Bringing people in, and keeping them around

Every association depends on a steady stream of members and volunteers – people willing to show up, take on tasks, and keep things running. Working on recruiting covers two things at once: attracting the right people in the first place, and creating an experience good enough that they actually want to stay.

Why it's worth getting right

It's almost always easier to hold on to the people you already have than to recruit new ones from scratch, so getting the underlying fit right pays off double: once someone joins, and again every time – like, every semester – when they choose to stay engaged. A clear sense of purpose (see Purpose of our organisation) can make it easier for people to recognise themselves in what you do, but it rarely attracts anyone on its own – that still takes genuine recruitment work: knowing who to talk to, and communicating clearly and confidently about who you are and what you do. What keeps people engaged is whether what they actually spend their time on matches what drew them in to begin with. Being sharp on who you're for tends to attract more of the right people too, which is as much about communicating your purpose clearly and strongly as it is about anything else. When that connection is missing, people tend not to complain; they simply stop showing up.

A job that peaks, but never really stops

Recruitment itself tends to cluster around the start of a semester, but understanding and holding on to the people you already have is a year-round job that involves continuous leadership and day-to-day operational consideration. Student associations see unusually high turnover – people graduate, go on exchange, take on a student job, or simply move on to other things – so it's all the more important to keep investing time in recruiting and engaging both members and volunteers.

The recurring work behind it

In practice, working with recruiting members and volunteers covers a handful of recurring tasks. It helps to have a genuine sense of who you're trying to reach and where to find them, rather than casting as wide a net as possible and hoping for the best. It's worth recognising early on that people rarely engage for the same reasons – some are drawn in by the social side, others by what it can do for their CV, their network, or a subject they care about, and still others by the chance to change something. Matching tasks and responsibilities to what actually motivates someone, and to the experience they bring, tends to keep them far more engaged than simply handing out whatever needs doing – and it's worth spending time formulating clear purpose and tasks that people find motivating, as well as making it easy to appreciate the work people put in, recognising the difference it makes to your cause and in your community. And a proper welcome matters more than it might seem: people who don't quickly feel part of the group are the ones most likely to quietly disappear before they've really arrived.

Where this pays off later

Understanding your volunteers well makes it considerably easier to lead them and run the association once they're in – which is when the important work you set out to do begins. Because you already know what motivates people, how they like to work, and have spent time making sure they understand what you're trying to achieve, it also becomes easier to match them to new tasks and roles as both they and the association grow.