Bring UN Volunteers and staff together

Choose a trained supervisor to oversee UN Volunteers. Someone respected by the team, who appreciates volunteering and can take the pressure off your team by being available to guide the UN Volunteer.

Train UN Volunteers according to their tasks and raise the awareness of your staff on how best to work effectively with them.

Give UN Volunteers a voice in decisions that affect them. You will gain their respect and trust. Ensure that UN Volunteers always feel part of the team.

Respect and recognize UN Volunteers and staff equally. Motivate everyone by celebrating their work and contributions to larger goals (huge wins, small successes).

Clear up concerns and misunderstandings on both sides. Explain a UN Volunteer’s complementary role in strengthening host entity capacity to deliver results.

Practise communication and collaboration with team-building activities. Studies show that staff need to get to know volunteers. Prioritize team building to foster connections, collaboration and mutual understanding.

Understand policies and procedures covering UN Volunteers, which are different from those covering staff. You may request your organization to prepare UN Volunteer specific guidelines.

Foster trust, commitment, capabilities and creativity for everyone to motivate high-performance in meeting organizational priorities