To Volunteer or Not to Volunteer

In 1971, behavioral scientists and innovative trainers Eva Schindler-Rainman and Ronald Lippett published The Volunteer Community: Creative Use of Human Resources. Though the book is now out of print, many of its concepts continue to resonate.  In this Voices from the Past, e-Volunteerism is pleased to publish an excerpt of Chapter Four, in which the authors present a force field analysis of volunteer motivation. The analysis helps explain what pushes people towards a “yes” to volunteering, and what pushes them towards a “no.”  The authors do the same analysis on another equally important volunteering decision: whether to continue as a volunteer, or to drop out.