You might call motivation an inside job. Volunteers do things for their own reasons, not yours, so your role is to create an organizational culture that stimulates the inner motivation of each volunteer.

Here are the top 4 things you can do to create a culture that motivates today’s new breed of volunteer:

1. Discover What Motivates Volunteers – Why do people join your organization? What motivates them to invest time, money, and talent and become involved in ministry? And what does it take to get them to stay involved? Answer these questions, and you’ll tap into their motivational drives. Once you tap into what motivates them to volunteer, you can also tap into what motivates them to stick around.

2. Give Regular Feedback – It’s crucial that you provide regular and frequent feedback. Your volunteers need encouragement, thank you’s, and even a little helpful coaching at time.

3. Offer Special Privileges and Perks – Provide perks for your volunteers to let them know you value them. The Bible says, “Wherever your treasure is, there the desires of your heart will also be.” (Matthew 6:21 New Living Translation). This certainly needs to be true when it comes to volunteers. Invest your treasure in them and acknowledge their value—because they could easily be doing something else with their time.

4. Have Fun – Fun is an amazing motivator. Ministry can be stressful, but fun can serve as your most effective stress buster. Groups that play together—stay together. Don’t become so serious about your cause and your mission that you forget to have some fun.