Understanding and managing volunteer motivation: two regional tourism cases

This study looks at two regional New South Wales tourism organisations heavily dependant on volunteers in order to analyse whether managers understand what motivates their volunteers and whether, as a result, they have any management strategies in place to retain current volunteers and to attract new ones. The Volunteer Function Inventory (VFI) was used to measure both management and volunteer perceptions as they relate to motivation. It was found that creating opportunities to permit new learning experiences and/or the opportunity to use skills or knowledge that would otherwise go unpractised, the understanding function of the VFI, is what mostly motivated those interviewed to become volunteers. It is argued that the VFI offers managers of volunteers a valuable tool to recruit new people and to re-invigorate, and maintain, existing volunteers.