Rebecca Nesbit

The Influence of Major Life Cycle Events on Volunteering

Volunteering motivations and patterns change over the course of a person’s life cycle. This paper tests hypotheses about the relationship between volunteering and four specific life events—the birth of a child, divorce, widowhood, and the death of another household member. I find that having a child decreases a person’s likelihood of volunteering and hours spent in volunteer work. Divorced males were more likely to volunteer and to increase the number of hours volunteered when compared to divorced females. Divorcees with children are also more likely to volunteer and increase the number of hours spent volunteering. Thus, gender and the presence of children in the home are important pathways to volunteering for divorced individuals. Overall, being widowed decreases the likelihood of volunteering and volunteering hours, but older widows tend to increase their volunteering activities. Having another (non-spouse) member of the family pass away is not related to volunteering.

Founding New Nonprofit Organizations: Syndrome or Symptom?

In this study, the authors explore how the dynamics associated with the founding of new nonprofit organizations, the characteristics of the founders, and the developmental life cycles of nonprofit organizations contribute to the seemingly fragmented landscape of the nonprofit sector. Based on data collected from interviews with 31 nonprofit organizations, we find that new nonprofits are being created by passionate, entrepreneurial individuals who hope to make a difference in the community.  Although these organizations are typically small, with few staff members and small budgets, the extent to which they rely on volunteers and are connected to the broader community varies considerably. Moreover, many founders had little experience volunteering or working in the sector. The findings from this study have important implications for the professional development of nonprofit staff, leaders, and volunteers, and they shed new light on how we think about and describe the founders of nonprofit organizations.

The Influence of Family and Household Members on Individual Volunteer Choices

This paper investigates the how the volunteering behaviors of family and household members influence an individual’s decision to volunteer. Using data from the 2005 Current Population Survey’s Volunteering Supplement, I test how living with volunteers and living with people who have never volunteered affect volunteering. I find that living with volunteers dramatically increases the likelihood of volunteering, especially for religious volunteering. The more volunteers the person lives with, the higher the person’s probability of volunteering. People who live with others who say that they have never volunteered in their lives are much less likely to volunteer and volunteer fewer hours. Living with volunteers also changes the methods by which people become involved in volunteering.

A Comparison of Volunteering Data in the Panel Study of Income Dynamics and the Current Population Survey

This article compares the volunteering data in the Center on Philanthropy’s Philanthropy Module of the Panel Study of Income Dynamics, generally referred to as Center on Philanthropy Panel Study (COPPS), and the September volunteering supplement of the Current Population Survey (CPS). In comparing survey methodologies, the author focuses on sample type and size, data collection procedures, response rates, and survey content. He also presents volunteering estimates from both datasets including an investigation of the uses of memory prompts and proxy responses for volunteering data. Both the COPPS and CPS volunteering data are high-quality datasets and each has relative advantages over the other. The COPPS data allow for longitudinal analysis and contain measures of charitable giving and religiosity; the CPS data’s larger sample size allows for state-level estimates and subgroup analyses. In both datasets, proxy responses generally underreport volunteering. Memory prompts in the volunteering surveys capture small amounts of additional volunteering by White, married, middle-aged women with larger households.

Employees, Supervisors, and Workplace Mediation: Experiences of Justice and Settlement

This study explores the experience of disputant–disputant interpersonal justice in workplace mediation in a public organization. The results show that there are significant differences between employees’ and supervisors’ experiences of disputant–disputant interpersonal justice. Moreover, the results indicate that the quality of participants’ interactions in mediation is significantly related to the quality of the mediated outcome in terms of settlement or case resolution. When disputants experience interpersonal justice with each other during mediation, they are more likely to reach a full resolution to the dispute. When disputants corroborate each other’s reports of their own behaviors during mediation, they are also more likely to achieve settlement of the mediation. Disputants who received an apology from the other party were more likely to report a settlement to the dispute. In sum, this field test supports the theory of disputant–disputant interpersonal justice and provides evidence that it is an important element in the mediated resolution of a workplace dispute.

A Tale of Two Charitable Campaigns Longitudinal Analysis of Employee Giving at a Public University

In light of the current economic conditions and the subsequent increased pressure on nonprofit organizations to collaborate, many nonprofit organizations are developing and conducting cross-sector workplace giving campaigns to increase philanthropic activity. Although some scholars have focused on the implications of such activities for for-profit organizations, little research has been conducted to better understand employee-level giving behaviors in charitable workplace campaigns. This longitudinal study focuses on workplace givers and the impact of individual-level factors on actual donation amounts in two annual workplace campaigns at a large public university from 2001 to 2008. Results show that salary consistently predicts giving amounts across campaigns; length of service, however, only predicts giving amounts in one campaign. Being promoted and receiving tenure led to employees donating less, whereas being promoted while already tenured led to employees donating more. We close the article with a discussion of the managerial implications of our findings.

Charitable Giving in the Public Workplace: A Framework for Understanding Employees' Philanthropic Performance

This study addresses formal workplace giving campaigns, a less-researched area of philanthropic studies that is increasingly important to the nonprofit sector and a fixture in local, state, and federal governments. Using data from an electronic survey administered to state employees at a large public university and mixed methods for preliminary analysis, a three-part analytical framework is proposed to better explain workplace giving, looking in particular at how philanthropic crowding, organizational identification, and conceptions of community influence employee donative behavior. No evidence is found that workplace giving crowds out private giving, and a possible reinforcement effect is detected in that those who give in the workplace also tend to give outside the workplace. Organizational identification and conceptions of community are also found to influence workplace donative behavior.

Light and Dark Sides of Nonprofit Activities and the Rules to Manage Them The Case of Charitable Bingo

Nonprofit organizations face numerous challenges in balancing mission and nonmission pressures. These competing demands create tensions that must be managed if nonprofits are to balance the light and the dark aspects of their activities. In addition to government regulation, the authors examine other sources of “rules” used to navigate light/dark tensions in the nonprofit sector. Drawing on one form of nonprofit activity—charitable bingo—this article uses neoinstitutional theories to develop a conceptual framework of how government and nongovernment actors actively generate rules to manage these tensions. Their work with charitable bingo demonstrates that nonprofit organizations are not simply passive recipients of nonnegotiable state-imposed rules. On the contrary, the authors demonstrate that individuals, nonprofits, and state actors develop boundary, position, choice, and scope rules to manage mission tensions in the nonprofit sector. Nonprofits that use rules to manage tensions appear better equipped to shape their environments by influencing their regulatory environments and how their missions are portrayed.

Inadvertent Volunteer Managers Exploring Perceptions of Volunteer Managers’ and Volunteers’ Roles in the Public Workplace

Although a voluminous literature addresses organizational change, employee stress, and organizational behavior, we have little understanding of employees’ responses to being assigned the role and responsibilities of a volunteer manager. Because many public and nonprofit organizations seek to incorporate more volunteers—especially during times of fiscal stress—employees’ responses to an influx of volunteers and additional volunteer management responsibilities can affect organizational performance. We use data from a case study at a large public library system to illustrate how role theory helps advance our understanding of these responsibilities in a human resource context. Our findings suggest that role perceptions, expectations, and conflict all inform the effectiveness and dynamics of managing important unpaid human resources: volunteers. We discuss the organizational implications of inadvertent volunteer managers—employees assigned to the volunteer manager role without prior training and experience.

To Give or Not to Give: Employee Responses to Workplace Giving Campaigns Over Time

In this article, we address a gap in our knowledge of workplace philanthropy. We explore the factors that distinguish givers from nongivers in workplace campaigns using observational data from a population of employees at a large, public university that has sponsored two annual giving campaigns from 2001 to 2008. The analyses correct for common issues—such as nonresponse and self-reporting biases—that frequently arise in empirical studies of philanthropy. This article is intended to supplement previous research that focuses on workplace givers. We conclude that several factors distinguish workplace givers from nongivers, such as age, gender, salary, duration of employment, and rank. This fuller exploration of workplace giving contributes to a broader understanding of philanthropic giving and its many manifestations.