How to Let a Volunteer Go

Yes, You Can Actually Learn How to Let a Volunteer Go

Volunteer management isn’t easy. As leaders of volunteers, you are often responsible for a wide range of duties. You manage schedules and manage feelings (of your volunteers, your co-workers, and yourself). It can be exhausting.

There’s one simple thing you can do to lighten your load — let go. Let go of your attachment to the perpetually miserable, the sometimes hostile, the actively subversive volunteers. Learn how to let a volunteer go.

The Gift of Goodbye

If there are volunteers on your team who actively undermining morale, let them go. If there are volunteers in your organization who don’t contribute to the mission in a meaningful way, let them go. If there are volunteers who won’t embrace the approved changes, let them go.

This may sound harsh. But, it’s in the best interest of everyone to give toxic people the “gift of goodbye.” Why use the term “gift?” Because it will benefit the volunteer, too.

You can lead with gratitude, even now. When you open your heart and let a volunteer go, you are actually helping them move on to a place they can enjoy and offer more. Everyone comes into our lives for a reason or season. Perhaps this person is here to teach both of you how to part ways graciously. Or, perhaps this will teach you to do a better job finding appropriate tasks for each volunteer.  

Letting a volunteer go may mean the they leave your organization altogether. Or, it may mean they simply switch tasks or teams. You decide what’s best. Here are some tips to decipher when and how to let a volunteer go.

8 Steps to Decide When & How to Let a Volunteer Go

1) Ground Yourself in Purpose

As a leader of volunteers, your primary responsibility is to ensure volunteers are deployed in the most effective way to meet your mission and that they are working together effectively to do so. Your focus is the mission, and volunteers are not generally your mission (unless you are a volunteer center). Volunteers are a strategy to meet your mission, but they are not the mission.  

2) Identify How the Volunteer Hinders the Mission

Ask yourself whether the volunteer is blocking mission achievement. Is the volunteer’s behavior actively disrupting progress? Can you explain why this is so, specifically? If a volunteer doesn’t have the physical or mental capacity to to the job, is this blocking progress? If they spread gossip and are rude to others, does this get in the way of a harmonious team?

3) Make Sure Expectations Have Always Been Clear

It’s not fair to let people go without communicating your expectations and allowing others to meet them, is it? If you haven’t done the following, get started here and see if things improve. Have you explained, and do volunteers understand …

  • The grounds for dismissal
  • The steps in the disciplinary process
  • How policies & procedures will be enforced
  • That you will follow through on consequences

4) Decide if They Simply Need New Placement

Decide if the problem is the job fit. It’s entirely possible that a re-assignment is all that would be needed to make the volunteer more comfortable. Explore what’s possible with them. But, make sure the new placement is also actively contributing to the mission. Asking volunteers to take on roles that have no real meaning doesn’t honor the volunteer or the mission.

5) Address Misbehavior

Address the situation and describe the problem behavior. Explain how it negatively impacts the mission. Ask for change and explain the consequences if it doesn’t happen. List the action items or steps you expect them to take, and have them sign an improvement plan.

6) Allow your Humanity to Show

It’s OK to share how you are feeling about the situation with the volunteer. Are you disappointed? Do these kinds of conversations make you uncomfortable? Are you angry? Be a human and explain how you feel in a calm, compassionate way. Don’t blame or whine. Simply report.

7) How to Let a Volunteer Go

If you follow steps 1-6, and you come to the conclusion that you can’t fix the situation, then it’s time to let the volunteer go.

Schedule a meeting with the volunteer in a private setting and have a third party present, preferably of the same gender as the person being dismissed. Be prepared. Inform your supervisor of the situation and the rationale for action. Remember that the time has passed for negotiation. Write up a script if needed.

  • At the meeting, state the reasons for dismissal and present them in writing. Say only what needs to be said — this should not come as a surprise to the volunteer. Your witness does not need to say anything.
  • Focus any comments on describing how their behavior deviates from what is expected. Avoid any personal issues, assumptions about their life or intentions, or value comments.
  • Discuss any recommendations for future volunteer work. This may include whether and under what conditions they may return, if ever.
  • Have a termination letter ready that the volunteer signs to indicate that they understand what is being said. If they won’t sign, note it. Give them a copy.
  • Secure the return of any keys, parking passes, name tags, files, marketing materials, or other work-related items before you conclude the meeting. Be sure you change any passwords for databases for which they have access.
  • Walk them to the front door following the meeting, making sure they don’t leave any personal belongings behind.
  • Write a short report of the meeting. Have your witness sign it.

8) Give Yourself Grace   

You may find yourself ruminating on why it didn’t work out. And, yes, there may have been something you could have done differently. But, be gentle with yourself. We do the best we can. Learn and make adjustments.

To truly move on, you’ll need to give your guilt (and misplaced shame) the gift of goodbye, too.