Why did you leave a volunteering job?

[FedUpVolunteer]

I’ve been volunteering in charity shops for about eight years and have had a new manager about once a year on average. I’ve recently started to resent the constant changes and having to get used to a new person’s different take on the job. I’m aware this is a me problem - the things that irritate me are quite small - but at bottom I feel unappreciated.

So I’m wondering, why have other people left volunteering jobs?

I know! Let's leave it there.

Because they were misogynistic, gosssipy and very flippant about people using the service.
they especially don’t care if you happen to be a woman.
this was the Samaritans

Let’s.

I left because the women’s charity that I really wanted to support drifted towards dangerous inclusivity, joining in the pretence of “trans women are women” and I couldn’t bear to be a part of it. I stayed for a while, trying to push back from within, but resistance was fierce. I still feel very sad for the service users who are being let down.

I left my volunteer role after 15 years, it was a children and parent charity, and it had gone through so many management changes that the ethos seemed to change, they asked too much of the volunteers we were not social workers some of the families needed specialised support, anyway it got too much, between that and my age and health, I decided to leave.

@FedUpVolunteer if you need to stop just give some notice and then leave, you can give as much reason as you want,

I was kicked out because I said boys and men shouldn't be joining by stealth. Ok I know that's a bit niche but I also know of other ex Guiders who left for the same reason. The organisation has a history of not treating volunteers professionally (dismissing their considerable expertise in their own jobs) - it does expect volunteers to operate very independently so that's very short sighted.
I don't think that's a problem unique to GG though.

I volunteered with some ladies who were in their 70's/80's. During the winter we were not allowed the heating on as it cost too much. One of my colleagues ended up with hypothermia. After that we all quit, the people we volunteered for couldn't understand why we wouldn't continue. None of us felt valued or appreciated.

DNA?

Because I spent a year being told how to do the job and one other volunteer even had the audacity to start doing my role despite refusing offers for him to have previously taken the role. - he was most surprised when I dumped everything on his doorstep and told him to get one with it.
Another one I didn’t even start as the entitlement form was extremely long and intrusive - 20 pages of health questions including what type of person I would be best matched with. It was for doing some weeding in flower beds!

Poor organisation. I've tended to approach volunteering in the basis that I can devote X hours of my time. But it's things like changing the start and end times of sessions with little or no prior notice. Or not having anything that needs doing. Things that just point to not valuing my time. I don't need a medal but if you say you need volunteers for something and I agree, don't then continually mess around with my time.

Sorry your thread has got a bit derailed OP as I find this interesting.

I think you can get bored with a volunteering role, much as you can with a job. That’s what’s happening to me at the moment - six years in and it’s getting repetitive. I also think that the combination of people matters more with a volunteering role because you don’t HAVE to do it, like a job. So if you’re not gelling, you can walk away.

I am likely to walk away within the next year and that’s fine. It has to suit me and I have the luxury of choice. Plus I also believe regular turnover keeps things alive - people who hang on and hang on can stifle change and growth.

Because they often treat you like an employee in terms of the commitment levels they expect. The most recent one I showed interest in wanted me to be on a roster (I need predictability, not days all over the place each week), training I would pay for when I was already way more qualified than the training required, advance notice of leave which was very limited. No thanks. This is why I never do any voluntary work anymore.

I left a volunteering position that I enjoyed because I couldn't put up with a new volunteer who thought she owned the charity.
Management knew what she was like but wouldn't control her and her big mouth.

There are lots of irritating responses, it's not surprising she's irritated. If charities treated their volunteers the way some posters treat OP they'd have no volunteers at all.

At the organisation I am involved with, people either have to leave due to lifestyle (they get a paid job, need to care for relatives, go travelling…) or if they choose to leave it is usually because they feel what they see as ‘petty admin’ drags them away from doing the volunteering thing they want to spend their time on.

Generally we find our volunteers step down when the demands of the role outweigh the (emotional) rewards. Ours is a high-demand high-reward role - people underestimate the demands, or their lives change and they can’t meet the demands, or they don’t see why they should conform to the demands, or they have unrealistic expectations of the rewards (size/frequency). And when things change the balance changes too.

It sounds as though in your case the endless tweaking of demands are beginning to outweigh the rewards of the role.

I've volunteered a lot over the years and left for lots of reasons. The vast majority because the project I was working on finished or because my circumstances changed and it was no longer convenient. But I left a couple of positions because I just didn't like the other volunteers. One because the manager was neurotic mess and it was just so tiresome trying to work with her. Another because I got called in at short notice to fix something and when I turned up an hour later (as I'd said I would) the manager had locked up and gone home. And a couple because the managers just weren't very good and it made the whole experience unfulfilling.

I wouldn't stay in a volunteer role I wasn't enjoying.

I left volunteering at my son’s sport club because he was old enough to drive himself there, and didn’t need mum there anymore (plus I felt I had done my stint).

If it’s not working for you anymore, feel free to move on. Perhaps give them a months notice, out of courtesy, and then stop. Find a new hobby or pastime you’ll enjoy more.

😮

Same here.
I used to enjoy the role, once the new person joined I didn’t.
Also as a volunteer I wasn’t going to start jockeying for position.

Weirdly prolonged ersatz "training".
Money and time being frittered away whilst service users didn't receive anything like what they were supposed to in terms of support- very frustrating to see, with no power to change it, as a volunteer.

Expectations changed from what was originally agreed.

There were five responses.

None of which were irritating. Four gave helpful answers giving actual reasons why either they or somebody they knew had left a volunteering role.

One poster also gave that information and also had an added sentence saying that there were other types of volunteering that the OP could undertake if she did not want to start volunteering completely as she was resenting her current one.

I don't see how any of those five posts were irritating.

I left my last voluntary role because I’d been given a complete non job that was pointless, I was literally wasting my time.

I can't get a volunteering role in the first place, let alone quit one. I've been applying for literally years but I don't have any references so nobody will take me on. I am offering my time and commitment for free but literally nobody wants to know. It's definitely the references that's the issue because when I'm applying online, I can't progress past the references part. And when I've contacted organisations to explain they've told me they can't take volunteers without them.

My mum volunteers at the local hospital , making cups of tea for patients etc. She hasn’t quit but I wouldn’t blame her if she did because the patients (and their relatives) treat her like dirt. Some of the stories are pretty shocking. I had a medical career myself so am used to rude patients but I’m surprised they also treat volunteers like that