How to add volunteer experience to linkedin: Real-world examples

Did you know that over 75% of hiring managers and HR executives take skilled volunteer work into account when making a hiring decision?

As you would with your resume, remember to showcase your volunteer experience on your LinkedIn profile as well.

How To Add Volunteer Experience: Step-By-Step Guide

Here’s a step-by-step guide on how to add volunteer experience to your LinkedIn profile:

• Log into your LinkedIn profile.
• Click on the “Add profile section” button located in your bio.
• Now click on Additional and then “Add volunteer experience”.
• Fill in the pop-up form and click “Save”.

How To Rearrange Volunteer Experience on LinkedIn

Regular volunteers may want to rearrange their LinkedIn volunteer experience to highlight those that align with their current career goals. Here’s a step-by-step guide on how to rearrange your volunteer experience on LinkedIn:

• Log into your LinkedIn profile.
• Click on the ‘Me’ icon at the top of your LinkedIn home page.
• Select ‘View Profile’ from the drop-down menu.
• Scroll down to the ‘Volunteer’ section.
• Click on the ‘Reorder’ button that looks like an up-and-down arrow.
• Move your cursor over the experience you want to rearrange.
• Click and drag the ‘Reorder’ icon on the right of the experience you want to move.
• Click the ‘Close’ icon and refresh to see the updated change.

How To Remove Volunteer Experience on LinkedIn

If you want to remove a volunteer experience from your LinkedIn profile, here’s a step-by-step guide on how to do it:

• Log into your LinkedIn profile.
• Scroll down to the ‘Volunteer’ section.
• Click the ‘Edit’ or pencil icon next to the experience you want to remove.
• Click ‘Delete experience’ on the pop-up form.
• Confirm ‘Delete’.

Why Add Volunteer Experience to Your LinkedIn Profile

We opened this article by highlighting statistics that demonstrate the value of skilled volunteer work on your resume. Additionally, studies also indicate that as many as 72% of recruiters and hiring managers use LinkedIn when they’re hiring new talent. In short, LinkedIn serves as your digital resume, and including additional details like volunteer experience helps you stand out from your peers.

Why Recruiters Prefer Candidates With Volunteer Experience

Volunteer experience is also an excellent opportunity to showcase your leadership skills and agency - traits that are highly valued in any work environment. By highlighting your volunteer experiences, you are setting yourself as an effective people leader committed to making a difference.

Moreover, regularly adding new experiences can boost your profile’s search ranking, as LinkedIn favors active profiles. To sum it up, maintaining a polished and updated LinkedIn profile can significantly enhance your chances of landing that dream job.

Tips for Adding Volunteer Experience to LinkedIn

While adding volunteer experience is important, presenting it effectively is equally important. Here are a few tips/best practices you should keep in mind while adding your volunteer experience on LinkedIn:

Show the Impact of Your Work

It’s great that you volunteered but always highlight the value you’ve personally added through your efforts. Show the growth you helped achieve and the impact you’ve left.

Use Bullet Points

Don’t let your volunteer experience be obscured by a wall of words. Legibility matters on LinkedIn. List your major accomplishments in 4-5 bullet points so that your contributions stand out immediately.

Reorder Your Experience

This is especially relevant for someone who’s an occasional volunteer. Make sure the volunteer experience most aligned with your work stays on top of your profile. Keep reordering your experiences as and when required.

Incorporate Relevant Keywords

Using industry-specific keywords when describing your volunteer experience is a great way to improve the searchability and relevance of your profile.

Showcase Transferable Skills

Volunteer work is a great way to enhance or add new and transferable skills. Ensure that you’re highlighting these skills, like leadership, problem-solving, team management, etc. on your LinkedIn profile.

Keep It Updated

We cannot stress this enough. Keep updating your volunteer experience to reflect new roles or accomplishments. The LinkedIn algorithm loves active and engaging profiles.

Add Visuals Where Possible

Pictures make your profile visually appealing. More importantly LinkedIn profiles with multimedia elements tend to perform better than text-only elements in terms of engagement. Multimedia elements can also capture your overall volunteer experience in lucid detail.

LinkedIn Volunteer Experience Profile Examples

In this section, let us have a look at a few examples to further illustrate how to add volunteer experience effectively to your LinkedIn profile.

Example 1

Example 2

Example 3

How To Get Relevant Volunteering Experience for LinkedIn

If you want to be a volunteer, we highly recommend finding relevant volunteer opportunities that align with your interests and career goals. Volunteering for a cause that actually resonates with your passion and aligns with your career will enhance your overall satisfaction and commitment while adding to your skill set. There are various websites, platforms and even LinkedIn where you can discover these volunteer gigs. Read on to know more.

Websites To Find Volunteer Work

1️⃣ VolunteerMatch

Founded in 1988, VolunteerMatch.org is a prominent U.S.-based nonprofit organization. It connects individuals with volunteer opportunities across the country. With over 14 million connections between volunteers and causes, VolunteerMatch serves as a vital platform for volunteers and nonprofit organizations in the digital space.

2️⃣ Idealist

Idealist was founded in 1995 with a clear mission to help create a world where everyone can lead free and dignified lives. Featuring over 100,000 listings for volunteer roles across various causes, Idealist can help you find positions that align with your interests and skills. This platform also offers valuable resources for job seekers and employers in the NGO space in the form of expert articles and recruitment tools. Besides being a platform for volunteer roles, Idealist also functions as a vigorous job board focused on social-impact positions. This potentially makes it the largest nonprofit job board in the United States.

3️⃣ AllforGood

Launched in 2009 and operated by Points of Light, AllforGood.org is one of the largest online volunteer marketplaces in the United States. This website serves as a great connecting point for individuals seeking meaningful volunteer opportunities across various causes. The highlight of AllforGood is the dedicated disaster portal. This portal allows individuals to register their skills and be contacted by organizations when in need of assistance. This feature enhances the platform’s responsiveness in critical situations.

4️⃣ United Way

Dating back to 1887. United Way is probably the oldest volunteering platform on our list. It began as a coalition of community leaders who wanted to address local welfare issues through coordinated fundraising and support. Today, it’s a global network of over 1,800 local nonprofit organizations. United Way is focused on mobilizing the caring power of communities to advance the common good, with a mission centred around education, income stability, and health. Operating through a decentralized model, United Way engages millions of volunteers and donors annually. Some of their initiatives include youth education, promoting financial stability for families, and enhancing access to healthcare services.

LinkedIn Volunteer Positions Outreach

With over a billion members, LinkedIn serves as a powerful platform for individuals seeking volunteer opportunities. It offers a vast array of volunteer positions across various fields making it easier for you to connect with organizations and causes that resonate with your interests. Here’s how you can make the best of LinkedIn volunteer position outreach:

🎯 Define Your Interests and Goals: Before diving into LinkedIn’s resources, your first step should be to define the type of volunteer work you are interested in. Factor in your passion, the skills you want to develop, and the causes that matter most to you. Once you gain this clarity, you’ll find it a lot easier to search and identify roles that align with your personal and professional aspirations.

🔍 Utilize LinkedIn’s Job Search Features: Now that you know what you want, it’s time to begin the hunt. Type in the right keywords in the search bar and find your desired role (e.g., “volunteer coordinator,” “environmental volunteer”). You can further filter the results by specifying your location. This will yield a list of organizations actively seeking volunteers in your area.

🏢 Engage with Organizations: Now that you have identified potential volunteer roles, it’s time to start reaching out to the organization themselves. Make it a point to visit their LinkedIn pages to learn about their missions, values, and current initiatives. This knowledge will be invaluable when you are reaching out to them. Here are a few more steps you should follow during this phase:

💌 Have an Outreach Message Ready: Write a concise and personalized message introducing yourself, expressing the reason behind your interest in the role, as well as the relevant skills or experiences that make you a suitable candidate. If you’re not very certain of your email writing skills, there are plenty of free tools like Highperformr’s Freestyle Email Generator available that can help you craft the perfect email.

🤝🏻 Network: Reach out to current volunteers or employees of the organization to know more about the role and the organization’s culture. This is also a great way to build rapport before applying.

➡️ Follow-Up: It’s possible that your email may have been overlooked. If you haven’t received a response after your initial outreach, consider sending a polite follow-up message after a week or two. This will demonstrate your continued interest and also serve as a reminder for your email.

‍