active ageing in active communities: volunteering and the transition

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Active ageing in activecommunities

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Active ageing in active communities

This publication can be provided in alternativeformats, such as large print, Braille, audiotape andon disk. Please contact: CommunicationsDepartment, Joseph Rowntree Foundation,The Homestead, 40 Water End, York YO30 6WP.Tel: 01904 615905. Email: [email protected]

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Active ageing in activecommunitiesVolunteering and the transition to retirement

Justin Davis Smith and Pat Gay

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First published in Great Britain in March 2005 by

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Justin Davis Smith is Director of the Institute for Volunteering Research. Pat Gay is an Associate Researcher at the

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Acknowledgements vi

1 Introduction 1Aims 1Background 1Methods 4Structure of the report 6

2 Volunteering and the transition to retirement 7Why older people volunteer 7Lifelong, serial and trigger volunteers 8The role of religion, family and place 9Comparison with paid work 10Implications for policy and practice 11

3 Involving older people as volunteers 13Recruitment 13What would work: how government policies could help 15Implications for policy and practice 16

4 Management and support 18Style of management 18What volunteers do 19Benefits to the organisations of involving older people 21Benefits to the volunteers 22Benefits to society as a whole 22Implications for policy and practice 23

5 Conclusions and recommendations 24Older people 24Retirement 24Transition 25Volunteering 25What works from the volunteers’ perspective 25What works from the organisations’ perspective 25Implications for the future 26

References 28

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The authors would like to acknowledge the helpand support of a number of people in thecarrying out of this research: Mark Hinman andDonald Hirsch at the Joseph RowntreeFoundation; the members of the independentadvisory group that oversaw the project;colleagues at the Institute for VolunteeringResearch, in particular Priya Lukka and MariaPower; and, most especially, the volunteers, staffand policy experts who took part in the researchitself. A debt of gratitude is owed to all, althoughresponsibility for the report itself rests, of course,with the authors.

Acknowledgements

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Aims

In recent times there has been increasingdiscussion about the part volunteering can playin the transition from paid work to retirement.One recent official publication noted that:

As well as providing a means to stayphysically and mentally active, volunteeringcan provide a productive vehicle forsuccessful transition from employment toretirement. (Scottish Executive, 2004, p 15)

Research suggests that older volunteers aregenerally quite positive about the satisfaction andfulfilment their volunteering provides and theimportant place it occupies in their lives (see, forexample, Davis Smith, 1998). Volunteering givesretired people the opportunity to make avaluable contribution to society and for many itseems like a natural progression from paid work.If volunteering is so highly valued by the retireesinvolved, it begs the question as to whyrelatively few of them take the opportunity tovolunteer and why the proportion of over 50sinvolved in volunteering actually falls afterretirement age.

The Joseph Rowntree Foundation’s researchprogramme, Transitions After 50, was establishedto explore people’s experiences, decisions andconstraints as they pass from active labourmarket participation in their middle yearstowards a new identity in later life. While thetopic of volunteering has been present in thewider debate, it has received less attention thanother elements in the transition to retirementcontext, for example finance and income in laterlife.

Introduction

This study is intended to throw light on the partplayed by volunteering in the transition byexamining closely the experiences of volunteersand the organisations that involve them. Themain focus of the study has been on ‘whatworks’ in relation to the involvement of olderpeople as volunteers, and an important elementwas to uncover the factors that work againstinvolvement and the steps organisations havesuccessfully taken to overcome these barriers.

Background

An ageing population

The total population of the UK rose from 38.2million in 1901 to 59 million by the end of thecentury. Over the period, with people livinglonger and the decline in the birth rate, thepercentage of over 50s in the population rosefrom nearly one seventh at the beginning of thecentury to approaching one third by the end. Notonly are the ‘Young Old’ increasing as aproportion of the population, a significantnumber have, in recent years, disengaged fromthe labour market. As Phillipson (2000, p 4)notes: “Among men in the UK aged 60-64,participation in the labour force declined from82.9% in 1971 (with some fluctuations) to 54.1%in 1991. By 1999 the rate had declined to below50%.” Put another way, current Organisation forEconomic Co-operation and Development(OECD) figures for the UK indicate that half ofmen leave the labour force at 62.6 years and liveanother 16.8 years without working, whilewomen leave at 60.4, giving a retirement span of22.3 years (Phillipson, 2000, p 7).

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Such a shift has prompted government to act, forexample by encouraging later withdrawal fromthe paid labour market to ease skill shortagesand the demand on the public purse forpensions. McNair et al (2004) note that in the last10 years there has been a significant shift invaluing older workers remaining in theworkforce, reinforced by “a politicised discourseof demographic timebombs and untenablepension burdens” (p 69).

Age has been conceptualised as an inexorableprogression from childhood to old age in aregular and predictable sequence. Moreover, thisview has become so accepted that thedevelopment of welfare services has reinforcedthese assumptions, and in the process hascharacterised later life in terms of physicaldecline, dependency and social burden(Phillipson, 1997; Biggs, 2004). Biggs (2004)argues that this viewpoint has come underincreasing strain due to three factors:demographic trends resulting in the erosion ofrigid differences between age groups; anincreasing variety of lifestyles of older peoplethemselves; and “therapeutic and technologicaladvances that increase bodily potential” (p 2).

All this will mean that people approaching theage of retirement will have a different attitudetowards their retirement, and how they relate tothe wider community, than those who retiredbefore them. While negative stereotypes of olderpeople still persist, older people at the start ofthe 21st century are healthier, better educated,have more disposable income and widerhorizons than their predecessors (Walker, 1996).The old ‘carpet slipper’ image of old age nolonger holds in the real world in the 21st century.Indeed, in a recent radio discussion aboutshaping programme schedules to appeal to theover 50s, one of the speakers described the over50s as the new 30s.

From the 1970s, academics and policy makersbegan to challenge the old paradigm of a lifecycle divided into the three stages of childhoodand education, work and retirement (Walker,1996). It was clear that there was a vastdifference between people in the early stages ofwithdrawal from work and their compatriots 20years down the line. Retirees could be dividedinto two rough categories, a younger group ofthose aged 50+ to 70, described by the term‘Third Agers’, and an older group who would be

less active, in poorer health and increasingly frail(the Fourth Agers who are often “at the limits oftheir functional capacity”; Baltes and Smith, 2003,p 123). As Forster argues:

Third Agers, grey panthers, empty nesters,baby boomers, the chronologically gifted –these attempts to describe older people area sign that society is waking up to thepotential of the over 50s age group. (1997,p 13)

Far from being passive bystanders, Third Agersactively participate in community activities,learning, informal caring, leisure, part-time workand informal helping. Laslett sums it up as:

... an era of personal fulfilment, followingthe Second Age of independence, maturity,responsibility, earning and saving, andpreceding the Fourth Age of finaldependence, decrepitude and death. (1989,p 4)

The transition to retirement

From the 1980s, for many people the transitionfrom employment to retirement can be describedas something of a roller coaster. They might leavepaid work because their jobs disappear in theeconomic–industrial shake-out, or because firmsdownsize in the wake of technological advances.At a time of recession there was encouragementfor older workers to leave the workforce to makeroom for the rising number of school leavers. Adecade later, concern about the composition ofthe workforce shifted the debate towards how tostem the flow of older workers out ofemployment and to remove age barriers in areassuch as recruitment and retaining staff (Trinder etal, 1992; Taylor and Walker, 1993).

It can be seen that final withdrawal from theworkforce was often preceded by a protractedperiod of uncertainty. Workers might be maderedundant, take early retirement or be onsickness benefit but resuming full- or part-timeemployment from time to time in response to thedemands of the economic cycle or recoveringfrom periods of sickness or incapacity. But by theage of 65 the majority will have finally given uppaid work, although this will change with theintroduction of the proposed retirement age of70. As Blaikie (1992) comments:

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If the earlier 20th century witnessed theemergence and consolidation of retirementas a fixed phase, then the closing decadereveals a growing fragmentation. (p 3)

There is a variety of ways in which people fill thevoid left by work. In the immediate aftermath ofleaving paid work it is not uncommon for thebetter off to take extended holidays, visit familiesor friends in far-away places, and take up orextend participation in sport and leisureactivities. For everyone, a common scenario willbe to spend time on catching up with domestictasks they did not have time for while working,and many will be undertaking a caring rolewithin the home or carrying out countlessinformal tasks in their neighbourhood or localcommunity (Kelly, 1997, p 167).

There are, of course, other transitions over alifetime, but these generally involve movementfrom one structure to another: retirement isgenerally a move from structure to no structure.

Volunteering in the transition

Leaving the workforce deprives people of theincidentals paid work generally provides: timestructure, social contact, collective effort orpurpose, social identity or status and regularactivity (Jahoda, 1983). This chimes in with thelater concept of what constitutes social exclusionand covers much the same ground. It could beargued that volunteering provides the 50+ cohortwith a way of compensating for the lossesidentified by Jahoda, at the same time allowingthem to escape social exclusion. Barnes andParry (2004) argue that retirement and thepreparation for retirement may prompt people todevelop new social contacts, drawing upon anumber of attachments of which voluntary andcommunity relations are two.

Various surveys, however, have found that the50+ age groups are the least likely to volunteer(Davis Smith, 1998). Davis Smith states:

It is an oft-stated paradox that despite theincrease in free time after retirement,participation in all manner of unpaidactivity outside the home declines. This istrue both for leisure activities outside thehome and voluntary work, both formal andinformal. (cited in Hirsch, 2000, p 96)

The 1997 National Survey of Volunteering (DavisSmith, 1998) found that formal volunteeringdeclines from about age 55. It also shows thatwhile women are more likely to volunteer beforethey retire, men are more likely to do soafterwards. The survey found that people insocial classes A and B are twice as likely toengage in some form of voluntary activity bothpre- and post-retirement, although it does nottake into account the prevalence of informalvolunteering, for example helping out withshopping for a neighbour or keeping an eye onvulnerable people in the community. Davis Smithcomments:

With older people shouldering the mainburden of caring within, and informalvolunteering outside, the family, it shouldnot perhaps be surprising that participationin formal volunteering is lower than for theyounger age groups. (cited in Hirsch, 2000,p 101)

Why retired people volunteer

In her study of health in later life, Bernard (2000)cites the most important factors that motivatemembers of the 50+ cohort to volunteer and it isclear that these echo those put forward in otherstudies of this nature. Some of the motivatingfactors were not very different from thoseapplicable across the age range: the desire tohelp others, a need to feel useful and valued, thedesire to make friends, and enjoyment of theactivity itself. More age-specific factors were:putting a structure on free time, a way ofcontinuing to use skills built up over a workinglife, and a route to learn and explore newavenues previously blocked by the demands oftheir careers or jobs (Bernard, 2000, pp 139-40).

Barriers to volunteering

Despite these motivating factors, it is clear fromthe evidence presented by Davis Smith (1992),Nyazi (1996) and Hirsch (2000) among othersthat volunteers in this age group can face a seriesof barriers that hinder, and sometimes evenprevent, their participation in voluntary activity.The most obvious is the application of thestatutory retirement age by organisations to oldervolunteers, in effect closing the gate at the verytime would-be volunteers should be free to

Introduction

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enter. Organisations employing such a techniqueargued that they:

... found it easier to have a catch all limitthan to decide whether volunteers shouldcontinue on a case-by-case basis. Such apolicy, it was argued, had the advantage ofmaking clear when the volunteer shouldleave without the need for interviews orassessment procedures. (Institute forVolunteering Research, 1999, p 3)

Some of the organisations that use post-retirement volunteers have restricted the types ofvolunteering they can engage in, for examplepreventing them from doing physically ormentally demanding work instead of assessingthem as individuals (Nyazi, 1996). One studyfound that such ageist practices were prevalent inaround 20% of organisations (Davis Smith, 1992).

Government policy

Governments of whatever hue claim to holdvolunteering in high esteem. Over recent years,governments have introduced a range ofprogrammes and initiatives aimed at encouragingmore people to volunteer, particularly thosegroups in society that research has suggestedhave been underrepresented as volunteers, suchas young people, people from black and minorityethnic (BME) communities and older people.Chief among initiatives aimed at the over 50s hasbeen the Experience Corps, launched in 2001with the aim of recruiting 250,000 oldervolunteers within three years.

Before the Experience Corps came The HomeOffice Older Volunteers’ Initiative (HOOVI),launched in 1999, which had as its objectiveimproving the quality and quantity ofvolunteering for those aged 50 and over. It set uppilots to identify existing good practice,promoting and publicising volunteering by olderpeople, advancing knowledge about oldervolunteers and recruiting older volunteers(Rochester and Hutchinson, 2002).

Better Government for Older People (BGOP)started in 1998 and is now a UK-wide networkingpartnership of voluntary groups, local authoritiesand central government that allows older peopleas citizens to engage in decision making and inthe development of strategies and services for an

ageing population. On the ground there havebeen many initiatives, for example independentgroups that meet regularly to feed in the olderperson’s perspective to local councils and theWisdom Academy, which promotes lifelonglearning. BGOP is now regarded as a key playerin policy making and service provision.

With an eye to health improvement among olderpeople, the Department of Health set up theHealth Development Agency, which conducted anumber of studies, some of which have featuredthe role of volunteering and identified the role ofpre-retirement courses in disseminating therelevant information.

The issue of volunteering by older people hasthus become of increasing public policy interestover the past decade. This study aims tocontribute to the policy discussion by exploringthe role of volunteering in the lives of olderpeople, particularly during the transition periodfrom paid work to retirement.

Methods

To achieve the aims of the study, the followingmethods were adopted:

• a review of the existing subject literature;• detailed case studies of 11 organisations that

involve older volunteers in their activities;• in-depth qualitative interviews with 21

volunteers drawn from the case studyorganisations;

• face-to-face interviews with 12 nationalstakeholders active in the field of oldervolunteering.

Case studies

The case study sample was composed of a rangeof volunteer-involving organisations fromdifferent geographic areas, fields of activity andstructures. In selecting organisations to take partin the case studies, an attempt was made toreflect the diversity of organisational formscontained within the voluntary sector. Of the 11organisations chosen, eight could be described asstraightforward service giving; two as hybridmembership/service giving; and one ascharacterised by hybrid task-swapping/socialactivities.

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Of the service-giving agencies, five were localbranches of national bodies or pilots for anational programme; the remainder had localroots. The second category comprisedorganisations with a large number of members,some of whom were active in providing serviceof some kind for fellow members. The lastorganisation was what may be best described asa broker in task-swapping and running club-likeactivities. Membership organisations wererespectively an elders’ forum project and a faith-based organisation. Table 1 gives further details.

Each case study involved a number of interviews:

• in-depth interviews with a volunteer servicesmanager or coordinator and the chair ordirector if they existed;

• in-depth interviews with two or threevolunteers, focusing on their previousvolunteering activities or lack of them.

These case study interviews were designed tocover:

• organisational procedures and practice;• benefits to organisations and volunteers;• drawbacks to involving older volunteers;• policy issues in relation to older people and

volunteering.

The sample of volunteers

Finding volunteers who would be prepared totalk in detail about their lives relied oncoordinators in the case study organisationsapproaching individuals on our behalf. By thismeans we assembled a sample of 21 people whowere volunteering in retirement. Coordinatorswere requested to approach volunteers in their

50s or early 60s who had joined the organisationwithin the last year or so.

Despite their best efforts, many coordinatorscould not find volunteers who fitted thespecification and the resultant sample includedsome older volunteers. The ages ranged from 59to 81, some of whom had been retired for sometime. However, because of the way theinterviews were conducted it has not beendifficult to plot the part played by volunteeringin their transition into retirement with a gooddegree of accuracy.

In terms of post-16 education, the largest numberin this sample had achieved secretarial, nursing,teaching or social work qualifications andsometimes other further education, pursuedthrough evening classes or training offered byemployers. Four of the sample had universitydegrees. Two of the volunteers who had missedout on school education took A-levelexaminations and a heritage volunteer studiedfor a certificate in landscape history, which she isfollowing up with a diploma.

Jobs held by the volunteers before retirementcovered a spectrum from the higher echelons ofsenior management in national and internationalcompanies through the middle range of jobs,secretaries, administration, teaching and nursing,to retail assistants and a handyperson.

The interviews were carried out face to face andfollowed a semi-structured format. Each interviewlasted for up to three hours and was tape-recorded and later transcribed for ease ofanalysis.

Introduction

Table 1: Type and location of case study organisations

Type of organisation Location

Elders’ forum LondonTimebank based in rural area North WestInformation and support South WestFaith-based voluntary organisation LondonLarge hospice North EastGeneral hospital MidlandsHeritage site East AngliaBranch of national mental health charity North EastNational charity for support and advice to older people in deprived areas South WestEmployee volunteering scheme South EastBranch of national charity for older people North West

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The focus of these very detailed interviews wason how volunteering had featured in the lives ofthe older people and the part it had played intheir transition from paid work to retirement.This yielded richly wrought accounts of informaland formal volunteering reaching back in manycases to early adult, even childhood, experiencesand captured the essence of what influencedthese individuals to volunteer.

It must be emphasised that with a sample of thissize the findings must be treated with cautionand, as with all such qualitative research, thatthey can be no more than indicative of the widerpopulation.

Stakeholder interviews

Interviews with key stakeholders involved inpolicy formulation in the field of oldervolunteering were designed to shed light on thewider public policy issues relating to theengagement of older people in volunteering andto provide a broader policy context in which toplace the findings from the case studies. Again allinterviews were carried out face to face, using asemi-structured format. The interviews lasted forup to 90 minutes and were tape-recorded andlater transcribed for analysis.

Structure of the report

In order to aid readability and to avoidunnecessary repetition, the data from theseparate research methodologies has beenbrought together thematically to shed light onspecific issues of policy and practice significance.

Chapter 2 examines the role played byvolunteering in the transition process, looking atwhat motivates older people to volunteer and theextent to which volunteering can provide forsome of the ‘elements’ lost with the end of paidwork. The chapter draws a distinction betweenlifelong and serial volunteers who have a long-standing involvement in community activity, andtrigger volunteers who have become involved involunteering for the first time upon retirement.

Chapter 3 looks at ‘what works’ in recruitmentterms and examines how organisations in thestudy have attempted to overcome some of thebarriers that prevent older people from

volunteering. It also discusses what governmentcan do to maximise the engagement of olderpeople in the community.

Chapter 4 looks at issues of management andsupport, and the importance of ‘flexibility’ in themanagement role. It explores respondents’ viewsof the benefits of older volunteering for allstakeholder groups – the volunteer, theorganisation and wider society.

Chapter 5 draws together the diverse themes togive an overall view of what works well andspeculates on the future for the next cohort ofretirees.

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This chapter explores the role played byvolunteering in the transition to retirement.Drawing primarily on the views of oldervolunteers themselves, it reaffirms the mix ofmotives that lie at the heart of the decision tovolunteer, and suggests that family influence andreligion are important factors that haveinfluenced people of this generation to volunteer.The study draws a distinction between lifelongand serial volunteers and new or triggervolunteers, and speculates that in an increasinglynon-religious age, volunteering, for some people,allows the expression of what might be calledthe ‘helping ethic’ in secular surroundings.

Why older people volunteer

There is a comprehensive literature on themotivation to volunteer, mainly based on therange of reasons volunteers themselves give. Bythis method, most studies, for example DavisSmith (1998), come up with a continuum withself-interested motives at one end and altruisticones at the other. It has been consistently foundthat volunteers usually cite more than onereason.

This mix of motives identified in previous studieswas mirrored in this study. The most frequentlymentioned motivation for volunteering was to“keep the brain active” as was the concurrentdread of indiscriminate “telly watching”. “Feelinggood” was also important, and one volunteercompared it to how he felt when he donatedblood.

Most of the sample mentioned their desire tohelp others and to affirm caring and compassion,which volunteering allowed them to do.Volunteers saw it as a simple matter, needing no

Volunteering and thetransition to retirement

further elaboration; in the words of one of them:“I just want to help. I don’t want money, I don’twant any medals, I just want to help”. Volunteersstrongly expressed the feeling of wanting to givesomething back, typified by one volunteer whosaid:

“Actually I didn’t expect anything formyself, all I wanted was to give somethingback. I mean my husband died of cancer,me mum she died of old age, but in the lastfew months of both their lives, they neededhospital care and that’s what they got, andit’s my way of giving a little bit back, that’sjust my way. I couldn’t afford to go out andgive them a couple of thousand pounds, Ihaven’t got it, but I can give them a little bitof help.”

For some older people, volunteering had clearlyplayed a crucial role in the transition process.Commenting on the need to adjust to changedcircumstances, one volunteer reflected on herthoughts in the run-up to retirement: “When youretire you just basically can’t work, you startgetting a pension and you’ve got to rearrangeyour life to adapt it to another way”.

A number of specific examples were given ofindividuals continuing to make a meaningfulcontribution through volunteering once theopportunity to do so in a work environment wascut off. For example, a former postmaster whohad owned a busy shop serving 1,500 regularcustomers a week said:

“Elderly customers look on the postmasteras some sort of social services. They comewith their problems so I suppose I couldsay it was a big influence, dealing with allthose people, helping out with problems,

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not just financial problems, they used tocome with all sorts of things. The postoffice is very full-time work. So when Iretired I thought it is going to hit me unlessI find something to do.”

Another example concerned a high-levelexecutive in a PLC company:

“People are so involved with their workthat they face a vacuum when they retire,and a charity presents them not with anopportunity so much to occupy their timeas to continue being in charge and havingthe status or on paper the status they hadwhen they were working.”

Lifelong, serial and trigger volunteers

By definition, everyone in the sample wascurrently volunteering but close examination oftheir volunteering history revealed differingexperiences and these had an impact on the waythey negotiated the transition to retirement.Analysis of the volunteers’ previous experienceled to the development of a threefold typologythat categorised them as:

• lifelong volunteers• serial volunteers• trigger volunteers.

Lifelong volunteers

For this group of people, volunteering inretirement was a continuation of volunteeringthey had done throughout their lives, informally,formally and in some cases, both. Nearly half thesample came into this category and examples aregiven in the following box.

Elaine1 , a volunteer in a faith-based organisation,worked continuously in her organisation from her20s, moving from hands-on work with youngchildren through serving on committees in roles ofsteadily increasing responsibility to become arepresentative on prestigious national andinterfaith committees.

Roy at the job-swap organisation started his careerin volunteering when he and his young familysettled in a village community more than 40 yearsago. He has been involved sequentially in churchwork, fundraising, organising fetes, fairs andharvest festivals. He has been a parish councillorand supported endless village events.

Serial volunteers

Serial volunteers were those who volunteeredintermittently throughout their lives. A typicalexample might be women who had perhapsvolunteered before their children were born.There might be a gap of several years while theywere juggling the demands of work and familylife but once the children had left home, theybecame involved in volunteering again. Therewere fewer volunteers in this category than inthe lifelong or trigger categories. Examples aregiven in the following box.

Barbara started her volunteering career as aSunday school teacher and helping out in a youthclub when she was in her teens. After a break involunteering of several years she became a schoolgovernor and, after the death of her husband,secretary and treasurer at the local church. Aftermoving house, she worked in a local daycentre andin a museum.

At the age of 14, Anne had volunteered as a carerbut later on, when married and with familyresponsibilities, she did not have time to take onvoluntary work until some years later when sheand her husband had emigrated to Rhodesia.While there she was heavily involved for manyyears in church work and as hospice befriender.Returning to England, she became a befriender fora mental health charity, later joining the localcommittee.

1 All names given in the report are pseudonyms.

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Trigger volunteers

For this group, volunteering was typically aresponse to wanting to put the time freed up byretirement to good use. Nearly all were first-timevolunteers, many of whom spent some timetesting the water of retirement before committingthemselves to formal volunteering. As one ofthem put it: “At the start, you do things you haveput off doing for lack of time, but there is onlyso much golf you can play, gardens you can doand rooms you can paint”. Death of a cared-forperson was also a trigger in some cases.

The role of religion, family and place

While this study could not identify backgroundcharacteristics that, statistically, make peoplemore likely to volunteer, it could identify thosecharacteristics that appear to play an active role,in the accounts of volunteers, in predisposingthem to volunteer.

The main influences reported by the volunteersclustered around:

• religion• family influence• geographical stability.

Religion

Around three quarters of the sample had ahistory of formal religion as children, attendingservices with their parents, Sunday school andbeing part of the religious congregation. Abouthalf of those volunteers who had a backgroundof church attendance still attended church butthe others did not, either ‘drifting off’ or makingconscious decisions to stop doing so. Nearly allthought, however, that religion had left a residualethos that was part of the underlying propensityto volunteer. The importance of good works ontheir own, decoupled from formal religiousobservance, was implicitly acknowledged and iswell illustrated by the following comments.

“I think all major religions require you tohelp other people. I mean Hindus andMuslims too are very great at helpingpeople less fortunate than themselves in avoluntary way, so I think it doesn’t have tobe Christianity, but I think there is a goodspark of it somewhere, and it doesn’t matter

which of the major religions you belong to,I think it comes through that belief that youshould help without seeking reward.”

“I just think it’s a basic principle that runsthrough all major religions, I don’t think it’sanything to do with a particular religionand I think it’s one of the things that makeshumans different from animals in someways, it’s their ability to stretch out andhelp.”

In the faith-based context, volunteering waswoven deeply into the fabric of belief andmembers had no hesitation in seeing a seamlessprogression from early religious teaching topresent-day volunteering.

Family influence

As powerful, if not more powerful, was theinfluence of family and the way the respondentsfelt they were brought up. Most volunteersdescribed what appeared to be closerelationships with their parents. They painted apicture of family life that portrayed the handingdown of attitudes and values described variouslyas “Christian”, “something I’ve grown up with” or“setting a good example”.

Volunteers who grew up in the 1940s, 1950s and1960s gave accounts of the kind of valuesparents implanted. Basically, these were that theyshould help others; informally in lending a handto neighbours who needed it, or more formallyby joining organisations. The followingcomments were typical:

“We were brought up properly, we weretaught to respect people, God’s creation,the animals and everything else, and showrespect to everybody and everything. Mydad used to say, ‘Son, if you can’t doanyone a good turn, leave them alone,don’t do them a bad one’, that’s remainedwith me, that’s the code I’ve lived by.”

“My aunt was very religious and she didlove her charity work. So indirectly I wasinvolved in helping birds and animals andthe poor, so you know because of hernature that might have influenced me to anextent, I reckon.”

Volunteering and the transition to retirement

10


As well as describing how values had filtereddown, people talked about the day-to-dayaspects of their early life, giving a vivid accountof interaction with aunts, uncles, cousins andgrandparents. Several of the volunteers madespontaneous mention of happy childhoods. “Wewere poor but we had a very very happychildhood, very happy”, was how one volunteerexpressed it.

This and the influence of religion are firmlyintertwined and difficult to disentangle buttogether form what might be termed an ethicallegacy.

While highly speculative, it is tempting to seeundertaking voluntary work as fulfilling the needto undertake good works outside the confines ofa conventional religious setting. In effect,volunteering allows for the expression of whatmight be called ‘the helping ethic’ in secularsurroundings.

Geographical stability

Many of the volunteers lived in or near the areawhere they were born or had been in theirpresent neighbourhood for many years, andseemed to have good social networks. Thesefactors are known to have a positive connectionwith the propensity to volunteer. For example,the 1997 National Survey of Volunteering found,as had earlier surveys, that both domesticstability and the relationship between people andtheir neighbours were significant for involvementin volunteering (Davis Smith, 1998).

The study reinforces the suggestion from otherworks that volunteering is at least in part areflection of good social networks; people whoknow more people are, not surprisingly, morelikely to be invited to take part in a range ofcommunity activities. But the relationship mayalso be working the other way as well, in thatthrough volunteering people extend their rangeof social contacts and build up their stock ofsocial capital.

Comparison with paid work

The study sought to tease out how volunteersperceived differences between working as avolunteer and a paid employee.

Generally, the sample volunteers did not makecomparisons on a practical level, like similaritiesor differences in structure or style ofmanagement; rather they drew attention to lesstangible aspects: cultural differences, theattitudes and commitment they brought asvolunteers, as illustrated in Table 2. The lack of acheque or wage packet was taken as given.

Table 2: Working as a volunteer and a paid employee

Similar Different

Having discrete duties Culture and ethos ofand responsibilities voluntary organisations

Solving problems Lower level of stressDevoting energy Quality of commitmentUsing specific expertise

Undertaking a duty like befriending a client on aregular basis and being responsible for turningup at an agreed time were seen as very similar inboth contexts. The sometimes quite heavyresponsibilities of helping to guide anorganisation and overseeing finances wereconsistent with what some of the volunteers haddone as employees.

A trustee volunteer captured something of theessence of the similarities when they commented:

“So I think there’s a lot of mileage in lettingpeople know they will be bringing the bestfrom their working life through intovolunteering without having to go throughthe nasties that they give them, and theywill have some new things that they’rebeing challenged with which they didn’thave before.”

Cultural differences between paid work andvolunteering would be more visible to volunteersin some roles than others. For example, a trustee,examining at some length his initiation into thevolunteering ethos, said:

“It took me a number of months to get usedto the rhythm and tempo of the voluntarysector. I don’t deny that I tended when Ifirst came here to be a bit chop, chop, andthen I had to realise of course that theculture, the tempo and the rhythm withinthe voluntary sector is not that at all, youhave to adjust.”

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Another volunteer pointed out that theirexperience of the commercial world is that it isoutcomes-driven as befits the profit motive, incontrast to the more laissez-faire attitude theyhad encountered in their voluntary capacity.

Some of the volunteers felt the great advantageof working as a volunteer meant that the tasksthey undertook were less stressful and also thatfor most of them volunteering occupiedsignificantly less time than was the case withpaid work, leaving time for relaxation and otherpursuits.

Volunteering also had the added advantage ofbeing less contractually binding than paid work.As one volunteer said:

“OK, you’ve got what you might call a fall-back position, volunteering, and you knowif you don’t like it you can just terminate itimmediately and say bye-bye, whereas ifyou were, as most of us were, dependenton the company for our salary, then youhad to put up with quite a bit.”

But for most volunteers, leaving would not beundertaken lightly. As one volunteer put it:

“If you have to go to a paid job you’reexpected to be there every day 9–5. Withvolunteering you could afford yourself theluxury of saying I can’t be bothered. But Idon’t think people who volunteer would dothat lightly, if they’ve got the will to dosomething for nothing they will do itbecause they feel obliged and bound to doit, to honour their commitment to it.”

These comparisons between their paid work andvolunteering help to give an enhancedunderstanding of the transition terrain. Theypoint to features common to both anddifferences that go beyond the superficial, andhow volunteering draws on and is influenced bythe experience of paid employment. Some of thevolunteers felt that it would be helpful if anexplanation of this different ethos couldsomehow be incorporated at some stage of theinduction process.

Given that, for many retirees, volunteering is oneof a range of options people can choose and thatorganisations have to compete for volunteers, itis helpful to consider to what extent volunteering

becomes a way of continuing their work careersby other means. Do volunteers who had enjoyedhigh ranking in their paid work want to take onless demanding tasks in their voluntary role orvice versa? Examples were offered of bothdirections.

The personnel director of a large company dearlywanted to work in a shop and was happily doingso two years later; a senior social worker workedin a daycentre and a top-flight engineer wasenjoying doing the hospice garden.

But people were much more likely to go foropportunities that allowed them to use the skillsthey had acquired over a lifetime’s work. Thiswas particularly true for trustees who hadformerly held powerful positions in PLCs.Coordinators expressed a desire to hold on tightto high-profile individuals as they were wellaware that the specialised expertise thevolunteers contributed was way beyond anythingthey could afford to buy in.

Similarly, retired civil servants, administrators,nurses and teachers would be matched to tasksthat suited their work experience andpreferences. For the greater part, retiredvolunteers appeared to take on tasks that werenot too dissimilar from those they wereaccustomed to, in administration, caring, ordirecting. Role reversal was unusual, but whetherthis was the preferred choice of the volunteers,or was due to pressure from the organisations tofill certain roles is unclear.

Implications for policy and practice

• Older people’s motivations to volunteer (justlike people’s of all age groups) are mixed. Forsome older people, volunteering is anopportunity to put something back intosociety; for others, volunteering provides achance to continue learning new skills andtasting new experiences; for yet others,volunteering offers a means of making thesomewhat painful transition from a lifetime ofpaid work to retirement. Organisations need torecognise the diversity of motives that driveolder people to volunteer and createmeaningful opportunities to meet individualneeds. For some older people, this willinvolve an opportunity to embark on activitiesvery different from the world of their paid

Volunteering and the transition to retirement

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work. For others, it will mean an opportunityto continue with the same sorts of activitiesundertaken during their paid career.

• Some older people volunteer because theyhave always done so. Others come back tovolunteering later in life following a break forwork and family responsibilities. But for someolder people retirement is the trigger thatinspires them to volunteer for the first time.Organisations and policy makers need tounderstand more about the nature of thistrigger response and what can be done tostimulate it into action. Further examination isrequired of the steps to be taken to ensurethat older people with no history ofvolunteering are presented with opportunitiesto get involved following their retirement. Therole of pre-retirement education in the triggerprocess is discussed in the following chapter.

• Some older people will look to volunteeringto replicate many of the aspects of paid worklost upon retirement, such as formalorganisational structure and tight timediscipline. Others, however, will be lookingfor volunteering to provide a complete breakwith the world of paid employment.Organisations need to be aware of thesedifferent requirements and to structure theirvolunteering activities accordingly. Some olderpeople will find the move to a more relaxedworking environment unsettling and willrequire help and assistance to settle in. Otherswill be drawn towards the informality and lackof bureaucracy that some volunteering canoffer.

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3

This chapter examines some of the organisationalissues surrounding the involvement of olderpeople as volunteers. It confirms what previousresearch has found: that word of mouth is thekey way by which (older) people find their wayinto volunteering. It explores some of the barriersthat work against the involvement of somegroups of older people, including negative andrestricted images of volunteering, and looks atthe steps organisations have taken to try andwiden participation. It suggests a role forgovernment in creating a supportive policyframework to maximise the engagement of olderpeople.

Recruitment

Coordinators in almost all the case studies hadrecruitment strategies that adopted a broad-brushapproach and found, as is commonly reported,that word of mouth is one of the most effectivemeans of engaging all people, including olderpeople, in volunteering.

Although effective word of mouth was found bysome to be a somewhat hit and miss approach,coordinators had to be proactive as well,employing standard practices like advertising inpublic places, for example shopping malls andpost offices, local press and radio, parishmagazines, newsletters and websites. Aware ofthe importance of nurturing contacts, onecoordinator said: “We’ve nurtured and culturedmost of the solid local journalists intounderstanding what we do … we give themhuman stories”.

As regards deliberately targeting the over 50s ingeneral, and retirees in particular, somecoordinators did so by providing presentations

Involving older people asvolunteers

on pre-retirement courses, taking part inpromotional videos, devising special literatureand supplying speakers where older audiencescould be expected, like Women’s Institutes andpensioners’ groups. These tactics worked wellbut coordinators felt they had to be content thatthe considerable effort involved would yieldperhaps only one or two people at any one time.

The experience of the efficacy of pre-retirementcourse slots was generally felt to bedisappointing, with a tiny number signing up onthe spot and a few more coming forward later,perhaps after a bereavement that left theindividual with more time on their hands. Thefew volunteers who had attended them thoughtvolunteering tended to get lost among all theadvice for financial products and holidays. It wassuggested that a different approach might bemore fruitful, perhaps arranging for a second-stage course to be run after six months whenpeople had gone through the initial phase ofenjoying freedom, and boredom might be settingin.

Another avenue that had a measure of successwas placing adverts in the newsletters that aresent out periodically by large employers likelocal authorities or hospitals to all their retirees.

Targeted recruitment of this kind was held to benecessary in service delivery organisations, butmembership organisations were felt to operate inan altogether different environment. In theseorganisations it was said that volunteering “justhappens” and stems from shared religious beliefs,ethos and interests. Respondents from theseorganisations felt it is common for members tothink they are just “doing something that needsto be done” and do not consider themselves asvolunteers at all.

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Barriers to volunteering

It is clear from the evidence presented by DavisSmith (1992), Nyazi (1996) and Hirsch (2000)among others that volunteers in the 50+ agegroup can face a series of barriers that hinder,and sometimes even prevent, their participationin voluntary activity.

The general consensus among the coordinatorsin this study was that their organisations did nothave any barriers to participation, but this wasqualified in some cases by reference to factorsoutside their control, either imposed by practicalrestrictions, or obstacles embedded in society’svalue system. Much of the discussion centred onfruitless efforts coordinators had made and thesefailures throw light on the magnitude of some ofthese difficulties.

Practical barriers identified by coordinators were:

• insurance arrangements;• lack of access for disabled volunteers;• legislation on health and safety;• lack of resources to create opportunities;• health of volunteers.

Insurance was mentioned as a barrier by somerespondents, although in one or two cases a wayround the restrictions had been found. Forexample, in the case of a hospital volunteerprogramme, although the voluntary organisationthat managed the programme did not provideinsurance cover to volunteers over the age of 75,the hospital where the programme was baseddid. The membership organisations generally hada blanket insurance policy that covered everyoneregardless of age.

Lack of access for disabled volunteers wassomething coordinators felt they had little controlover as disability-friendly venues were few andfar between and they felt there was no simplesolution to making suitable access to premises atthe top of flights of stairs or in inaccessiblelocations. Another point raised about thedifficulty of working with disabled volunteerswas that they often had support needs thatcoordinators felt were beyond the capacity of theorganisation to provide.

Some coordinators in the health care field felthealth and safety regulations militated against theuse of volunteers because of the need to be

registered with Care Standards. As onerespondent said: “Putting on someone’s cardigancan be construed as a personal care task andregistration would come in....”

Another obstacle to the participation of oldervolunteers was lack of suitable opportunities.There were many examples of wherecoordinators knew they could create moreopportunities for the over 55s but wereprevented from doing so by lack of staff time andfinancial constraints.

Cultural obstacles were seen as altogether moreintractable. Almost all recognised the absence ofolder volunteers from BME communities andmade efforts from time to time to broaden theirrecruitment, usually without much success.Leaving aside that some of the organisationsoperated in areas where there was not much of aBME presence, rural Cheshire or Dorset forexample, others in city areas had tried but madelittle or no impact.

One such organisation had achieved somelimited success and the coordinator’s accountprovides very useful insights into the difficultiesof recruiting this group of people and howprogress can be made. She began by describing aproject providing a daycentre for Asian eldersthat only one person ever attended and was laterclosed down. She had been told that the reasonfor the failure was because no one had anyunderstanding of the cultural implication ofexpecting two different Muslim groups to use thesame facility. She continued:

“Since I’ve been in post the way I’ve beendoing it is by working with groups that arealready working in the community, bysetting up a project with African/Caribbeanor Asian groups to provide a projectbetween us, and that’s the way we’ve kindof got into the community. I think it’s theonly way to do it, rather than us, apredominately white organisation, trying togo there, and I think that’s part of the issuein volunteering as well. We have justrecruited our first black volunteer.”

One city centre organisation did report areasonable number of black and Asian volunteersbut attributed their success to the previousdirector who was Asian herself and brought incontacts because of that. Another organisation

15

had worked hard in trying to find approaches tothe minority groups in their area and althoughthey had gone to community leaders andworkers in BME organisations in the hope theywould disseminate information through leafletsand flyers, this had not materialised.

Improving recruitment among retirees

On the whole, the volunteers were baffled as towhy more retirees did not come forward tovolunteer and quoted examples of friends andex-colleagues who seemed to have nothingpositive in their lives, but felt there was noglaringly obvious way to recruit more of them.They identified two main underlying difficulties:the image of volunteering; and the lack ofawareness of the interesting opportunities andrewards volunteering can offer.

The image problem

Volunteers felt that the public’s image ofvolunteering was that it was solely concernedwith charity shops and fundraising for bigprojects like Comic Relief and Children in Need.In their view, what comes over is that, whileorganisations make efforts to inform the public ofwhat money is spent on, they fail to say enoughabout what work they do.

Lack of awareness of what volunteering canoffer

In considering the broader question of why thetake-up was not greater among retirees, therewas a general feeling that the message of howrewarding volunteering is does not get across topeople. Some had encountered the ‘why dosomething for nothing’ syndrome among peoplethey knew, and felt that raising awareness of thesatisfactions volunteering could bring was theonly way to counter such attitudes.

Marketing

Given the image problem and the lack ofawareness, volunteers felt that volunteeringshould be much more vigorously promoted. Thisshould start with more advertising and large-scalepublic relations campaigns aimed at retirees by

organisations focusing on the enjoyment factorand emphasising the variety and high quality ofthe jobs and challenges on offer. As onerespondent commented:

“Well if it’s going to improve, it’s marketingisn’t it basically, it’s got to become muchmore upfront with what roles there arewhich a volunteer could fulfil, and what’s init for the volunteer if they do take it up,and probably a lot more marketing in termsof ‘try before you buy’.”

Discussing the issue of how publicity might beimproved, one volunteer suggested large posters,photographs of ordinary older people, posted inbus shelters on the basis that pensioners usebuses and revolving adverts are something tolook at while they wait interminably for the nextbus! A solution was felt to be needed to theproblem of getting the message across. As onevolunteer said:

“How can we get people to understand ifthey don’t know what the subject is.…Understanding the audience and using theright language would be good for starters.”

A more novel approach perhaps, one that wasalso referred to by a coordinator, was thatorganisations should set up ‘a half day in the lifeof a volunteer’ taster sessions that could becirculated to all local firms. In the words of thisvolunteer:

“It would be interesting for a personcoming up to retirement age to observewhat goes on, even if it’s only sitting at adesk doodling on a piece of paper withthings happening all round you or a sessionat a daycentre, whatever interested aparticular individual.”

What would work: how governmentpolicies could help

There was an overall consensus among thestakeholders that the government needs to domore about pre-retirement planning generally,with the suggestion that policy planners shouldbring together some of the key agencies to take areally broad look at the next 10-20 years.

Involving older people as volunteers

16


There were several ideas about what thegovernment could do to make volunteering amore prominent component in the transition toretirement, most specifically promoting theconcepts of phased retirement and lifelonglearning, and developing the role of pre-retirement education.

Phased retirement

Stakeholders felt that employers should besensitised to the idea of phased retirement. It wasnot enough for employers to send workers on apre-retirement course three months before theywere due to retire and leave it at that. They sawphased retirement as being about developingflexibility for older employees in a way thatwould give them opportunities to pursue otheractivities alongside paid work.

There was some support for an American model,also in operation in some large companies in theUK, where there are schemes that allow peoplecoming up for retirement to have time off duringthe week to work in a voluntary capacity.Typically they may start with half a day a week inthe year running up to retirement and increasethe amount of time as retirement gets closer.

Phased retirement in which people have had achance to see for themselves what they can getout of volunteering rather than including it aspart of a pre-retirement course alongside a hostof other topics was felt to offer a hugeadvantage. As far as promoting volunteering isconcerned, stakeholders felt that however goodthe presentation or a video might be, there is nosubstitute for real experience that could eitherconfirm retirees in their volunteering role oralternatively allow them to reject it after personalexperience.

Another factor in promoting phased retirementwas that people would have to be assured that itwould not jeopardise their pension. Stakeholdershad noted that there were misunderstandingsabout the effect on pensions so that people feltunable to undertake anything they thought mightbe a risk to their entitlements.

Stakeholders felt that, for many retirees, lettinggo of a bit of responsibility in the work contextand picking up a bit of responsibility somewherein the volunteering world gives a much longer

and therefore smoother transition between workand retirement and that the two can actuallywork together. As one stakeholder said:

“Flexible retirement is the key word – weneed a more flexible retirement strategy sothat people can go early if they wish to orgo on working on a part-time basis, saythree or four days a week and use the otherday for their own purposes of whichvolunteering may be one.”

Lifelong learning

Taking the opportunity to build on theenthusiasm and appetite for life of the ThirdAgers as a starting point, some of thestakeholders were convinced that thevolunteering movement had a large part to playin facilitating lifelong learning. In this scenariothe worlds of work and volunteering wereconceptualised as parallel universes with trainingopportunities being the same for both. Therewould be state-financed packages including freecourses and incentives for retired people to takeup a ‘volunteering career’. For example, theycould build on their life’s experience of childrenand grandchildren by studying for qualificationsthat are nowadays required for working withyoung children. Such training and accreditation,it was felt, would have beneficial effects allround.


• In recruitment terms, organisations need torecognise that, while word of mouth may bethe most effective method of engaging oldervolunteers, other more proactive approacheswill be required if a broader range of peopleare to be involved. The study suggests thatsuccessful outreach programmes will includepresentations on volunteering and what it hasto offer to gatherings of older people, forexample pensioners’ groups, and mailshots tothe recently retired through such mechanismsas company retiree associations.

• Organisations need to take firmer action toremove the barriers that prevent certain groupsof older people from engaging involunteering. Removing arbitrary retirementages for volunteers is one obvious course of

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action and looking for ways of overcoming theproblems of insuring older volunteers isanother. The government also has a role toplay in this respect in terms of trying toinfluence the behaviour of the insurancecompanies and by setting a good example inthe way in which it involves volunteers in thestatutory sector. Organisations should alsotake greater steps to involve older disabledpeople as volunteers and not hide behind theobstacles of inaccessible buildings andresource constraints. Government again canset a good example in the way in which itseeks to engage disabled people involunteering in the public sector.

• More also needs to be done to engage olderpeople from BME communities involunteering. The study points to a number ofsuccessful strategies that have been employedin this regard and highlights the importance ofoutreach work and partnership working withthe BME community.

• The negative image of volunteering held bysome older people remains a barrier to fullerengagement and the study suggests that moreneeds to be done to challenge the ‘myths’ ofvolunteering and to showcase its benefits forolder people, particularly during the transitionprocess from paid work to retirement.

• Government and employers should lookcarefully at the concept of phased retirement,which would allow older people approachingretirement an opportunity to take part involunteering within their local communitywhile still in employment. The study suggeststhat there is ample scope to develop pre-retirement education so that volunteeringfeatures much more strongly in the menu ofpost-retirement activities and options. Asecond-phase, post-retirement course mayhave value in raising awareness of thevolunteering option after the initial flush ofretirement euphoria has begun to wear off.

Involving older people as volunteers

18


4

This chapter looks at the issue of managementand support of older volunteers. Appropriatemanagement and support were found to beessential in ensuring that the benefits ofvolunteering by older people were maximised forthe good of the volunteers, the host organisationand the wider society. The study suggests thatflexibility in management style, underpinned by astrong organisational commitment to support,training and rewards, lies at the heart of thesuccessful engagement of older people asvolunteers.

Style of management

Most of the management techniques describedby the coordinators apply to volunteersregardless of age. They recognised that for oldervolunteers (as with all volunteers) there was amix of motives at work that required a mix ofmanagement styles to be employed. While someolder volunteers described their involvementprimarily in terms of altruism – “paying back” or“helping to make things better” – others werelooking to volunteering as a chance to learn newskills and experience new opportunities.Consequently, the opportunities older volunteerswere given, and the way in which they weremanaged – the degree of formal training forexample – had to be tailored to individualcircumstances.

For most coordinators the emphasis was oncreating goodwill and trust, building upteamwork and ensuring volunteers get enjoymentfrom what they do and a sense of community. Asone respondent said:

Management and support

“It’s not a resource to be exploited –volunteering is something people do if theywant to and to feel part of the team. I’m justas much part of the team as they are – Ican’t do without them. That’s how I work.One of the keys is not getting somethingout of somebody for nothing.”

The basic role of the coordinator is to be afacilitator, to be supportive and friendly (Gay,2000) but the case study coordinators felt that, inaddition, they needed to accord a due measureof respect to older people for their lifeexperience and the advanced skills they couldbring to tasks. Management takes on a differentdimension in membership organisations. In thiscontext, the job of the coordinators was morepassive in nature, helping members who wantedto be active, for example with an informationservice or a travel club. In the case of the faith-based organisation, coordinators helped servicegroups of members whose roles might becollecting things for gift parcels, transport forolder members, fundraising, organisingentertainment rotas or providing back-up toreligious observance.

Flexibility

The implications for coordinators and their styleof management are immense. Theyacknowledged that it had been a commonexpectation on their part in the not-too-distantpast that volunteers would fit into whatevertimetable the task demanded. But all that haschanged radically and, to keep abreast of thesechanges, coordinators had to realise thatflexibility was indispensable in managing oldervolunteers.

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With flexibility as the watchword, coordinatorsestablished at the interview stage what theapplicant’s lifestyle was like and what theiravailability would be over the short and mediumterm. In practical terms, coordinators approachedvariable availability in different ways and as thetasks demanded. For example, in oneorganisation volunteers could go on a regularrota or in a ‘bank’ where they could be calledupon as needed. In the heritage context, themanager drew up an annual schedule and postedit in the volunteers’ common room wherevolunteers could trade places if necessary. Howthey dealt with variable availability is wellsummed up by the following coordinator:

“Just this week we’ve had one of our oldervolunteers whose mother is very ill andshe’s had to say she can’t actually give ustime at this moment. So long as they let usknow we can usually cover for them. Wemake sure when we interview them thetime commitment will suit the servicethey’re working with. We weed out whenwe first talk to them whether we thought itwas going to be an issue because forinstance for the information advice line weask for a commitment of one day a weekfor a minimum of a year and that you knowwe say that right from the beginning … soit’s quite clear what we’d be expecting.”

Process of selection

At the service delivery end of the spectrum therewas a fairly consistent pattern in selection andplacement. Once a would-be volunteer expressedinterest, most of the organisations sent aninformation pack with an application form andwould generally follow this up with a phone callwithin two or three weeks. Once the applicationform had been returned, it would be followed byan interview. At the heritage site, the managerwould have a fairly informal chat, introduce himor her to other volunteers and leave thevolunteer to wander round the site. This hadproved very effective; hardly anyone haddropped out at this stage and retention had beenexcellent. Some have role descriptions andagreements setting out what the organisationexpects and what the volunteer can expect inreturn. References are taken up and inductionand training are offered.

What volunteers do

The tasks the volunteers do and the amount ofsatisfaction they derive play an important part inthe transition process.

The case study organisations covered a very widespectrum of tasks. The following Table gives asummary.

Table 3: Tasks carried out by volunteers

Task Examples

Administration Photocopying, filing,envelope stuffing,reception desk

Befriending Visiting isolated people,supporting carers

Information and Providing information,advice giving advice and advocacy

Practical tasks Small works, gardeningWelfare/therapy-type Talking to patients,tasks members providing

services for fellow clientsand fellow members

Trusteeship Serving on boards

Tasks the sample volunteers perform in both themembership and service-giving organisationsreflect the diversity and scope of voluntaryorganisations, and range from hands-on serviceto clients and members to the high-profiledecision-making roles of trustees and boardmembers. An individual may have more than onerole, for example helping with administration,speaking at meetings and travelling worldwideon behalf of the charity.

Coordinators broke down the tasks into broadcategories, but volunteers themselves revealed analtogether different dimension that providesimportant insights into how tasks can allow forthe expression of creativity and caring that otheractivities do not. As one volunteer explained:

“You might be only serving tea or coffee,but you’re doing more than that becausesometimes these people come to thecounter and they can’t carry anything, andyou take it to them and see that they’resettled.… You’re helping that person andthat’s what it’s all about in my eyes, it’shelping somebody.”


20


At the other end of the scale, a treasurer, whoseorganisation turns over nearly £1 million a year,drew up a long-range action plan for expansionand relocation that involved fundraising andendless visits to estate agents to find suitablepremises.

Another volunteer, who described themselves asa “dedicated salesman”, said they used clevertactics to become known to the psychiatric unitso they could persuade them to let them set up apatient information point for their mental healthcharity. Not only did they succeed in this butthey were asked to contribute to training coursesfor the doctors and nurses.

What these examples indicate is that behind whatmay sound like an ordinary, even uninteresting,task there may be room to exercise creativity,entrepreneurship, a high standard of work and toapply qualities of empathy and good sense.

Most coordinators usually had heavy work loadsand felt the time needed to reflect, scan thehorizon and come up with ideas for expandingopportunities was limited, but there were someexceptions. An age-based organisation was proudof its Speak Easy Project. This project involvedinterviewing older people about their experienceand satisfaction with home care as part of thesocial services review of the system in theborough. Several of the volunteers reported thatinterviewees appreciated being interviewed bysomeone in their age group rather than “astatutory person we can’t understand”.

Support

Part of the successful management of volunteersinvolves support and the level will varyaccording to the tasks and the kind oforganisation. Most coordinators had an opendoor policy so that volunteers could come in atany time if they were concerned about anythingor just for a chat. Some had regular supervisionmeetings and support was given on an ad hocbasis to others. ‘Keeping an eye open’ for thevolunteers’ welfare would perhaps be more of afeature for this group of volunteers. In somecases, volunteers supported each other and ifthey were part of a staff team, in the hospitalsetting for example, support would beforthcoming from staff.

Recognition and rewards

What might be termed a ‘reward system’ ismultifaceted and volunteers were asked ifvolunteering had helped to fill the gap left bypaid work in any of the following ways:providing a time structure; getting out of thehouse; meeting people/colleagues; feeling part ofthings outside the home.

Most of the volunteers agreed wholly or in partwith these overarching ideas, which can be seenas rewards available to volunteers of any age butwould be particularly applicable to retirees.

Factors that could be seen as particularlyapposite to retirees – keeping the brain active,sharing in success and meeting new people –appeared regularly in the volunteers’ list ofrewards. Less specifically, enjoyment andpleasure were almost universally cited asrewards.

As well as the overarching benefits ofvolunteering, many gave detailed accounts oftheir rewards, both intrinsic to the work andextrinsic as shown in Table 4. Volunteersappreciated a “thank you” or a “well done” whenoffered by clients or coordinators. While somedeclared that they did not want, in the words ofone, “money or medals”, they were neverthelessappreciative of formal recognition by theorganisation and spoke warmly of beingincluded in trips and events with othervolunteers and staff.

For one heritage volunteer, being able to indulgean interest in art at the same time as performing aservice to the visiting public was seen asrewarding, particularly as it had led to furtherstudy and involvement.

Table 4: The rewards of volunteering

Intrinsic Extrinsic

Positive feedback from Enjoymentclients/coordinators Pleasure

Inherent interest of work Keeping the brain activeRecognition by the Feeling good

organisation Social contactSharing in success Meeting a challenge

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Training

Training occurred in several different ways:

• on the job;• attendance at a training programme;• training alongside staff;• training to improve particular aspects of the

work.

On-the-job training was essentially ‘watch whatNelly does’, and was considered appropriate insettings where anything more structured was notrequired, for example in the outpatients’department where volunteers in the ‘meeting andgreeting’ role would quickly catch on to the jobby observation and common sense.

This would not, of course, be viable whenvolunteers were working with carers ofvulnerable patients and in this case they wouldbe obliged to undertake several training sessionsbefore starting. If volunteers wanted to improveskills in a certain direction, opportunities weresometimes made available to participate inhigher-level courses, sometimes alongside staff. Agood example was an IT course that a volunteertook so he would be better able to performadministrative tasks.

Benefits to the organisations ofinvolving older people

There was unequivocal endorsement by theorganisational representatives of the view thatthe benefits of having older people as volunteerswere substantial and far outweighed anydisadvantages there might be for theorganisation. Many things were placed on theplus side:

• strong commitment;• time;• loyalty;• establishing good rapport with people in their

own age group;• understanding of older people’s issues;• doing the job;• good retention.

Commitment was seen as essential for thesmooth running of the organisations and likely tobe strongest in the older cohort. Commitment

and loyalty resulted in a high retention rate andcoordinators reported that older volunteersstayed for long periods. There was remarkableconsistency in the coordinators’ experience thatretention was excellent and that volunteers leftonly when their circumstances changed or theirhealth declined to the point where the tasksbecame too much. At the heritage site, ex-volunteers were encouraged to come in whenthey felt like a chat with their old colleagues, tohave a cup of tea in the volunteers’ commonroom and to use the library.

There was variability in the amount of time theolder volunteers contributed each week: someput in a full 35 hours but the average was fivehours, in line with what other studies havefound. If travelling times are added in, this comesup to roughly a day’s input. Retired people wereable to give time, particularly during the daywhen working people were not available.

Due to the varied nature of volunteers’contributions, organisations said they had notattempted to put a figure on the value of thevolunteers’ contributions, but the heritagecoordinator said that the rule of thumb for himwas that six volunteers equated to oneequivalent full-time paid member of staff.

Establishing a good rapport with the older agegroups was seen as an obvious bonus andexamples have already been given. This andloyalty were highly rated. In the hospital,volunteers were seen as adding value to thework of every department they worked in andoffering patients time and a degree ofunderstanding that hard-pressed professionals arenot always able to offer. In particular, befriendervolunteers, because of their life experience, wereseen as uniquely placed to bring understandingand comfort and an ability to empathise, addinga dimension that was felt to be often outsidewhat younger staff could give.

As for doing the job, the coordinator in themental health organisation, the majority of whosevolunteers were over 50, could demonstrate thatthey added considerably to the work. She did soby pinpointing 2002, when fundraisers raisedseveral thousand pounds, befriending andinformation services were delivered, and aninformation point established at the generalhospital. The committee provided strategic


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direction and worked on detailed plans for futuredevelopment.

Other coordinators agreed that the input ofcommittee members adds immeasurably to theirwork. Put simply, organisations could notperform or plan for the future in the way they dowithout the work of the retired volunteers. Moregenerally, the advantages of having oldervolunteers were seen as being able to call ontheir energy and, in the case of the recentlyretired, a link into the wider working world.

As well as direct benefits to the organisations,coordinators felt there were benefits tovolunteers and to society as a whole too.

Benefits to the volunteers

One coordinator pointed out that she had neverseen any controlled trials of the health benefitsof volunteering, but common sense and her ownexperience left no doubt in her mind thatvolunteering played a part in maintaining goodhealth and in some cases even restoring it. Shesaid:

“I hear from sons and daughters who liveall over the country, and one lady writes tome from France thanking me because hermother is here … she wrote, ‘We weredespairing, all she ever did was sit at homeand read, or she was becoming a couchpotato’. So the families are pleased they’reoccupied and they make a lot of friends.Pride in achievement and by extension self-esteem are also benefits.”

Most agreed, and these points were also madestrongly by the volunteers, that the good effectswere most often in keeping the mind active,meeting people on a regular basis and gettingout of the house, especially for thoseexperiencing the death of a spouse after alifetime together.

Benefits to society as a whole

In considering benefits as they might apply in thewider society, coordinators identified two mainthemes: those that had immediate effect, and adeferred benefit for later generations. Chiefamong the immediate benefits was the part

played by volunteering in social inclusion forolder people.

In the case of membership and job-swaporganisations it is easy to see that providingopportunities for social interaction is all or part oftheir raison d’etre. In the case of some immigrantmen, for example, who had spent their livesworking in gangs, living in bedsits and failing tobuild savings, could find themselves stranded onthe bank of social exclusion once they retired.For them, membership of the elders’ forum gavethem a route to social inclusion again, animportant factor in the transition to retirement.

The effects volunteering can have on peoplewho have been socially excluded are admirablycaptured in what the hospital coordinator said:

“The volunteers look out for each other …they’re pleased to be doing something, a lotof them were unemployed for long periodsand thought they’d never work again andall of a sudden they’re necessary andthey’re made to feel wanted by the peoplethey work for and I do my best to makesure if any of them is ill or needs somethingand they ring me at home sometimes just tosay ‘hello’. So it’s like a little communitywithin a community.”

Several people expressed the view that one ofthe spin-offs of volunteering is that it helpspreserve something of lasting worth. The heritagecontext is a prime example. The coordinator’sview was that:

“Volunteering for us has enduring appeal topeople with a strong interest in art andarchitecture who feel they are helping topreserve the natural beauty of thecountryside, old or interesting buildings,and the myriad beautiful objects that adornthem. Benefits to society are incalculable,not just for the present but extending farinto the future.”

Less obviously, in other organisations volunteerswere felt to bequeath an intangible legacy incontributing to a public asset that keeps theorganisation alive for the next generation. At amore down-to-earth level, another coordinatorsaid: “Seeing volunteers around and doing usefulthings gives encouragement to others and showsthat when they get to the age of retirement it

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doesn’t necessarily mean that all they can do issit in front of the telly all day”.


• Styles of volunteer management will varyaccording to the nature of the organisationand the types of volunteering beingundertaken. In some organisations, a moreformal style of management will beappropriate; in others a much more light-touchapproach will be required. Organisationsshould look to introduce the most appropriatemanagement style for their particular type ofagency and to best fit the needs andrequirements of their older volunteers.

• The study suggests that a flexibility ofmanagement will be required to take accountof the varying needs and interests of oldervolunteers. In particular, organisations shouldlook to offer a flexible approach in respect oftypes of activities undertaken and timecommitment required, to enable older peoplean opportunity of fitting volunteering in totheir increasingly busy post-retirement lives aspart of a ‘portfolio career’.

• Organisations should consider creatingvolunteering opportunities specifically for theover 50s and should consider whether thestandard support and training on offer isappropriate for their older volunteers orwhether tailor-made systems and proceduresare required.

• Organisations should look to developappropriate reward and recognition systemsthat fully recognise the unique contributionmade by older volunteers.

• Organisations should look for ways of betterselling the benefits of volunteering for olderpeople and of disseminating the message thatolder people have a unique and essentialcontribution to make in their communities.


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5

The study has ranged widely over theexperiences, opinions and perspectives ofvolunteers, coordinators in voluntaryorganisations and stakeholders’ ideas about howgovernment policies can be geared to supportvolunteering by retired people. What has brokennew ground is using volunteers’ life histories,which have allowed unprecedented insights intothe life worlds of older people.

It should, however, be recalled that the studyfindings are drawn from small samples, and it istherefore not possible to know to what extentthey reflect what is happening in society overall.What they do is provide a snapshot ofvolunteering by a particular group of retiredpeople and highlight the importance ofvolunteering in the lives of older people.

Before going on to the general conclusions, webegin by looking at definitional issues raised bythe study. They cluster round what meanings areattached in this context to:

• older people• retirement• transition• volunteering.

Older people

In earlier times, older people were oftencharacterised as a group of individuals of inferiorworth, their usefulness exhausted, tucked awayfrom the mainstream and with little further togive to society. But this has changed as olderpeople are seen to be exercising choice, takingsome share alongside younger people in thegood things of life and benefiting fromeducational opportunities and leisure pursuits.

Conclusions andrecommendations

Nowadays, older people are more likely to belooked upon as an active, often vibrant, groupable and willing to contribute a great deal totheir communities through volunteering andmore generally to society as a whole.

Some organisations in the study recognised twostages in the ageing process: the 50-70 agegroup when, generally speaking, volunteers werein full control of their lives, followed by the over70s age group when people might, to somedegree, be winding down their activities.

In this definition being over 50 is not adisqualification from volunteering: it is doing thejob that counts and, in recognising this, thevoluntary organisations in the study consistentlytap into the potential of the so-called Third Age.

Retirement

In recent decades, the meaning of retirement haschanged from the idea of people ‘being put outto grass’, entering a phase of diminishedresponsibilities and reduced purpose in life.Nowadays, retirement is seen as a multifacetedstage in the life cycle with opportunities to usefree time in ways that please the individual. Asthe study shows, retirees may have a range ofactivities: perhaps a time-consuming role incaring for a family member at one end of thescale and, according to circumstances, theopportunity to indulge in desired pastimes at theother.

For many, retirement offers hitherto unavailablescope for choosing what they do on a daily basisand this autonomy may be an option for the firsttime in a person’s life.

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Transition

The hypothesis behind the Joseph RowntreeFoundation’s Transitions After 50 programme wasthat during a transition people might developnew identities and activities, as part of anadaptive process that established a pattern onewould expect to last beyond the transition itself.This research suggests that people are dividedbetween those who volunteer on a lifelong orserial basis and those who are triggered tovolunteer at this stage of life as part of atransition to retirement. However, the evidenceseems to show that it is rather late in thetransition process that the trigger group do so –once other patterns have been established – andthat therefore it does not tend to be the first orprimary feature of retirement patterns oridentities.

Volunteering

As the sample included some retirees who weremembers of their organisations rather thanvolunteers in the formal sense of the word, itbecame clear that the distinction between thetwo situations is blurred. The question arises asto what degree membership of a faith-basedorganisation, or one whose main purpose issocial, can be regarded as volunteering and whatpart these groups play in the lives of retiredpeople.

This type of participation sits more comfortablyin the realm of informal volunteering: what hasbeen termed the fourth sector approach(Williams, 2003). Whichever way it is labelled,such participation is one of a range of thingsretirees can place in their portfolio of activities.

What works from the volunteers’perspective

The vast majority of volunteers in the study werehappy with their volunteering, which was widelyseen as giving the opportunity to participate insomething that was both meaningful andenjoyable while being less stressful than paidwork. It was seen as a way of keeping a toeholdin the mainstream as well as offering for somethe possibility of much appreciated opportunities

for lifelong learning and as a way of contributingto productive ageing.

For some, it was a mini world of work allowingthe exercise of skills, already finely honed duringpaid employment, fitting nicely in theconstellation of other activities. For them andothers, it was a way of gaining importantpsychological and emotional rewards.

In the membership context, people were morelikely to see themselves as taking on an activerole in helping to maintain the organisation and/or caring for other members than as volunteers.

The presence of religion, practised now or in thepast, and a culture of helping were notablefeatures in the backgrounds of many of thevolunteers, regardless of the type of organisationor the voluntary tasks they carried out.

What works from the organisations’perspective

High standards of management practice withregard to older volunteers were commonplaceamong coordinators in the study. Good practice,underpinned by an understanding of thechanged and changing face of older age andretirement, resulted in tailoring volunteering tothe individual’s preferences, aptitudes, expertiseand crucially, in many cases, their multifacetedlifestyles.

Organisations benefited from the experience,commitment and capacity of older people andfrequently their long service, widely seen as faroutweighing any disadvantages there might be.As well as the gains that volunteeringtraditionally confers on volunteers, mostcoordinators kept a discrete watching brief ontheir health and wellbeing.

Coordinators demonstrated an awareness thatpeople from BME and blue-collar backgroundswere underrepresented in their organisations andsome had tried, largely unsuccessfully, to redressthe balance. The general feeling was that theydid not have the resources to devote to thesustained effort needed to diversify recruitment.

Conclusions and recommendations

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While some coordinators created newopportunities for volunteering, others did not,either because they could not see the need to doso or for lack of resources.

What the study showed was that the largelystandard management practices organisationsdeployed worked well, but as far as recruitmentis concerned they were in a sense ‘preaching tothe converted’, since so many had previousexperience of volunteering. Therefore,organisations will need to develop new strategiesfor attracting older people for whomvolunteering is not familiar territory. They couldachieve this through better marketing, a moreentrepreneurial approach, and creatingopportunities at the organisation level: in short,they need to be able to demonstrate to olderpeople generally that what is on offer is for them.

Implications for the future

Finally, we turn to speculation about what thefindings might mean for retiree volunteering insucceeding cohorts. It proceeds on the premisethat the factors identified in the background ofthe study volunteers – religion and family values– underpin the shaping of helping behaviour.

The starting point is to look at factors reportedby the study volunteers that could be seen ashaving played some part in their propensity tovolunteer. These were: religion, family attitudesand values, to which could be added economicand geographic stability.

Volunteers in the study spent their formativeyears in the aftermath of the Second World War,which has been described as “brave, semi-collectivist years … a combination of hope andpublic purpose” (Hennessy, 1992, p 453). As theexperience of the study volunteers revealed, jobswere for life and people did not move housemuch outside the area where they were born,neither was there much ethnic diversity.

The rising generation of older people will havegrown up in a very different cultural worldwhere the collective ethic has been replaced byindividualism and consumerism. With the sharpdecline of religious observance and changingfamily structures, influences that pervaded earliercohorts may no longer be there. Greater

geographic and economic mobility may alsomilitate against involvement in volunteering.

If these buttresses to volunteering and the spiritof voluntarism are no longer in place,volunteering will be operating in a differentsocial and intellectual climate. This begs thequestion of how a more secular and polarisedsociety might retain the helping ethic without thebackground elements that predisposedparticipation by the study volunteers.

At this point it may be useful to consider whatgovernments might be able to do to stimulatevolunteering in the next cohort. Two tentativesuggestions present themselves.

The first is to engage interest in voluntarism at anearly age through citizenship classes in schoolsthat contain a strong element of practicalvolunteering experience for their students and anaccompanying collaboration with local voluntaryorganisations to provide the opportunities. As aresult, some could be expected to acquire a tastefor volunteering that they may well carry forwardto adulthood, becoming serial if not lifelongvolunteers and, by extension, volunteers inretirement.

The second concerns the role of employers.Employee volunteering, in which employersallow time off, sometimes paid, for their staff toparticipate in local voluntary initiatives, has beena growing movement in the last few years.Encouraging this movement could lead toincreased numbers continuing to volunteer intoretirement.

As regards phased retirement that contains avolunteering element, government can encourageemployers in two ways: as a large-scale employeritself, it can set an example by embracing bothemployee volunteering and phased retirement.

Companies that offer phased retirement areusually larger enterprises that have the resourcesto make it a widely available option. Fundingresources for small- and medium-sizedbusinesses to do the same would open upphased retirement possibilities to a much greaternumber of people as they approach retirementage.

Ways of promoting formal third sectorvolunteering are well known and have been tried

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and tested over many years. Another, less wellcharted, area where government help might befruitful in involving retirees would be inpromoting informal, fourth sector volunteering.

A further speculative idea concerns the futurerole of formal volunteering as the means bywhich people have the opportunity to expresstheir caring nature. With the decline in churchattendance among the UK population and theconsequent closure of church buildings, there isthe possibility that voluntary organisations will,in the future, become the repository of individualacts of caring and goodwill. If this is the case,there will be a need to create institutions andstructures that measure up to the realities of anincreasingly secular society.

Conclusions and recommendations

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active ageing in active communities: volunteering and the transition

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