Manager of Volunteer Experience

As our Volunteer Experience Manager, you will be our champion of experience and relationship management for our dynamic volunteer-powered programs. This role leads our Volunteer Experience team, collaborating cross-functionally within our organization and our established network of 500+ regular volunteers, and 3,000+ yearly volunteers. The volunteer team of Community Action House is a diverse group of caring, invested, and passionate people.

Activating practices within programs across our organization, the Volunteer Experience Manager will be responsible for establishing new and maintaining existing standards across our volunteer programs, while working with our Volunteer Champions and their respective program managers. In this role you’ll collaborate with volunteer experience team members embedded in our various program teams to create a highly effective and satisfying volunteer experience within individual programs. As our Volunteer Experience Manager, you will also drive strategy for the future of volunteerism, addressing how that landscape is evolving and developing ways to enhance our creation of volunteer opportunities and recruitment processes to meet these changing needs.

Our ideal candidates will have experience supervising employees combined with professional experience planning, organizing and leading projects involving groups of people, ideally in a collaborative and cross-functional environment. In this posting we’ve provided more details about our team, the role, and the qualifications we seek as well.

We recognize that strong candidates will come from a variety of backgrounds and professional experiences. We encourage all interested professionals who are passionate about our mission to apply directly via our website!

About Community Action House

Since its founding in 1969, Community Action House has been the focal point of community efforts to provide critical support and pathways out of poverty for our neighbors in need. Our community-powered work takes a client-centric approach that meets people wherever they are at and offers services that enhance ownership and agency. Our work is organized in three interconnected areas: Food Access, Resource Navigation, and Financial Wellness. Welcome, excellence, and collaboration are some of our core values.

In October 2021, we launched our new ‘Food Club & Opportunity Hub’ to expand efficient, impactful healthy food assistance with the on-site integration of other pathway programs. In July 2023, we publicly launched our expansion of Lakeshore Food Rescue. In Spring of 2026, we are opening our second Resale Store. More recently, we announced a partnership with Dwelling Place to help address the affordable housing crisis in our community.

Organizational budget: $9M-10M (inclusive of $5M in-kind support)

Agency Size: 60-70 staff and 2,300+ annual volunteers

Responsibilities & Essential Duties of Volunteer Experience Manager

• Volunteer Strategy, Standards & Organization-Wide Systems
  • Develop, implement, and maintain organization-wide volunteer standards, policies, and procedures, ensuring clarity, consistency, and alignment with organizational values.
  • Lead the creation and refinement of volunteer behavior guidelines, training standards, stewardship expectations, and internal operational processes (e.g., welcome and farewell talking points, vacancy & coverage processes).
  • Oversee volunteer technology platforms including selection, implementation, and maintenance. Ensure applicable staff are trained to utilize the platform.
  • Build and maintain organization-wide volunteer appreciation strategy, including milestone recognition, annual events, and stewardship systems.
  • Develop and steward organization-wide volunteer program effectiveness metrics, including designing data collection expectations, interpreting trends, and equipping program teams to make data-driven decisions for improvement.
  • Evaluate and ensure the effectiveness of the volunteer program and systems used, including identification of new tools and best practices to implement.
  • Create and manage volunteer feedback, including surveys and evaluations. Manage communications plan with teams and volunteers for follow-up reporting and action items.
  • Consult with program leaders to track volunteer program effectiveness, support evaluation processes, and ensure use of the established success measures.
  • Partner with the Strategic Leadership Team members and program leaders to make programmatic adjustments based on volunteer experience data, trends, and feedback.
• Volunteer Workforce Planning & Recruitment
  • Partner closely with program leaders to strategically plan volunteer opportunities, including role design, required skills, shift and slot structures, and workforce needs.
  • Contribute to volunteer opportunity–specific training and scheduling, defining training standards and ensuring alignment across teams.
  • Support with problem identification with pattern based vacancies or volunteer dissatisfaction.
  • Support the Volunteer Experience Coordinator in the intake of new volunteers—providing consultation, stepping in when needed, and ensuring alignment of onboarding standards and processes.
  • Through oversight and standardization, ensure that onboarding experiences are consistent, streamlined, and values-aligned, particularly focused for volunteer groups and program-specific needs.
• Volunteer Relationship Management & Culture
  • Serve as a strategic partner to program teams by building and maintaining strong volunteer relationships, deepening engagement pathways, and reinforcing a positive volunteer experience.
  • Support program teams in volunteer appreciation at the program level, ensuring consistency with organizational standards.
  • Lead Volunteer e-newsletter content, creation and distribution in alignment with Action House messaging platform.
  • Partner with program leaders in volunteer disciplinary action and dismissal, ensuring alignment with policies and organizational values, and advising on next steps.
  • Provide consultation to program staff regarding volunteer problem-solving and behavior issue resolution, ensuring proper use of guidelines and escalation pathways.
  • Serve as an escalation pathway for volunteer situations that may result in disciplinary action including volunteer suspension and/or termination.
• Volunteer Experience Team Leadership
  • Collaborate with supervisor, direct report, and other cross-functional teams to ensure flow of information and success of key project outcomes.
  • Leads, manages, develops, and retains Volunteer Experience team members by charting an annual course of direction and monitoring quarterly progress toward annual goals. This includes leading various meetings and matrix based reporting with Volunteer Experience Champions across different departments and teams.
  • Other duties as assigned.

Education & Experience

• 6+ years of relevant experience required
• 1+ year of supervisory experience required
• Bachelor's Degree required; or in place of a degree, equivalent years of experience
• Basic conversational Spanish proficiency desired but not required

Qualifications

• Professional experience with planning, organizing and leading people, ideally in a collaborative and cross-functional environment.
• Experience fostering trust with others by consistently conducting work with honesty, reliability, and mutual respect, while also demonstrating transparency and emotional openness, with the ability to develop trusting professional relationships.
• Demonstrated ability to work effectively in collaboration with diverse groups of people.
• Demonstrated ability to cultivate a collaborative and supportive work environment, empowering team members, fostering collaboration and teamwork, and providing guidance and mentorship as needed.
• Demonstrated ability to mitigate and resolve conflicts, fostering a calm and constructive environment where team members feel supported and conflicts are effectively managed.
• Analytical and problem-solving skills with the ability to interpret information to support decision making.
• Willingness and interest in continuous learning and adaptation based on your professional interests and organizational needs.
• A high standard of performance and integrity, and ability to lead by example to foster a positive workplace culture.
• Proficiency in clear and effective written and verbal communication.
• Demonstrate a genuine passion for our mission and a commitment to upholding our team’s values: Radically Welcoming, Guest-Centered, Lead with Kindness, Curiosity-Driven, Always Improving, Collaborative by Design, Contagious Commitment, & One Team

We provide a generous benefits package that includes options for health, dental, and vision coverage for employees and their dependents, in addition to paid vacation, sick days, holidays, a 401(k) plan with company matching, and company provided STD, LTD, and Life Insurance - among many other benefits and perks! We also provide monthly and ongoing professional development opportunities as part of our goals of inclusion, belonging, emotional intelligence and cultural competency in our highly collaborative and diverse environment.

English is required, Bilingual is preferred