Anne Bartel-Radic, University Professor of Management Sciences, Grenoble Alpes University (UGA) and Amélie Artis, Lecturer and HDR Associate Professor at Sciences Po Grenoble, Grenoble Alpes University (UGA)

Health and social services, education, youth, local development, environmental protection, humanitarian aid, cultural and leisure activities... The number of associations in France, whatever their field, continues to grow. There are currently an estimated 1.5 million, 200,000 more than in 2011. That's an average of 30,000 more organizations every year.

44% of them do not only cater to their own members, but also to external audiences. Their combined budget remains substantial: €113.3 billion, or around 3.3% of French GDP, and is also growing every year, by an average of 1.6% between 2011 and 2017.

Associative life relies heavily on the commitment of volunteers, and this was the subject of a recent questioning by the Conseil économique social et environnemental (Cese) during a day entitled "L'engagement bénévole, indispensable facteur de cohésion sociale et de citoyenneté".

There are almost 22 million active members in France, representing some 1,425,000 full-time equivalent jobs. Only 10.6% of associations employ salaried staff. Although not for profit, associations remain organizations in their own right, with objectives, coordination of individual activities and collective actions to manage.

But isn't there a paradox in associating volunteering and management? The latter term, taken from the corporate world, is often confused with a purely financial and accounting logic, aimed at cutting costs and boosting results. Volunteering, on the other hand, remains a free, unpaid commitment: isn't it illogical, even immoral, to try and apply managerial logic to it?

Formal framework and shared identity

These questions are addressed in the collective work Bénévolat et management : pratiques, paradoxes et préconisationsto which 14 teacher-researchers and experts from the voluntary sector contributed. In particular, it explains that turning to management science to help manage volunteers is not a pointless exercise.

How do you attract and recruit volunteers? What tasks should they be assigned? How to satisfy and reward volunteers? How can we retain them? These management questions arise in the same way as for other human resources. No organization can be successful in the long term without successful operational management to achieve its objectives. The same applies to organizations mobilizing volunteers.

Many aspects of volunteer management are not very different from those of salaried employees. For example, an association providing psychological assistance to people in distress has set up volunteer recruitment procedures similar to those for salaried employees in a large company. It publishes recruitment advertisements in the press and on the Internet, and those interested undergo several interviews with psychologists before entering a progressive training and integration program.

Even in the case of less sensitive volunteer positions, it's important to ensure a good match between the position to be filled and the organization's values. The question of meaning and motivation is important to leave room for choice and autonomy for volunteers. Explaining as clearly as possible what the organization offers them (or not!) is essential. Contractualization through commitment agreements, civic contracts or follow-up interviews is also increasingly common in large associations. This has proved appropriate in the case of several of the associations featured in the book.

Alongside the formal framework, it's important to create a shared identity among active members. In the case of a major sporting event, for example, conviviality and a sense of belonging are fostered by evenings reserved for volunteers at the end of each day of the event. Similarly, an immigrant aid association organizes twice-yearly social events and outings in the surrounding area.

Differentiating between volunteers and paid staff

That said, the role of volunteers should not be confused with that of salaried staff. In the book, an association in the field of social action and health entrusts its activity of welcoming beneficiaries to volunteers, but their administrative follow-up to salaried employees.

It's a good idea to set up a "hierarchy" for volunteers. They can then turn to their volunteer referent, in charge of identifying and defining tasks, organizing any training or apprenticeships, and answering their questions.

Articulating the roles of the various players provides stability for the organization and encourages volunteer loyalty and renewal. When a large community organization decided to entrust the reorganization of its office to the management committee, it quickly realized the need to call on third-party experts to help build the collective, without creating any ambiguity or asymmetry between the respective roles. Differences of opinion between volunteers and employees on sensitive issues are often reduced to skills and investment. However, taking into account the subjective and intersubjective dimension is a decisive factor. We need to give meaning to everyone's commitment.

However, separation by status - volunteer or salaried employee - is not always an airtight boundary when it comes to organizing skills and avoiding a feeling of competition. This can sometimes be risky. In one association in the disability sector, management neglected the management of salaried human resources and allowed the number of unpaid hours worked by employees to multiply. As a result, the association has drifted towards a "voluntaryization" of its employees, which has a negative impact on their well-being at work, as well as on the association's attractiveness as an employer, which has seen many departures.

In search of recognition

Although volunteers are, by definition, unpaid, it is essential to recognize the value of their work. Their support, particularly through regular exchanges and formal and informal acknowledgements, plays a part in this. After all, while volunteers get involved to fulfill their potential, they also do so in search of some form of recognition (including written recognition).

The perception of the "rewards" received depends on the volunteers' expectations, so it's a good idea to question them beforehand and make the proposed rewards explicit. What they have been "promised", or what they think they have been promised, forms what are known as "psychological contracts". The more realistic these are, the more volunteers will feel that the contract has been "kept", which will reinforce their satisfaction and commitment. The major sporting event already mentioned describes various "packs" on its website, in which the duration of the volunteer commitment determines the objects and events offered in return.

In any case, managing volunteers calls for a specific approach, one that neither simply transposes the management of salaried employees, nor "does nothing". Mobilizing volunteers is not a spontaneous action: these contributions need to be organized, prioritized and encouraged within the organization - in a word, managed.

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read theoriginal article.