By Anjali A
Assistant Manager, Impact Operations

Every team managing volunteers has faced this problem at some point: people join with a lot of energy, but somewhere along the way, that energy fades.

They come with a lot of excitement, but before they can even reach the finish line, they slowly drop off.
We have been there too.

In our very early days, more than 30-40% of our volunteers would drop off before completing their projects.

These were passionate people who joined us of their own will & wanted to create change. However, over time, priorities can shift, projects can sometimes slow down, and eventually, the momentum can also fade away.

We dug deeper to find out why drop-offs were happening.

Some volunteers were unclear about what was expected of them when entering the project. Others lost interest when there wasn’t consistent communication from the nonprofit they were working with. At the same time, some couldn’t clearly see how their work would impact the nonprofit.

On the other hand, since our project-based volunteering programs are longer-term (1-2 Months), on the NGO side, teams would get stretched thin and couldn’t always be available to put in the time and effort needed to work with volunteers. And somewhere in the middle, we’d lose volunteer motivation.

Once we started noticing these patterns, we realized that retaining volunteers is not going to be about reminders or constant follow-ups. It’s not about pushing people to stay. It’s about how we design their experience.

What truly makes a difference is helping volunteers feel connected to the cause, clear about what’s expected from them, and supported throughout the journey. When those three things come together, commitment sustains itself.

With that in mind, we started introducing some practices in place, a few of which are highlighted below - How did we re-imagine our volunteer journey?

Making Volunteers Clear About What’s Expected

1. Structured Onboarding:
   Every project begins with a kick-off call, ensuring we are starting off strong. Volunteers & NGOs work together to define each stakeholder’s role, set weekly touchpoints, and outline communication methods that help everyone stay aligned.

2. Volunteer Levels in Teams:
   Volunteers with less professional experience (like interns or junior associates) tend to feel uncertain or overwhelmed. We create a tiered structure for each project. We have senior leadership guide projects, managers lead the projects, and juniors work & support them.

Supporting them throughout their journey

1. Easy Project Coordination:
   Instead of adding another platform or dashboard for volunteers to check, we created WhatsApp groups - a tool everyone already uses daily. Each project has its own WA group where volunteers and nonprofits can share updates, coordinate tasks, and resolve any blockers quickly.

2. Volunteer/Project Cohort System:
   We started grouping similar projects into cohorts so volunteers could connect with others tackling similar challenges. This not only gave them a peer network to seek help from but also exposed them to different ways of solving similar problems in different contexts.

Connecting Volunteers To the Cause

1. Monthly Reflections:
   We introduced monthly review calls to create space for volunteers to talk about their challenges and mind blockers. Together, we reflected on what was working, what wasn’t, and how to move forward. These conversations also reminded everyone of the larger purpose behind the work.

2. Celebrating Small Wins:
   We began recognising even the smallest moments of progress — like finalising a project plan. Because that plan brought clarity and direction to both the volunteers and NGOs, recognising these steps helped everyone feel their contribution mattered, reinforcing their connection to the cause.

Have these practices been working for us?

To be honest, the changes didn’t necessarily happen overnight.

But things started changing slowly. Volunteers started completing more projects. More importantly, they started coming - signing up for new roles, new causes, new challenges.

This reminds me of this one instance -

A team of two volunteers started a project full of enthusiasm. They would follow up with the NGO POCs by themselves, take ownership of the goals and all good signs. A few weeks in, calls started getting postponed, and one of the volunteers went completely silent and stopped responding to our messages.

Seeing this, the other volunteer wanted to drop off as well. We began by understanding the struggles the volunteer was facing. We connected the volunteer with a mentor who had over 8 years of experience.

The collaborative effort with the mentor and regular check-ins with our team helped build the volunteer's motivation to complete the project in just one month.

Sometimes, all it takes is a slight nudge, a check-in, a support system, a moment of clarity.
Today, our volunteer drop-off rate is under 5%.

And more than the number itself, it’s what it represents: a community where people feel connected, transparent, and supported.