❖ Heads up! This article is intended for site managers. If you're a program facilitator looking for more information about how to review your programs, click here!
Your volunteers are contributing their skills and time to making incredible impacts in your community—and you can show them appreciation! Benchmarks are a great feature for both showing appreciation and encouraging volunteer engagement. In this article, we cover:
What is a benchmark?
The Benchmark area of your site lets you set up certain goals for volunteers to reach. Once they've met a goal (e.g., 10 volunteer hours), they receive a badge. This achievement is displayed in their profile area and volunteer resume!
- Here it's displayed on their profile:
How to add benchmarks
To add or manage your benchmarks, navigate to Volunteerism > Benchmarks from your site manager panel:
- From here, you can either click the Create a Benchmark button or the Add New Benchmark button to get started!
Now, customize your benchmarks!
- You can give them a unique title, assign the number of hours required to reach those achievements, designate a badge, select the start and end date for when those benchmarks apply, etc.
- There are 15 default benchmarks available for you to choose from when selecting a badge.
- Do you want to approve the hours submitted for benchmarks? Would you like to allow individual hours to be applied toward these achievements?
- Toggle the button to On beside Approval Required to require your approval on hours submitted toward benchmarks.
- To allow individual hours to be applied toward benchmarks, toggle the button to On beside Allow Individual Hours.
ⓘ So you know: If you have assigned user groups on your site, you can also assign specific benchmarks to those user groups.
- This means that only the users in that group can receive those benchmarks!
- In addition to boosting volunteer engagement, this could be a fun way to incorporate some friendly competition where everyone wins in the end!
What are the available badges?
Badges come in three colors—bronze, silver, and gold. Each color includes different options for the wording on the badges, including:
| Badge | What it looks like |
|---|---|
| Bronze - 10 Hours |  |
| Bronze - 25 Hours |  |
| Bronze - Community Champion |  |
| Bronze - I Made a Difference |  |
| Bronze - Outstanding Service |  |
| Silver - 20 Hours |  |
| Silver - 50 Hours |  |
| Silver - Community Champion |  |
| Silver - I Made a Difference |  |
| Silver - Outstanding Service |  |
| Gold - 50 Hours |  |
| Gold - 100 Hours |  |
| Gold - Community Champion |  |
| Gold - I Made a Difference |  |
| Gold - Outstanding Service |  |