The National Standards for Volunteer Involvement

In 2015 Volunteering Australia announced the launch of the National Standards for Volunteer Involvement coinciding with the annual National Volunteer Week held in May. These Standards incorporate significant changes to the original standards in order to reflect best practice in volunteer management in Australia’s current work environment.

The Standards provide a sound framework for supporting the volunteer sector in Australia. The Standards are much easier to follow and are adaptable to different organisation types and different forms of volunteering which reflect the diversity of this growing sector.

Direct benefits to organisations:

• They provide good practical guidance and benchmarks to help organisations attract, manage and retain volunteers, and,
• Help manage risk and safety in their work with volunteers.

Direct benefits to volunteers:

• They help improve the volunteer experience.

The National Standards for Volunteer Involvement are available here for free download.

Guidance on applying the Standards will be provided via comprehensive implementation resources.

Additionally, Volunteering Australia will be developing a flexible, tiered voluntary certification, or ‘Quality Mark’ system to enable organisations to check how they are tracking in implementing the Standards.

For more information, visit www.volunteeringaustralia.org or www.volunteeringqld.org.au