The Pursuit of Passion: Volunteers Make the Difference
Today is International Volunteer Day! That’s right, it’s a day to celebrate, invigorate, and collaborate with volunteers from all over the world. And today is as good a day as ever to share some knowledge about volunteering!
Did You Know?
- Worldwide, there are over 1 billion people who volunteer. That’s equal to a little under ½ of YouTube’s users! According to Statista, in 2021-YouTube had 2.2 billion users.
- In the US and Canada, 38% of people donate between $101-$999. The same percentage of people who believe that if your teeth are straight, you’re smarter than everyone else.
- In New Zealand and Australia, a majority of people who donate prefer to contribute online with a credit card. Interesting fact: The now defunct retailer, Sears was one of the founding fathers of the credit card and created the first retail store card back in 1911.
- Africa has the highest percentage of donors that enroll in a reoccurring giving program at 62%.
Whoa! Check this out, reoccurring donors give 5x more on average than donors who give 1x, and the average reoccurring donor will give for more than 2 years! Better news than the 20% of adults who suffer from reoccurring ear aches.
Volunteering Around the World
- 70% of volunteering is done informally. With that said, if volunteers were paid for what they do their labor would be valued at $28.54 an hour. That’s over 4x the federal minimum wage of $7.25 per hour. Volunteers contribute nearly $200 billion to their communities, annually.
- Roughly 30.3% of Americans volunteer at least once a year. Almost 36% of those volunteers are fundraising, while a little over 34% volunteer activity is focused on collecting, prepping, or distributing food. According to the USDA, 34 million people, including 9 million children face food insecurity in America. Find a local food bank in your area.
- On average, people in the US spend 52 hours a year volunteering.
- Collecting & distributing food
- Fundraising
- Tutoring
- General labor
Social media users spend an average of 2 ½ hours a day on the platforms. Multiply that by 365 days and that equates to a mind-blowing 912.5 hours a year. That’s 17x more than the hours spend volunteering in one year. Let that sink in, then go look for volunteering opportunities.
Millennials & Gen Z account for roughly 25% (Gen Z makes up 2%)
Baby Boomers are more likely to volunteer more than any other generation.
Baby Boomer & Gen X account for 37%
But all isn’t lost! Gen Zers are on track to be the best educated generation ever! According to the Pew Research Center, Gen Zers are less likely to drop out of high school and more likely to be enrolled in college.
Maybe this accounts for why only 2% of Gen Zers volunteer—their busy getting schooled while more Baby Boomers are volunteering in their retirement years.
- 100% of non-profits rely on donors and volunteers to exist. The same percentage of people who need food, water, air, and shelter to survive! Those are the facts.
So, check this out!
The BRM Institute has a plethora of volunteer opportunities just for you!
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Micro-volunteering:
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4-10 hours a month*
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Short engagements
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Finite projects
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Macro-volunteering
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12-24 hours a month*
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Moderate engagement
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Demarcated projects
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*Commitment times are rough estimates
As a BRM, you’re no stranger to the importance of building authentic relationships to satisfy organizational purpose. What you may not realize is that by offering your time, you’ll also satisfy your personal purpose and enjoy a sense of fulfillment while continuing to advance the future of BRM. Now that is something to be proud of!
Did you know you can help shape the future of BRM by becoming a volunteer? You can be a thought-leader by volunteering your time and expertise to shaping future content, publications and so much more.
Check out BRM Institute volunteer opportunities at the Volunteer Center!