V4V Good Practice Case Studies: MTÜ Triathlon Academy/ IRONMAN Estonia

Pillar 1 – Volunteer strategy and planning

Pillar 2 – Volunteer recruitment and deployment

Pillar 3 – Volunteer management and retention

Pillar 4 – Volunteer development and training

Focus of volunteer intervention: Communicating with volunteers using social media

To develop a system that allows volunteers to communicate with each other and share their experiences and to also ensure that they are not over-exploited and ‘burn out’ by volunteering at too many events.

The Triathlon Academy is involved with the organisation of large events such as Ironman Tallinn and other Triathlon competitions in other cities. Volunteers are required to undertake a variety of role to support these events. In order to provde support to the volunteers who organise these events, the Volunteer Leader at the MTÜ Triathlon Academy established a closed Facebook group for Estonian sport volunteers – “Organizers of sporting events” (“Spordisündmuste korraldajad”). The group enables volunteering opportunities to be shared, but perhaps more importantly enables volunteers running events to discuss issues and challenges and utilise the experience of other volunteers to help develop solutions.

The success of the initiative depends on volunteers being able to access and use social media.

The Facebook group for volunteers gives them the opportunity to chat and talk about their volunteer experiences, to ask for help and get different solutions/ideas from other volunteers. It has also provided opportunities for volunteers to make friends with other volunteers, creating a community of volunteers who share similar interests and volunteer at similar events. The social and community aspect of this, helps to ensure that volunteers are motivated to continue volunteering in the future.