Prof. Dr. Chantal Munsch

When volunteers give up, nobody takes much notice. In Germany, there are no statistics on the number of people who opt out of volunteering. The topic has also been largely ignored by research in the past. That was until Chantal Munsch, a professor for social work, teamed up with Dr. Andreas Kewes and Moritz Müller to analyze why people leave volunteering.

Together with her team, Munsch has intensively studied the difficulties volunteers face. Therefore, in two successive studies, they analyzed why volunteers leave their organizations. To find out about their experiences, the researchers talked with more than 60 people who had broken off a voluntary commitment. They looked at four dif-ferent areas of volunteering: welfare organizations, church communities, environmental initiatives, and sports clubs.

One finding was that people who leave volunteering come from all groups. From the young alter girl to the family father who works in his sons’ sports club to the senior citizen who sits on church committees: the stories about leaving the service are often very similar,« says Moritz Müller. The researchers found that the main reasons people give up volunteering result from collective experiences they have during their activities. The team defined two different dimensions of experience. Firstly, specific challenges that arise in the different fields – welfare organizations, church communities, environmental initiatives, and sports clubs. Secondly, challenges that come with being a volunteer whatever the field of work.

For example, people in welfare roles have to cope with a very stressful challenge inherent in the sector. Helping people who need care is, on the one hand, fulfilling. On the other hand, care provision in Germany is organized along strict economic lines – a shortage of time and money as well as the routine-heavy work of the organizations are in conflict with what many volunteers expect from care for people in need. »That can be very frustrating, leading some volunteers to give up,« says Müller.

The study reveals that the specific challenge in church work lies in volunteers’ different views about what the church is for. When these different perspectives – the church as a community, a movement, or an organization – clash, huge tensions arise. »Some volunteers find it hard to cope.« The researchers report that the key challenges in environmental initiatives are the high demands on the time and expertise of the volunteers. »If you want to achieve change against the professional structures in politics and administration, you have to acquire an enormous amount of knowledge. That takes the kind of time and energy many people can’t afford,« says Kewes.

According to the study, volunteering in sports clubs is comparatively low in stress, although typical conflicts still occur. One problem is the daily club work that demands a lot of time and effort, says Kewes. »The bottom line is that supporting sport always means a lot of organizational and bureaucratic work.« Apart from specific tensions in the different fields, Munsch, Kewes, and Müller also identified universal challenges that drive people away. »Whether in church, environmental, or sports work, a common theme was difficulties in working together with other volunteers. In fact, this aspect was a constant in all the conversations,« says Munsch. She finds this unsurprising and inherent in the nature of civic organizations. »The cooperation between the various actors is much less controlled than in the world of work, where there are clearer hierarchies and job descriptions. Volunteers have to work all this out between themselves.« Therefore, the requirements of cooperation are particularly high. It gets difficult, especially when different cooperation styles clash.

The researchers found two typical cooperation viewpoints in the stories of the former volunteers: On the one hand, the idea of putting together a puzzle of the big picture. These volunteers see themselves as pieces of a puzzle that work together on an equal level to form a swarm intelligence. On the other hand, there is also the idea that some volunteers with particular skills should take on responsibility for the cooperation and make decisions for the whole group. »For this cooperation style, we chose the metaphor of game pieces. The volunteers see themselves as people who act autonomously and develop their own strategic goals,« explains Kewes. It’s obvious that »puzzle pieces« and »game pieces« don’t get on. »Conflicts quickly bubble up. And especially because most people put their heart and soul into their volunteering, the resulting injured feelings are all the more painful.«

Munsch is confident that a more realistic depiction of volunteering that also addresses its challenges would boost volunteer activities and give volunteers new prospects. »If you’re aware of the challenges in advance, you’re more likely to be able to manage them in a cooperative way or to cope with disappointments.«