Teams: A Guide for Volunteers

Created by Brittany Crow, Modified on Thu, 21 Mar 2024 at 09:01 AM by Brittany Crow

Heads up! This article is intended for volunteers looking for information about teams. If you're a site manager, click here


You may see an option to respond to a volunteer Need as a team. This option is only available when a site or agency manager has enabled team signup for a volunteer Need. This is a great option when you and a group of friends or coworkers—or even family—want to volunteer together! Here we cover: 

So you know: 

  • Some sites have language overrides in place. 
    • This means you might see Opportunities in place of Needs, Programs in place of Agencies, or even Prerequisites in place of Qualifications. 
  • Are you a team leader looking for information about managing your teams? Click here!

Finding team-friendly Needs

When you click on a Need, you can determine if it's a team-friendly one right away—they have the Respond As Team button. 


How to filter for team-friendly Needs

Want to save yourself time looking? You can always filter Needs to show team-friendly ones only. To get started: 

1. Go to Needs from your side navigation menu. 

2. With the Select A Filter dropdown, select Teams

3. With the Select Access dropdown, select Accepting Teams

4. Click Search

  • Only Needs that are team-friendly are listed.
  • Click View Details to learn more about the Need and start responding as a team! 

✏️ Quick tip: You can add more than one filter to narrow down your search. Want to see team-friendly Needs that meet your team size? Add the Available Slots filter!  

1. Apply the Teams > Accepting Teams filter. 

2. With the Select A Filter dropdown, select Available Slots

3. Type in the number of your team size—e.g., if you have five people signing up, type 5. 

4. Click Search

  • Only Needs that are team-friendly and have that number of available slots are listed. 
  • Keep in mind that you can't add more team members than there are available volunteer slots for a Need. 

Creating a new team

Is this your first time responding to a Need as a team? No worries! You can create a new team that can be reused for future Needs. 

1. Click Respond As Team

2. On the Build Your Team page, give your team a Team Name

3. Add yourself by clicking Add Me

4. Click Add Volunteer

  • If the user has a registered account on the site, then the site asks you to confirm if that's the user you're adding.
  • Enter a valid email address and the first and last name of the volunteer. 
    • You may have to answer a required question for them. 
  • If the Need has required qualifications that must be submitted before responding, you won't be able to add volunteers until they're qualified for it. 
  • If the volunteer doesn't already have an account, be sure to recommend that they complete their profile setup and any waivers or qualifications for the site. 

5. Click Add Team Member

So you know: You can review how many members you can have on your team and how many shifts are available as you build your team. 

✏️ Quick tip: Need to remove someone? Just click the X under the Remove column for that member! 

6. Set someone as the team leader by checking the box by their name under Leader

  • You can mark more than one person as a team leader. 
  • Team leaders can:
    • Add default hours to users or the team. 
    • Email team members. 
    • Update the number of reserved slots for the team. 
    • Add or remove team members. 
    • Unregister a team. 

7. If the Need has scheduled shifts, click Continue and select the shifts you want to respond to. 

  • The Continue button is only present for Needs with scheduled shifts.

✏️ Quick tips: 

  • You can filter shifts to show shifts for specific days—e.g., Show Mondays.

  • Want to select all available shifts? Toggle the button beside Respond to All Shifts to Yes.

8. When you're done building your team and selecting your shifts—as applicable—click Finish

So you know: When you create a team response to multiple shifts, those responses appear individually in the My Teams area. 

  • This makes it easy for you or other team leaders to manage those shift responses individually. 


A note about Reserved Slots

Reserved Slots are a good option if you want to add people to your team who don't have accounts on the site. 

  • Please note that this option may not be available on all sites—it's only available if a Site Manager has enabled it. 
  • When adding someone to a team via a reserved slot, you only enter their first and last name, and answer any required questions as necessary:


How to reuse a team

Once you've created a team on a site, you can reuse it for future volunteer Needs—or create a new one as necessary. If you already have a team in the system, then when you click Respond As Team, you are given the option to Use One Of My Teams or Create a New Team. To get started reusing a team: 

1. Click Respond As Team

2. Select Use One Of My Teams

3. With the Select Team dropdown, select your team name. 

4. Review your team members. 

  • Want to remove someone? Just uncheck the box by their name.

5. Click Continue

6. Now you can add more volunteers by clicking Add Volunteer

  • If the user has a registered account on the site, then the site asks you to confirm if that's the user you're adding.
  • Enter a valid email address and the first and last name of the volunteer. 
    • You may have to answer a required question for them. 
  • If the Need has required qualifications that must be submitted before responding, you won't be able to add volunteers until they're qualified for it. 
  • If the volunteer doesn't already have an account, be sure to recommend that they complete their profile setup and any waivers or qualifications for the site.

7. Click Add Team Member

8. Set someone as the team leader by checking the box by their name under Leader

  • You can mark more than one person as a team leader. 

9. If the Need has scheduled shifts, click Continue and select the shifts you want to respond to. 

  • The Continue button is only present for Needs with scheduled shifts.

10. When you're done building your team and selecting your shifts—as applicable—click Finish. 

So you know: When reusing a team, if any team members don't meet a required qualification, they're grayed out and you won't be able to select them when building your team. 

  • Reach out to them to have them complete the required qualifications so they can participate in the Need. 
  • Let them know that even after submitting the qualification, they may have to wait for approval. 

I'm a team member—now what? 

Now that you've been added to a team, you can always remove yourself from it if you'd like! You can also review details about the team response, see your team's resume, or email the team leader(s). 

1. Click on your profile image or initials from the top menu bar. 

2. Select My Teams

3. Under the Options column, use the Select an action dropdown to either Email Leader or Remove Me From Team

4. To view your team's awesome accomplishments, click View Resume

  • You can select a date range to view on your resume too.
  • To export your team's resume click the Export As PDF button.  


The join team link

You may be invited to join a team through a join link. A join link can be sent to potential team members by the team leader or the site manager. If you're invited to a team through a join link, there may be some additional steps you must complete before you're officially on that team. For example, you may have to answer a response question or complete a qualification for a volunteer Need to complete the process. Here are a few things to consider: 

  • The link may be sent to you through a direct message or to your volunteer profile inbox 
  • If you don't already have an account on the site, you'll need to set one up as part of the process
  • You may have to wait for a pending qualification to be reviewed and approved by a site manager before completing the process


In this example, the user already has an account on the site and has received the join link in their inbox:

1. Click the link. 

2. Complete any required response questions or qualifications as applicable. 

3. Once all necessary fields are complete, click Join Team

  • After clicking Join Team
    • A notification is sent to your inbox that welcomes you to the team and another that thanks you for your interest in that Need
    • You can access the team's information from the My Teams area
    • You can update your response to that Need at anytime