re left waiting. And waiting…

 

Sound familiar? While employee volunteer programs are great for brand awareness, employee satisfaction, institution growth, and team collaboration, that doesn’t mean it’s easy to convince employees to volunteer. People are busy, and volunteering is often the first thing to slip their minds. 

 

Don’t despair, though! Volunteering really is important for your institution, community, and employees. And it often takes just a little extra effort on your part to increase employee volunteerism and make a difference. 

 

Here are 7 easy ways to increase those employee volunteer hours. 

 

1. Plan events based on employee interests

 

Just because you’ve created an employee volunteer program doesn’t mean your work stops there. To be really effective, you also need to take the time to plan events and give employees the opportunities they need to make a difference. 

 

Banks and credit unions hold all kinds of events—galas, golf outings, Habitat for Humanity builds, financial education workshops, fundraisers, etc.—but not every event will interest every employee. You should intentionally cater your events to different employee interests. Don’t just hold the same event every month for the same audience. Mix it up! The more variety there is in your events, the more employees will be interested in at least one volunteer opportunity. 

 

Maybe some employees love working with tools, so inviting them to a Habitat for Humanity build is a good idea. Maybe some employees love working with children, so taking them to an elementary school to teach kids about finances is great. Just remember that not every employee will be interested in every event. Giving them a variety to choose from is bound to boost volunteer hours and get employees excited about volunteering.  

 

 

2. Make it easy to find and register for events

 

Now that you have an event planned, how do you get employees to register? 

 

The secret is making sure that your institution’s events are super easy to find and register for. If nobody knows about your event, then you can’t really expect to see many registrations, now can you? Instead, announce events as soon as they’re planned, promote them heavily—think branch signs, posts on the intranet, employee newsletters, etc.—and collect all the information you need upfront. 

 

Make sure your event registration form is easy to access and complete. Don’t make people jump through a bunch of hoops. No misleading links, no unnecessary passwords, no illegible forms that nobody is going to finish. Registration forms should be simple, but not so simple that all employees have to do is reply “yes” to your email. You know you’re going to need more information than that, so why not collect it up front? If you get their T-shirt size, shift availability, and anything else you need when they’re signing up, you won’t have to send follow-up emails asking more questions.

 

After someone has registered for the event (yay!), make sure they get a confirmation email or calendar invite so the event stays top of mind. 

 

Hint: Check out Kadince event management software if you want this whole process to be easy and automated.

 

3. Remind employees about volunteer opportunities

 

Getting employees to register for an event is only the first step. Now you have to make sure they actually show up. 

 

Let’s face it: remembering what you’ve signed up for can be easier said than done. To avoid employees forgetting to show up to their volunteer shift, they should receive consistent reminder emails about the event. Hype it up! Talk about who this event will impact, how it will support the institution, and how they should feel good giving back to the community. 

 

By keeping the event top of mind, employees are much less likely to forget. And your volunteer activity is more likely to go off without a hitch. 

 

 

4. Offer paid volunteer time off (VTO)

 

Maybe your institution doesn’t plan specific volunteer events for employees. Maybe employees are expected to find their own volunteer opportunities and simply submit their hours for review. That’s totally okay, too! But it does add an extra layer of difficulty for employees, and increasing employee volunteer hours becomes a little harder.

 

One way to counteract this and encourage volunteerism is by offering Volunteer Time Off, or VTO. VTO is basically PTO, but used specifically to volunteer. 

 

Because VTO takes away much of the burden that comes with volunteering—finding time outside of work to volunteer, making arrangements at work, getting the most out of their shift—your employees are much more likely to make the leap and do some good. Some institutions that offer VTO actually require employees to use these hours each year. Requiring employees to volunteer is another way to increase hours and your impact. Just make sure that employees have the resources they need so this requirement doesn’t become a burden. 

 

By not making employees use their personal time to volunteer, you show how much you care about your community and how dedicated you are to volunteerism and employee well-being. It’s a win-win! 

 

5. Create friendly competitions

 

What better way to increase employee volunteer hours than by turning it into a friendly competition? 

 

Many of your employees are likely competitive by nature, and gamifying volunteer hours in this way is a great way to get employees involved and encourage them to volunteer. Here are some friendly competition ideas:

 

• The employee with the most volunteer hours each quarter gets a prize

• The department with the most volunteer hours each year gets a pizza party

• The first employee or department to reach X amount of hours gets a prize

• The employee who volunteers the most hours with a single organization gets to donate X amount of dollars to that organization

 

As you can see, there are lots of ways to incentivize employees through competition. People love to win, and offering individual prizes can help employees feel seen and wanted. On the other hand, having employees compete as a department is a great way to build camaraderie and teamwork. Find what works best for your institution and go for it! And don’t be afraid to have several competitions going at once. 

 

Just make sure that employees know how to properly track and view their hours so there’s no confusion about who wins.

 

 

6. Recognize and reward volunteers

 

Recognizing and rewarding employees for their volunteer efforts goes a long way to increasing hours and helping employees feel like an important part of the team. 

 

If you decide not to arrange competitions between employees or departments, that doesn’t mean you can’t reward employees for their service. 

 

In fact, studies show that 92% of workers are more likely to repeat a specific action after receiving recognition for it. This means that when you reward employees for volunteering, 92% of them are more likely to volunteer again in the future. Now that’s how you increase employee volunteer hours!

 

When it comes to rewarding employees, you may think that cash is king. But 65% of employees actually prefer non-cash incentives. Here are some non-cash reward ideas:

 

• Reserved parking spots

• More vacation time

• Higher priority when approving time off

• Relaxed dress code days

• A department-wide pizza party

• Tickets to a local playhouse, amusement park, or sporting event

 

For more reward ideas, download this PDF

 

30 WAYS TO REWARD EMPLOYEES FOR VOLUNTEERING

 

No matter what you offer, the goal is to show employees that you value the time they spend volunteering. Every institution’s reward system will be different, and no reward system is better than another. Whatever works best for your institution is the way to go.

 

Check out this article to learn more about rewarding employees for volunteering and to see how other institutions do it.

 

7. Make it easy to report hours

 

Even if employees are volunteering, that doesn’t mean you always know about it. In fact, chances are there are plenty of volunteer hours your institution has missed. One reason you may be missing out on volunteer hours is because employees don’t know how to submit their hours for review. Or worse, your institution’s submission process is so difficult or confusing that employees avoid it at all costs. 

 

One of the simplest ways to increase employee volunteer hours is to make your submission form easy to use and painless to submit. The easier your form is to submit, the more hours employees are likely to report.

 

Kadince employee volunteer tracking software makes it super easy for employees to submit volunteer hours and for your team to review them. With Kadince, you can:

 

• Create web-based forms to simplify volunteer hour submissions

• Use custom fields and logic to create smarter, user-friendly forms

• Make fields required to ensure all necessary details are collected upfront

• Allow employees to log hours from any device

• Automatically log hours for employees who register and attend events

 

Schedule a demo to see how Kadince can help your team increase volunteer hours and track them with ease. 

 

Schedule Demo

 

 

 

Read this article to learn more about creating a volunteer form employees will actually complete.

 

Bonus: Learn from other institutions 

 

Starting a volunteer program doesn’t mean you have to start from scratch. Most financial institutions have some type of employee volunteer program, and studying how these other institutions do it is a great way to get ideas for your own. 

 

Maybe you have friends at other institutions you can talk to. Or maybe your institution works closely with another bank or credit union. If you don’t know anyone personally, you can learn about other institution’s programs by looking at websites, social media posts, and online articles.

 

Here are some articles to get you started: 

 

• How Isabella Bank Gets All Employees to Volunteer with its Compassion Into Action Event

• How Bankers Trust Encourages Employees to Volunteer in the Community

• How This Small Bank’s “Make A Difference” Day Led to Over 400 Volunteer Hours In One Day

• How Fox Communities CU Logged Over 400 Employee Volunteer Hours in One Day Using Kadince

 

The more you know about other volunteer programs, the more ideas you’ll have. Of course, you don’t want to copy another program exactly, but by mashing ideas together and adding your own institution’s flair, you’ll likely end up with a fun, unique program that will help increase those volunteer hours. 

 

So what are you waiting for? Take some of the ideas from this article and start increasing your institution’s employee volunteer hours today! 

None of Kadince, Inc., its affiliates, or its respective employees, directors, officers, and agents (collectively, “Kadince”) are responsible or liable for any content or information incorporated herein. Read full disclosure.