Now is a great time for recruiting top-quality volunteers. With the employment picture (unfortunately) remaining less than rosy, management-level talent is finding its way to more nonprofit organizations (NPOs) than ever before.

Whether you find yourself as a volunteer manager trying to tap into these new volunteers’ developed skills, or helping other volunteers develop their leadership skills, you’ll probably find a core leadership group can be quite an asset to your organization, with growth and sustainability not far behind.

How to Identify Potential Leaders
Analyzing volunteers as they work, as well as their skill set coming in, is the best way to determine if they’ll make a good leader. Make sure your volunteer application is set up to gather information like work experience, education level, areas of expertise, specific skills and areas of interest. Also, the application should give potential volunteers the opportunity to express themselves by asking open-ended questions. This way, you can judge communication skills.

What Qualities Do Leaders Possess?
Reliability: Volunteers who show up when they say they will, on time and ready to work their tasks, are potentially the dependable type of leader you want. Other volunteers will not follow a leader who they cannot depend on.

Natural Leadership: Watch your volunteers to see who exhibits natural leadership qualities. Teaching others, listening well, performing duties without much supervision, and a positive outlook are all traits that leaders possess.

Team Players: Leaders are seldom the loner type. They enjoy being around people, and others are naturally drawn to them. Often, leaders have groups that tend to gather around them at every event. If you have a volunteer like this, you’d better take advantage of their charisma and ability to attract more people to their cause!

After you Identify a Leader
Conduct an informal interview with all volunteers who posses the leadership skills you want. Ask how they see themselves contributing and growing with your organization. Identify the leadership qualities you see, and ask if they are willing to take on a leadership position. Have the new job description ready to clearly communicate expectations. You might be surprised to see how enthusiastic your new team leaders are!

Follow Up
Give your new leaders plenty of time to become accustomed to their advanced duties. Don’t pile on too much at once. And follow up often to see how they’re doing, what questions they have, and what assistance they need. If it’s not going as well as expected, cut back on their responsibilities and see how they handle a reduced workload.

When it comes to advancing volunteers to leadership positions, easy does it. You don’t want to scare anyone away, but rather bring them closer to help achieve your organizational goals.