Transformational leadership and follower proactivity in a volunteer workforce

This study explored how transformational leaders can enhance volunteers’ proactive behavior in an all‐volunteer nonprofit organization. Based on Parker, Bindl, and Strauss’s model of motivation, it was hypothesized that role breadth self‐efficacy, work values (self‐direction/stimulation and universalism/benevolence), and positive affect would mediate the transformational leadership—proactive behavior relationship. Data came from 141 volunteers in Brazilian chapters of an international not‐for‐profit organization. The model was tested using structural equation modeling, with mediation hypotheses tested by estimating the indirect effects using bias‐corrected intervals. Comparative fit index (.97) and standardized root mean square residual (.05) fit statistics indicate the model is plausible. These findings contribute to the understanding of the role that leaders play in increasing followers’ proactive behavior in volunteer organizations.     

Volunteer Engagement: Exploring the Distinction Between Job and Organizational Engagement

Retaining engaged volunteers is crucial to many non-profit organizations. However, research on volunteer engagement is limited, and the distinction between job and organizational engagement in volunteers remains to be investigated. In this paper, we examine both organizational- and job-level engagement, and specifically, whether perceived organizational support would enhance volunteer engagement and associated attitudes. We surveyed 221 volunteers, and asked them about their perceptions of organizational support; their engagement with their volunteer job and the organization they volunteer for; satisfaction; commitment; and turnover intentions. Both organizational and job engagements had significant relationships with the attitudinal variables. However, we found that organizational rather than job engagement mediated the relationship between organizational support and volunteer satisfaction and commitment. While organizational engagement correlated with turnover intentions, neither job nor organizational engagement mediated the relationship between support and the intent to leave. Our findings advance the research on volunteer engagement, and highlight the importance of organizational engagement for this important, but too often overlooked, workforce.     

Sources of Volunteer Motivation: Transformational Leadership and Personal Motives Influence Volunteer Outcomes

We examined the separate influences of volunteers' personal motives and their team leaders' behaviors on volunteer satisfaction and contributions, along with mediating processes suggested by self‐determination theory. Participants were 302 volunteers who worked in teams at various sites through a central agency. As predicted, both personal motives for volunteering and transformational leadership influenced volunteer satisfaction through enhanced work meaningfulness and higher‐quality team relationships. However, motives that predicted volunteer contribution were different from those that predicted satisfaction. Whereas satisfaction was positively associated with motives concerning esteem enhancement and value expression, contribution was positively associated with motives to gain understanding and negatively related to motives pertaining to esteem enhancement and social concerns. Transformational leadership was positively associated with volunteer satisfaction, but not with volunteer contributions. The theoretical ramifications of these findings are discussed, along with practical implications for the recruitment and retention of volunteers.     

Social Constructs and Human Service: Managerial Sensemaking of Volunteer Motivation

Managers of volunteers in human service interpret their job and experiences through a cognitive construct grounded in past interactions and experiences. This construct—sensemaking—then guides the managers' perceptions of subsequent interactions with peers, volunteers, and supervisors. Volunteers similarly make sense of their surroundings through cognitive constructions grounded in their own experiences. Unfortunately, managers and volunteers do not always make sense of their surroundings in the same way. Research has demonstrated that supervisors and paid employees may not necessarily agree in their perceptions of such issues as, for example, employee motivation. Such differences can lead to disagreements about the meaning of behaviors and the design of reward systems, eventually compromising organizational performance. In this study, sensemaking of volunteer motivation was assessed from the manager's perspective and compared with a previous study of volunteers themselves. Differences in understanding such a primary question as why volunteers are present can reasonably be expected to have an impact on organizational effectiveness. Interestingly, the predicted outcome of a different sensemaking schema was not supported in either the understanding of motivation or in the relative importance assigned to altruism. Additional attributes of volunteer managers were also considered to determine if sensemaking is driven by environmental factors such as exposure to volunteers, tenure as a volunteer manager, or social roles associated with gender constructs. These additional attributes were not found to significantly affect the process of attribution of altruistic motives.     

Transformational leadership and job satisfaction of police officers (carabineros) in Chile: the mediating effects of group identification and work engagement / Liderazgo transformacional y satisfacción laboral en carabineros de Chile: los efectos mediadores de la identificación con el grupo y el work engagement

Abstract

The aim of this paper is to examine the relationship between transformational leadership and work satisfaction, as well as to analyse the mediating role of group identification and work engagement in a police training process at a Chilean professional military institution. The sample was made up of 985 candidates representing all the candidates that joined the units of the country in the different locations. Officers and non-commissioned officers acting as instructors were considered ‘leaders’, while their ‘followers’ were the young candidates in the training period. It was found that all the relevant variables were positively and significantly interrelated, and a model of structural equations revealed that both work engagement and group identification played a mediating role in the relationship between transformational leadership and work satisfaction.     

Does managers' motivation matter? Exploring the associations between motivation,transformational leadership,and innovation in a religious organization

Religious organizations are social systems operating in a complex and changing environment. By looking to an authority beyond themselves, religious organizations have comparatively little control over defining their own goals. In this juggling between sticking to the ultimate goal of an organization and adapting to complex changing environments, that is, in the juggling between tradition and renewal, transformational leadership seems to play an important role in religious organizations. The extensive body of literature on transformational leadership has focused more on the outcomes of transformational leadership than on its antecedents. We extend the existing literature by linking managers' motivation to their transformational leadership behaviors in a religious organization. More specifically, we examined the associations of intrinsic and prosocial motivation with transformational leadership, and we investigated the relationship between transformational leadership and innovation among 252 managers in the largest nonprofit organization in Norway, the Church of Norway. Analyses in structural equation modeling revealed a positive relationship between intrinsic motivation and transformational leadership, whereas the relationship between prosocial motivation and transformational leadership was not significant. Transformational leadership was positively associated with innovation. Based on the results of the study, we discuss practical implications regarding how to support intrinsic motivation, transformational leadership, and innovation in religious organizations.     

Distributive Justice for Volunteers

Volunteer organizations continue to suffer from turnover; the current volunteer rate is the lowest since 2002. Distributive justice, satisfaction, and extrinsic outcome importance were examined as influences of volunteer intention to quit. Survey results from 294 volunteers revealed that those who perceived less than fair distribution of extrinsic outcomes experienced heightened intention to quit compared to those who perceived fair distribution. Overall satisfaction partially mediated this relationship. We explored the potential moderating role of volunteers’ assessment of the importance of extrinsic outcomes on the overall mediated relationship.     

Enhancing Volunteer Engagement to Achieve Desirable Outcomes: What Can Non-profit Employers Do?

Engagement is a positive psychological state that is linked with a range of beneficial individual and organizational outcomes. However, the factors associated with volunteer engagement have rarely been examined. Data from 1064 volunteers of a wildlife charity in the United Kingdom revealed that both task- and emotion-oriented organizational support were positively related to volunteer engagement, and volunteer engagement was positively related to volunteer happiness and perceived social worth and negatively related to intent to leave the voluntary organization. Consistent with theory, engagement acted as a mediator between these factors. The implications for future research and the relevance of the findings for voluntary organizations are discussed.     

Enhancing volunteers capacity in all‐volunteer nonprofit organizations: The role of volunteer leaders' reliance on effective management processes and (de)motivating leadership

All‐volunteer nonprofit organizations rely solely on the commitment of volunteers to support their operations. As such, it is important that leaders of these organizations, even though they are volunteers themselves, rely on professional skills in order to optimize their organization's volunteers capacity. In the present study, we investigated how volunteer leaders' reliance on effective management processes and a (de)motivating leadership style related to volunteers capacity. To this end, we relied on the Competing Values Framework (CVF) and Self‐Determination Theory (SDT), respectively. Results revealed a positive (unique) association between (the sum score of) the management processes of the CVF models, as well as (the sum score of) the motivating leadership styles and volunteers capacity. Bivariate analyses indicated that the management processes of each CVF model (i.e., human relations model, internal process model, open system model, and rational goal model) and each motivating leadership style (i.e., an autonomy‐supportive and a structuring leadership style) related positively to volunteers capacity. These findings have important practical implications as they revealed that it is crucial for volunteer leaders to implement effective management processes, while adopting a motivating leadership style.     

What is Old is New Again: Achieving Effectiveness with Volunteer Programs in Kazakhstan

Abstact This study based on Kazakhstan nonprofit organizations (NPOs) is the first to address the important issue of the relationship between volunteer management and volunteer program effectiveness in an international setting. Our inquiry is informed by findings of US scholars that show that the adoption of a recommended set of volunteer management practices is related to the level of effectiveness achieved with volunteer involvement in NPOs. The paper advances a path model to explain volunteer program effectiveness, with volunteer management practices the crucial intermediate variable. Based on data collected in a survey of Almaty (Kazakhstan) NPOs in 2004, the empirical analysis yields considerable support for a path model that focuses on both the adoption of these practices and the attainment of program effectiveness. Given the heterogeneity of NPOs, not every organization can be expected to benefit from the adoption of the recommended practices. Nevertheless, results suggest that they offer one workable means for successfully integrating volunteers.     

Transformational Leadership in Labor Organizations: The Effects on Union Citizenship Behaviors

This study suggests that transformational leadership influences union citizenship behavior by fostering a covenantal relationship between the union and the union member. A framework for covenantal relationships is developed from social exchange and social identity theories. Transformational leadership behavior was found to be strongly related to perceived union support, a social exchange construct. The results also indicated that there are positive and significant relationships between other social exchange constructs such as felt obligation and trust. Social identity theory is used to augment social exchange theory in explaining the process by which transformational leadership behaviors relate to union citizenship behaviors through union-based self-esteem. Limitations of the study, implications for union management, and directions for future research issues are discussed.     

Emerging volunteerism for Indonesian millennial generation: Volunteer participation and responsibility

ABSTRACT

Voluntary activities have been a part of Indonesian society since the pre-independence era until now. Volunteerism began implemented effectively in many countries after the Second World War, including in Indonesia. Currently, voluntary activities have grown in the community social life, especially volunteer involvement in the festival event. This article explores the involvement of young volunteers in the Krakatau Festival. The data were collected from the volunteers who were involved in the festivals. An ethnographic approach implemented to reveal the engagement of the individual during the event conducted. This article identifies the festival as a medium for young volunteers to strengthen self-civic virtue in the life of the millennial generation participation in the community. The result shows that young millennial generation’s activities cannot be separated from engagement with information technology, which can be used to strengthen social integration, active participation, and responsibility.     

Bittersweet and Paradoxical

The American Red Cross is the most active nonprofit organization involved in disaster planning and response in the United States. The organization deployed nearly 50,000 volunteers to provide essential support to victims of some 125,000 domestic disasters, including home fires, hurricanes, wildfires, and floods, in a recent two‐year period. This study asks how American Red Cross disaster response volunteer experiences function to cultivate satisfaction and, at the other end of the spectrum, the kind of dissatisfaction that leads people to quit; it pays particular attention to ways in which volunteer management shapes dissatisfaction and fatigue because of implications for volunteer retention. Paradoxically, the Red Cross facilitates the highly satisfying act of helping victims, but volunteers feel dissatisfied when management practices get in the way of helping. The study suggests voluntary organizations that rely on skilled, long‐term volunteers to deliver services should evaluate and strengthen their communication strategies, recognition practices, and support systems for volunteers in distress.     

Engaged or Connected? A Perspective of the Motivational Pathway of the Job Demands-Resources Model in Volunteers Working for Nonprofit Organizations

There is a paucity of research on volunteers compared with paid workers. The aim of this study is to examine the mediating roles of work engagement and connectedness simultaneously in the motivational pathway of the Job Demands-Resources (JD-R) model. Survey data were collected from 471 volunteer participants and analysed using structural equation modelling methods. Contrary to expectation, the findings did not show that engagement mediates the relationship between job resources and volunteer satisfaction (1), between job resources and determination to continue (2), and between job resources and health (3). The findings, did however, show that connectedness mediates the relationship between job resources and volunteer satisfaction (4), between job resources and determination to continue (5), and between job resources and health (6). These findings add support to the motivational pathway of the JD-R theory to understand volunteer wellbeing and retention in health care organizations, but suggest that the theory may be expanded to include connectedness as a mediator.     

More is less? The volunteer stewardship framework and models

Scholars have devoted substantial attention to developing conditional models of volunteer administration and management, but no consensus surrounds the criteria underlying the different models or the rationale. The literature reveals a welter of possibilities but no clear choice. This study conceives the primary managerial challenges as securing access to and guiding volunteer energy into productive volunteering, and the volunteer administrator as the central actor in this process. Based on how volunteers are accessed and guided in their roles, we develop the Volunteer Stewardship Framework, which distinguishes volunteer administration according to two key dimensions: organizational access to volunteer energy (private resource vs. common pool) and guidance of volunteers (unitary vs. shared). Results of a survey of volunteer administration practitioners in the Netherlands show that respondents working under the four models emanating from the Framework recognize different elements of volunteer administration as “Very Important.”     

Linking Autonomy-Supportive Leadership to Volunteer Satisfaction: A Self-Determination Theory Perspective

This study examines the development of volunteer satisfaction within the framework of self-determination theory (SDT). Therewith, autonomy-supportive leadership—as an influential part of the organizational context—is studied as an antecedent of volunteer satisfaction. The hypothesized model suggests that the link between autonomy-supportive leadership and volunteer satisfaction is serially mediated by general need satisfaction and autonomous motivation. Volunteers (N = 113) working closely together with their supervisors completed a paper-based questionnaire. As predicted, both general need satisfaction and autonomous motivation serially mediated the link between autonomy-supportive leadership and volunteer satisfaction. The results indicate that autonomy-supportive leadership is an important factor of the organizational context, increasing both volunteers’ autonomous motivation and satisfaction. Practical implications for volunteering organizations, as well as implications for further research, are discussed.     

Episodic Volunteering at a Religious Megaevent

In preparation for Pope Francis's visit to Philadelphia and the 2015 World Meeting of Families, organizers looked for thousands of volunteers to help carry out these events. This is common for many one‐time and episodic events, such as large sporting events (from marathons to Special Olympics), arts and cultural events (such as festivals and concerts), and fundraising events. After the pope's visit, volunteers were asked to respond to a questionnaire about their experiences and the volunteer management of the event; 2,408 responded (34.4 percent). Data on motivation, who volunteered, recruitment, training, assignment, supervision, communication, satisfaction, and suggestions for improvement were elicited. We focused on episodic volunteering at a religious event and on a broad spectrum of issues pertaining to management of episodic volunteers. Our findings add to the knowledge regarding volunteer management and also add to conceptual understanding of the distinction between ongoing and episodic volunteers.     

Mindful leadership: mindfulness as a new antecedent of destructive and transformational leadership behavior

Purpose: While previous research has well-examined the stress reducing effects of mindfulness, much less is known, evidentially, about the impact that it might have on working behavior, particularly in the context of leadership. Against this background, the goal of our study was to examine whether mindfulness influences leadership behavior.Design: To answer this question, we used a two-source survey study consisting of 60 teams, examining trait mindfulness of leaders via self-evaluation and their leadership behavior through the eyes of their subordinates. To analyze the given data, we conducted regression analyses.Results: Our findings confirmed the hypothesized relationships. We found a negative relationship between leaders’ mindfulness and destructive leadership, as well as a positive one between leaders’ mindfulness and transformational leadership.Implications: The results of our study underline the importance of mindfulness as a potential tool to optimize leadership quality. In order to prevent destructive and promote transformational leadership, organizations should help to develop leaders’ mindfulness capacities.     

Leadership Style in Relation to Organizational Change and Organizational Creativity: Perceptions from Nonprofit Organizational Members

As the environment within which organizations act continues to change and becomes increasingly competitive, maintaining an organizational climate that supports change and encourages creativity is a key objective for organizational leaders. This article examines the relationship between leadership style (transformational, transactional, laissez‐faire) and members' perceptions of the psychological climate for organizational change readiness and psychological climate for organizational creativity. Results indicate that transformational leaders have a direct positive relationship with psychological climate for organizational change readiness and organizational creativity, while laissez‐faire leaders have a negative relationship.     

Problems recruiting volunteers: Nature versus nurture

In a national study of public charities in the United States, we find that some organizations experience little difficulty recruiting volunteers while others report substantial problems. We study which organizations are more likely to report recruitment problems, separating the underlying forces for those problems into two camps. One, which we label “nature,” represents organizational conditions that cannot readily be overcome by a management response. The other, which we label “nurture,” represents organizational conditions that volunteer resource managers and other members of the top management team can directly influence as they seek to make their organization more inviting to prospective volunteers. We find some support for both camps, concluding that managers must be prepared to work with both immutable and malleable conditions when devising strategies for recruiting volunteers whose schedule and skills fit the organization's needs.