Examining employee volunteering in a group setting Click here to enter text.

In today’s society, the necessity of voluntary work is growing, as voluntary work solves societal problems that cannot be solved through paid work (Rodell et al., 2017). As the interest in personal voluntary work is decreasing, corporate voluntary work, which is voluntary work done by employees with the support of the company, is increasing. Even though previous organizational literature have spent a considerable amount of attention towards voluntary work, scholars (e.g. Overgaard, 2019; Shachar, Von Essen & Hustinx, 2019; Gatignon-Turneau & Mignonac, 2015) argue for examining more specific forms of voluntary work. This research examines how corporate voluntary work activities in a group setting are experienced by employees. This research thus tries to what drives employees to voluntary work events, how they experience the communication with the Non-Profit Organizaation (NPO) that organizes the event, and what are the outcomes of voluntary work to the employees. Qualitative interviews have been conducted to answer these three questions. During research, 11 Dutch participants were interviewed. These participants have all participated in a corporate group voluntary work activity at a Non-Profit Organization (NPO), of which 9 respondents have participated at activities organized by Stichting Jarige Job and 2 respondents have participated at activities organized by other NPOs. The interviewees were asked questions about their volunteering experiences, their experiences during the voluntary work activity, how they experienced the communication with the NPO and in what ways the voluntary work activity has contributed to them. Thematic analysis was then done to analyze the transcripts of the 11 interviewees, following the six coding phases of Braun and Clarke (2012). This analysis resulted in three overarching themes being apparent: The role of time and money, the importance of structure and clarity, and the group forming process that exists in voluntary work. Time and money play an interesting role in group volunteering, as volunteers do think it is important to spend time and money on voluntary work, but similarly time and money can obstruct the realization of voluntary work The themes illustrate the hybrid nature of the voluntary work activities and show that the drives and outcomes of voluntary work are influenced by multiple settings and processes. From the conclusion, therefore, it is apparent that future research should take into consideration these different aspects, and hybrid settings in which volunteering can occur.