It is now well recognized that volunteers play a vital role in the successful operation and management of sporting events. But, the number of people volunteering for organizations has dropped significantly from 1989 to 2005 (Grimm, Jr., Dietz, & Foster-Bey, 2006). Consequently, the benefits of retaining volunteers are increasingly being recognized and a crucial component of volunteer retention is to understand motivation and satisfaction factors of an individual volunteer. Therefore, the purpose of this study was to investigate the volunteer motivation and satisfaction at a Special Olympics sporting event.
Method
Participants for this study were composed of 66 female (42.3%) and 90 male (57.7%) volunteers from the 2008 State Bowling Tournament organized by Special Olympics. The Special Event Volunteer Motivation scale (Farrell Johnston, & Twynam, 1998) and the International Sporting Event Volunteer Motivation and Satisfaction scale (Lee et al., 2005) were modified and used to measure volunteer motivation and satisfaction.
Analysis/Results
The findings from this study indicate that the most important motivation factor for volunteers was purposive factor (M=4.56; SD=.25), a desire to do something useful and contribute to the community and the event. And, the most important satisfaction factor for volunteers was social interaction factor (M=4.43; SD=.35), primarily concerned about relationships with others. But, this study found no significant differences in the motivation and satisfaction factors based on age, gender and education.
Conclusions
These findings suggest that it is crucial for sport managers to understand that identification of specific motives of volunteers enables to match them with tasks and to appropriately meet their motivations for volunteering, therefore enhancing greater levels of satisfaction and ultimately continued involvement.
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