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I've worked with several association who have asked objective outsiders (not experts in their field) to examine structure and then work to make the appropriate changes in structure and volunteer recruitment. My impression is that the latter is far more important than the former, although making it easier for individuals to volunteer often means overcoming the 'sales objections' that good people in any field seem to harbor over time regarding volunteering. Sometimes the attitudes are just excuses but sometimes they have a basis in fact.

Most volunteer structures seem sound and logical based on their industry or profession's structure, economics, supply chains, degree of globablization, current/desired membership profile, etc.

But in interviewing unengaged members I find that there are often clusters of people who will remain loyal members, but are firmly convinced that they wouldn't be chosen for anything if they did volunteer. It's often not systematic (i.e. a specialty, discipline, location, company type, field of practice/study/employment or tribe) but rather isolated individuals who tried to volunteer in the past and were either rejected with no reason (or no communication at all!) and told others about it or in turn people who have never tried but heard from others. When you drill down and challenge your interviewee, still others have no personal experience OR hearsay, they simply infer from the association's communications style, face to face interactions at conferences and receptions, etc. that the culture is clubby or insular and the community may not be embracing of outsiders (including first-time volunteers).

These are, of course, people who often won't respond to a simple 'cattle call' for volunteers. Some of the things I see in response include a greater sensitivity in member recognition practices: steps taken to profile more obscure contributors to avoid recognizing the same people repeatedly because they are the most prominent volunteer leaders ... continuing to celebrate volunteerism in ways that help the less engaged see themselves trying out volunteer opportunities (i.e., making it sound less time-consuming ... and adding smaller-scale opportunities that are more granular or time constrained (work groups with a defined function, subcommittees, etc.) ... sometimes working with staff to overturn attitudes such as 'things are just as easy to do & quicker without volunteer input' and 'we have the right amount of volunteer involvement now and don't need more'--to get more staff to find new or creative opportunities to welcome engagement as something oter than a complication to their jobs.

Sometimes when associations say they want more engagement, they need to look internally first to ensure that staff aren't avoiding creation of opportunities, or if they are, that they're not caught up in the 'cult of personalities' that lead us to spend too much time on the major leader and too little time encouraging others to either make their first foray into volunteering, or to try again after a negative or indifferent first experience.