Meet Lana, Head of Volunteering Operations (Acting) at Baptcare/BaptistCare whose leadership champions inclusion, compassion, and connection. In this Share Your Story – Volunteer Managers Edition feature for International Volunteer Managers Day (IVMDay), Lana reflects on how bold leadership means seeing beyond the numbers, creating spaces where people can belong, heal, grow, and give in ways that genuinely matter.
Why do you think bold leadership is important in volunteer management?
Bold leadership is about seeing beyond day-to-day coordination and daring to reimagine how volunteers are valued, supported and recognised. It’s not always easy to ensure volunteers remain visible, but bold leadership means speaking up for them in strategic conversations, shaping systems that honour their contribution and ensuring their stories are part of the organisational narrative.
Volunteer managers sit at the intersection of people, purpose and possibility. Too often, volunteering is treated as an “extra add-on” or a function to “do more with less.” Bold leadership challenges that perception by ensuring volunteers are recognised as essential partners in impact.
For me, bold leadership has meant pushing to keep volunteers’ visibility in a newly merged entity, even while systems and communications are still being aligned. It has meant asking tough questions, like where volunteer voices are missing in decision-making and taking the risk of suggesting new structures and strategies that may feel uncomfortable at first, but ultimately strengthen trust and connection.
Being bold is also about humility: inviting volunteers into co-design and co-creation and recognising the difference between the two. Co-design allows volunteers to shape the frameworks and processes, while co-creation empowers them to work alongside us in bringing those ideas to life. Volunteers’ lived experience often holds the solution. True leadership is about creating the conditions where volunteers can thrive, not just fill rosters. In redefining what it means to lead volunteers, we reshape the public perception of volunteering as a driver of innovation, inclusion, and community impact.
Proudest achievement as a Volunteer Manager
I’ve had the privilege of leading Baptcare’s volunteer programs to achieve an extraordinary scale of over 600,000 hours annually in VIC/TAS. Valued at $27.8M SROI, achieved without paid advertising, because volunteers felt so connected they brought others with them.
We embedded co-designed and co-created engagement strategies to achieve the growth needed to support our service delivery.
We also won the EV Strengthening Communities, fully inclusive volunteering workplace award, a testament to how we can diversify the understanding of volunteering, that it’s not just about filling rosters, it’s about building movements of compassion, unity and belonging.
However, when I think about my proudest achievement, it’s not the numbers; it’s in the moments:
- The volunteer who told me, through tears, that after losing their spouse, volunteering gave them a reason to get out of bed again.
- The student who nervously joined a program for “work experience” and left with a sense of purpose and a new career pathway in care.
- The retired nurse who said that even though she couldn’t physically keep working on the ward, volunteering allowed her to continue contributing to healing, just in a different way.
For me, it was also honouring my volunteering journey, having started as a youth volunteer, being able to challenge existing beliefs about “youth volunteering is just too hard to manage” and flipping the script to make it even more accessible.
These moments remind me that my role is about creating spaces where people can belong, heal, grow, and give in ways that truly matter to them, even if they don’t see it as an outcome when they first join us on their volunteering journey. My proudest achievements are not just about building structures but building an evolving culture where every volunteer feels seen, valued and essential, believing in our mission and the volunteer experience as much as we do.
One piece of advice for fellow Volunteer Managers
Remember that you’re not just managing programs, you’re governing people’s willingness to give their time, energy and heart. Take the time to listen deeply and involve volunteers meaningfully in shaping how services are delivered. For me, that has meant understanding the difference between co-design and co-creation. Take risks to affect positive change, communicating and leading your people along the way.
When we bring volunteers into the design stage, they feel invested; when we create alongside them, they feel empowered. Both approaches build trust and unlock innovation, which is where the magic happens. ‘Moments build momentum’ is a statement I have lived by and share regularly with my team. Leaders of volunteers are often the bridge between community and organisation: walk that line with courage, care, and clarity, and you’ll transform not just programs, but lives every step of the way.
View the full collection of our Share Your Story series and be inspired by the many ways Volunteer Managers are leading with courage, care, and creativity.
