Celebrate Your Volunteers This Season

By Michael C. Mack

This is a great time of year to say thank-you and let your volunteers know how much you appreciate them for their service. Here are five simple but significant giving ideas:

1. Be sure your gift communicates that you care about and appreciate each person as an individual.

2. If you have a large number of volunteers, it may be cost prohibitive to send each one an extravagant gift, but you can send a high-quality Christmas card””not the $3 boxed set of 100 cards!””with a personal note in each one, thanking them for their ministry, letting them know you are praying for them (mentioning specific things as you can), and wishing them a blessed Christmas season. This will take some time and effort, but it is well worth it!

3. Give your leadership team, coaches, and some of your other special leaders a gift card to a store they like. Or give a small trinket (like a candy bar or some other inexpensive item) that you know for sure they will enjoy. Of course, in order to know what kinds of personalized items they like, you must spend time with these leaders throughout the year!

4. Personally deliver the gifts the week before Christmas. Call beforehand and arrange a time when you can stop by their office or home to drop off the gift and personally thank them for their service.

5. Take this opportunity to invest in your volunteers as servant leaders. Buy each leader a book that will help that person be more effective in leading in his or her ministry area. On the title page of the book, write a short, personal note thanking the person for his or her ministry and letting them know you bought this book to invest into them and their leadership.