This research project aims to answer the question of ‘A review of the effect of volunteer training and development on company performance: a case study of Citizens Advice’s current volunteer development programme in the Arun and Chichester Citizens Advice’.
Quantitative and qualitative primary data will be collected using a questionnaire and interviews, they will be supported by secondary data relating to the topic. The data collected will be used to support and make theories that will show Citizens Advice how they can get the most from their volunteers withing training and development and also company performance. The interviews are transcribed, and all the quantitative data analysed and formatted into graphs, charts, and tables.
The main findings of the research project show that Citizens Advice have a good current plan for training volunteers but improvements that could be made, including using a wider range of learning methods that are chosen based on the volunteers input and needs. Literature suggests that motivation is a key factor or good performance and participation in training and development for volunteers. Next, the research found that the company performance appears to relate to quality of advice and the number of clients seen over an allotted time period. This is important for Citizens Advice but when volunteers were asked many seemed unsure as to how they affected the company performance through training.
Recommendations include using feedback tools such as satisfaction surveys. Secondly, to aim to create and provide a diverse range of training methods within the volunteer training and potentially having more than one training methods available for a single module as well as supplying more feedback on work done do the volunteer can see progress and areas for development. Finally, to use the volunteers to help benefit performance in the company through the use of learning needs analysis identifying gaps and using new methods for motivation possibly linked to reward of a non-monetary value but ensuring that the volunteers are motivated to complete work to a high standard and are able to help identify gaps within training such as IT skills for online or remote working.