There is a specific kind of anxiety that comes with joining a volunteer board.

It doesn’t show up when you raise your hand and say you’re willing to help. It shows up later when it’s time to plan the season. You get your first assignment and you realize there is no plan yet. Just an understanding that “we did this last year.”

Board members turn over every year. Historical knowledge lives in someone’s inbox or in someone’s head. Documentation, if it exists, is incomplete and disconnected from execution.

So each new board does what the previous board did. They start from scratch.

That is the Blank Page problem.

The cost of the Blank Page

When there is no predefined plan for the season:

• Volunteers feel overwhelmed

• Deadlines are missed

• Critical tasks are discovered too late

• Initiatives don’t have funding

• Strategic improvements never happen

The board spends its energy retracing its steps instead of growing it. Over time, that reactive cycle lowers the ceiling of what the organization can achieve.

Not because people don’t care, but because there is no playbook. Most businesses would never operate this way. Yet we expect our volunteer boards to.

Over time, something subtle happens.

The board stops asking, “What is something new we could do?”
And starts asking, “What do we need to get through?”

That’s when growth stalls.

Playbooks: A Different Starting Point

Volunteer-Board Operations software eliminates the Blank Page. At Third Job, we’re building the first system that creates the plan for your board.

Here’s how.

1. Playbooks: A Built-In Operating Model

When a board starts a new term, it can select from pre-built Playbooks that automatically create the entire plan of activities for the board’s next term.

By simply knowing key dates, the system automatically:

• Generates a complete list of To-Dos with due dates and priorities

• Assigns Owners for tasks based on role and/or committee assignments

• Helps visualize the status, dependencies and risks for the Board

No more blank page. The groundwork is laid and the weight is lifted off the shoulders of the Volunteer.

2. Rollover: Continuity by Design

Playbooks are a great starting point for every volunteer board. However, let’s face it, if you did it last year, you’re going to do it again next year.

Using Rollover, boards can carry forward the learnings and momentum from the previous year’s plan. The Rollover automatically generates all of the following from last year’s plan:

• Activities & ownership

• Documents & notes

• Dependencies & learnings

Rather than rebuilding the last term, you can refine it.

This creates continuity across leadership transitions. Historical knowledge becomes embedded in the system instead of walking out the door with outgoing board members.

3. Activity Assistant: Automate the To-Dos

The advancement of AI presents an opportunity for Boards to finally ease the operational burden on their Volunteers.

An AI Task Assistant built specifically for Volunteer-Boards:

• Completes tasks on your behalf

• Drafts emails and communications for outreach

• Creates assets for your board, your partners and your community

• Summarizes last month’s meeting and assigns follow-ups

Regardless of your role on the board, AI uses historical patterns to suggest sequencing what should happen next. AI helps to make each task easier to complete for your Volunteers.

From Reactive to Intentional

When planning is structured:

• Leaders feel more confident

• Volunteers are more engaged

• Responsibilities are clearer

• Your Board achieves more

The next time someone joins your board, imagine that their first experience is not the quiet panic over a blank page, but a plan waiting for them.

Volunteer board members don’t lack commitment. They lack a system designed to help them.

It’s time to change that. Join us at Third Job as we reimagine how volunteer boards operate.

Leave a comment

Subscribe now

Volunteer-run organizations are the backbone of our communities.

Volunteers run our local youth sports leagues, fundraise for our schools, support religious institutions, and organize programs that leave a lasting impact on the community.

And yet despite their outsized impact, volunteer boards have been underserved by technology. A volunteer board today runs much the same way it did decades ago, with each member carrying an oversized operational burden of never-ending to-dos.

Behind the scenes, the volunteers doing this work are juggling their first job (their career), their second job (family & home life), and their third job, as a volunteer-board member.

With the rise of AI-driven software, we finally have the opportunity to reduce that operational burden.

Today we are introducing Volunteer-Board Operations software.

Volunteer-Run Boards have unique challenges

Over the last few months, we spoke to dozens of Volunteer-board members and consistently heard the same themes:

• Volunteer boards are in a constant state of catch-up mode, trying to remember and recreate what they did last year instead of innovating for growth.

• The cyclical nature of the Calendar dictates the majority of the work; the same Milestones, Activities, & To-dos every year.

• Board members rotate in and out every year, taking hard-earned knowledge with them. New members are forced to start from scratch.

• Board are full of well-meaning individuals, but many lack the operational experience or technical expertise to succeed.

The result is an organization that members feel is not reaching its potential because they lack the time and tools to operate effectively.

The Current technology landscape

Volunteer-boards do already have tools that help them manage the “front of house” of the organization - the public facing website, participant registration portals, payment processing.

→But Volunteer-boards have nothing that helps them manage the “back of house” of the organization - the operation of the board members themselves.

Corporate-boards already have board management software that is catered to the needs of corporate professionals and helps them operate more efficiently.

→But Volunteer-boards don’t have the same structure or objectives and require software that is built specifically for their challenges & needs.

Volunteer-Board Operations software must run the board on autopilot so that volunteers can worry less about keeping track of tasks, and more about making an impact in their community.

What is Volunteer-Board Operations software?

This new category requires the latest & greatest AI-driven capabilities that automate the recurring nature of a Volunteer-run organization.

Volunteer-Board Operations software aims to:

1. Simplify the role of the Board President

2. Automate To-Dos for Board Members

3. Preserve board continuity year over year

4. Reduce volunteer burnout, while increasing community impact

The software must be easy to use, automate as much as possible, and reduce the operational grind of being a volunteer. We envision its core capabilities to be the following:

• AI Board Meeting Companion:

  • Planning: AI-generated Board Meeting Agendas based on past minutes and upcoming activities

  • Running: Relevant context for every discussion

  • Recording: Meeting recordings with AI-generated summaries so nothing gets missed

  • Next Steps: AI-Recommended action items with owners and due dates
    

• AI Task Assistant

  • Organize: Activities, Events, and Milestones in one place with clear ownership

  • Remind: Automated reminders and alerts

  • Complete: AI-driven task completion based on historical insights

• Board Continuity

  • Playbooks: Step-by-Step guide for recurring tasks, events, & milestones

  • Storage: Repository for bylaws and important board documents

  • Rollover: Automation of each term or season’s plan with last year’s learnings

This isn’t just a vision.

We have been hard at work building Volunteer-Board Operations software and are excited to announce early access NOW at Third Job AI.

Please join us on our mission of making a volunteer board feel less like a third job, and more an opportunity to leave a legacy in your community.

Leave a comment

January has a funny way of sneaking up on volunteer boards.

The holidays just wrapped. The calendar turned. And suddenly spring season is right around the corner.

Registration. Coaches. Schedules. Uniforms. Fields. Snack bars. Tryouts. Emails from parents who are just checking in.

“Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it”

Volunteer-run organizations tend to be cyclical by nature. Each year there are a similar set of seasons, milestone events, and tasks to complete for the board.

And yet, every year, it somehow feels new. New board members. New volunteers. New problems layered on top of old ones.

Last year you learned hard lessons:

• Registration opened too late

• Coaches weren’t confirmed early enough

• Communication broke down

• One person held too much institutional knowledge

• Everything felt rushed at the end

But those lessons? They’re often trapped in someone’s head or lost when that person rolls off the board.

January Is Your Window

Right now, before the emails start piling up, is your chance to change the pattern.

This is the moment to pause and ask:

• What actually worked last spring?

• What caused stress we could have avoided?

• Where did we scramble unnecessarily?

• What decisions did we wish we had made earlier?

From Memory to Milestones

Start preparing by documenting the following for your organization:

• Milestones – key dates that must happen on time

• Tasks – what actually needs to get done

• Dependencies – what can’t start until something else is finished

When you write these things down, something powerful happens:

• New board members get context instantly

• Work spreads more evenly

• Risks show up earlier

• Spring feels manageable

This is how boards move from reactive to ready.

Make This the Year You Don’t Start From Scratch

Volunteering shouldn’t feel like reliving the same fire drill every year. You deserve better.

We wish best of luck to all the volunteer-run organizations out there, and let’s keep this year focused on what matters; fun, fulfillment, & a lasting impact in the community.

Leave a comment

Share

We’ve talked before about how operating your volunteer board like a business can lead to a better experience for all involved.

If you’re a 501(c)(3), you already qualify for many of the same tools real businesses use for free.

Here’s our guide of free tools that volunteer boards find most helpful to their board operations:

The Big One: Google Workspace for Nonprofits

If your organization is a qualifying 501(c)(3), you can get Google Workspace for Nonprofits at no cost.

Read More: https://www.google.com/nonprofits/offerings/workspace/

Google Workspace includes the following:

Gmail: Branded Email Addresses

Upgrade your email addresses from league123@gmail.com to president@yourleague.com.

How it helps:

• Looks more credible to sponsors, partners, and parents.

• Consider role-based alias emails: “treasurer@”, “registrar@”, “volunteers@”

• When someone transitions off the board, you can transfer over the inbox and maintain that branding

Google Drive: Document Storage

Google Drive gives you cloud storage. Shared Drives belong to the organization, not any one person.

Use it for:

• Bylaws, board minutes, budgets, vendor contracts.

• Sponsorship decks, logo files, field maps, safety plans.

• Separate Shared Drives like:

  • Board Bylaws

  • Finance

  • Rules

  • Registration

  • Sponsorship & Fundraising

Again, when a volunteer leaves, your documents stay.

Google Docs & Sheets: Agendas, Playbooks, and Tracking

Docs = shared writing.
Sheets = shared spreadsheets.

How they help:

• Create a reusable board meeting agenda and take live notes together.

• Turn recurring work into simple playbooks (“How to run tryouts,” “How to close the snack bar”).

• Track budgets, rosters, sponsors, equipment in a Collaborative Google Sheet instead of living on someone’s desktop in a document called: “FINAL_FINAL_V7.xlsx”.

Google Calendar & Meet: Fewer “Wait, When Is That?” Moments

Google Calendar helps you organize meetings & deadlines:

• Board Meetings

• Registration Deadlines

• Fields & Facility Closures

• Volunteer Shifts

Share them with board members, coaches, or key volunteers so everyone sees the same schedule.

Google Meet then gives you video meetings directly from those calendar invites, so you can:

• Hold board meetings when people are traveling.

• Do quick working sessions (budget review, schedule planning) without commuting across town.

Google Forms: Automate the Repetitive Stuff

Google Forms collects information and pipes it into a Sheet for you.

Use it for:

• Uniform/merch orders (sizes, names, quantities).

• Season feedback surveys for parents.

• Board/committee interest forms for new volunteers.

• Incident reports that you don’t want lost in an inbox.

If you’re currently copying things out of emails into spreadsheets, Forms is your new best friend.

Optional but Nice: Chat & Sites

If your board wants to keep things in one ecosystem:

• Google Chat: channels for Executive Board, Fields, Fundraising, etc, instead of scattered text threads.

• Google Sites:

  • A simple public site, or

  • A private “Board Hub” with links to folders, meeting schedule, and onboarding docs.

You don’t have to use everything, but it’s there when you’re ready.

A Few Other Free Options

Here are a few other tools worth knowing about. Always check each provider’s current nonprofit policy as offers can change.

Canva for Nonprofits: Look Professional, Fast

What it is: A drag-and-drop design tool to help you create visual assets for your community.

Read More: https://www.canva.com/canva-for-nonprofits/

Use it for:

• Social posts (“Registration now open,” sponsor shout-outs).

• Branded Flyers and yard signs.

• Banners for events and fundraisers.

Easily create templates once and reuse them every season.

WhatsApp: One Place for Quick Conversations

Pick one primary place for quick conversations. If not Google Chat, we recommend WhatsApp.

• WhatsApp: Group messaging platform for boards that communicate via text frequently

Channels provide the ability to organize different chat threads. Consider creating one channel for Executive Board Members, one for All Board Members, and ones for each shared committee.

SignUp Tools: No More Volunteer Spreadsheet Nightmares

Tools like Signup.com make it easy to:

• Create volunteer sign-up slots.

• Let people choose their own time.

• Send automatic reminders so you don’t have to chase them.

Yes, you can hack this with Forms + Sheets but the built-in reminders and time slots are a helpful upgrade.

Basic Online Donations

Most donation tools aren’t “free” (payment processing fees still exist), but the platforms are often free or discounted for nonprofits.

Look into:

• A simple donation platform like Cheddar Up for quick & easy collection.

• Stripe nonprofit programs for taking payments at Events or online collection of funds

Make it easy for people to give without handing checks to your treasurer in the parking lot.

The Real Point: Buy Back Your Time

Technology won’t line the fields or flip the burgers.

But it can:

• Stop you from rebuilding the same spreadsheet every season.

• Automate reminders you’re currently sending one by one.

• Turn last year’s chaos into this year’s reusable template.

If your board is a 501(c)(3) and still running everything out of personal Gmail account and text chains, now is a great time to upgrade your operations with free software.

Leave a comment

Thanksgiving has always been a time to slow down, look around, and appreciate what’s in front of us; our families, our friends, our communities, and the people who quietly make our everyday lives better.

But it’s also the perfect window for reflection for volunteer-run organizations.

“What worked? What didn’t? And what should we do differently next year?”

This is standard practice in the business world. End of review season mobilizes an organization to assess performance, run retrospectives, send surveys, document learnings, and prepare for the year ahead.

Volunteer boards can and should do the same.

Here are some tips for applying best-practices from the business world into your volunteer-run organization

1. Run a Simple End-of-Year Review

Add this topic on the Agenda for your next board meeting. Start with these simple but critical questions:

• What were the top 3 things that went well this year?

• What were the top 3 things that we could have improved on?

Don’t overthink it.

- The things that did work? Capture them so next year’s board doesn’t need to rediscover them.
- The things that didn’t work? Capture them so next year’s board doesn’t repeat them.

Real progress can be made from simply reflecting, documenting, and planning for improvements.

2. Survey Your Stakeholders

The best-run “customer centric” businesses have a simple but powerful practice for improvement: they ask customers and employees how they’re doing.

Volunteer-run organizations have “customers,” too:

• Board members

• Volunteers

• Sponsors

• Families or community members who participate in your programs.

The holiday season is the perfect time to send a short, two-minute survey:

• How likely are you to recommend this organization to a friend? (0–10)

• What’s one thing we did well this year?

• What’s one thing we could improve next year?

Pro-tip: Google Forms are free and easy!

You’ll be amazed by the clarity that comes back. Patterns emerge quickly. And unlike guessing in a meeting room, this feedback comes straight from the community.

These insights become a gift to next year’s board members: tangible insights to build from.

3. Write Down the Things That Didn’t Work (While They’re Still Fresh)

Every volunteer board has the same story:

“Ah, right, we forgot about that until it was too late.”
“We said we’d fix that this year…but no one remembered.”

You can break that cycle with one simple habit: Create a “Lessons for Next Year” list during the holidays.

Think of it like leaving breadcrumbs for future you:

• What deadlines snuck up on you?

• What did you wish you had started earlier?

• What processes were confusing?

• What took way too long?

• What questions did new board members keep asking?
  

This list becomes gold when the next season rolls around. It’s all about continuity, something volunteer organizations rarely have, but desperately need.

4. Set Smart Reminders for Next Year

Reflection is helpful, but pairing it with action is key. Take the items from your review and schedule them now, when they matter least but will matter most later:

• Add calendar reminders for key deadlines.

• Set up tasks for next year’s board in your project system (or even a shared doc).

• Jot down the order of operations for big events.

• Capture vendor contacts, budget numbers, and timelines while you still remember them.
  

This is the type of operational muscle that businesses build naturally, but volunteer boards rarely have the time or tools to create from scratch. These small actions upfront will pay dividends next year.

5. Say Thank You

Lastly, and most importantly, use this moment to say thank you.

Volunteer organizations run on generosity, not compensation. A simple, heartfelt note of gratitude can go a long way:

• Thank the board member who always took the late-night emails.

• Thank the treasurer who kept everything organized.

• Thank the volunteer who showed up early and stayed late.

• Thank the sponsors who helped make things possible.

Your board’s year is built on the shoulders of people who choose to care. They deserve to hear that it mattered.

Thank You from Third Job

To every volunteer reading this:

• Thank you for making your community stronger.

• Thank you for giving your free time, your ideas, and your energy

• And thank you for doing your third job, the one that isn’t on your resume, but leaves a lasting impact on your community.

Wishing you and your families a warm, joyful, and restful Thanksgiving.

Subscribe now

Leave a comment

With the Third Job Blog, we promise to bring you stories from volunteer board members across the country.

This week’s article is brought to you by our first guest contributor, Jordan Lane. Jordan has served for years on multiple volunteer boards and brings a wealth of experience as a board member and proud Father.

Snack bar Duty: Fear Not, You Got This

You know the situation; your little one is excited to start her first season of a new sport. Registration fee is done. The forms are complete and submitted. The team’s name has been voted on.

The uniforms are ordered. Her coach has sent the first introductory email. Then, it happens! You get an email from someone on the board with a link to sign up for the dreaded snack bar.

• Your first thought is – I’ll delete the email. They will never know.

• The second thought is – maybe I can get out of it. But alas, there is not a buy out and if you do not register for a shift, then the uniform your little one is desperately waiting for will not be handed out.

Shoot. Other than moving to foreign country and assuming a new identify, you know that you must suck it up and register for snack bar duty.

Okay - now breathe! Here are some tips from a board member and parent to make this an easier experience.

1. Sign up EARLY. Find a date and time that works for you and go for it. You can always trade with someone at a later date if something comes up.

2. If you are absolutely terrified of the prospect of working the snack bar, find a later shift in the season. By then, hopefully, any kinks in the process will be figured out. You can also trade up if an earlier date is better.

3. Most importantly, ask question and attend any training that is offered.

BOTTOM LINE:

Embrace the snack bar shift! The snack bar has likely been running years before your shift began and will keep running long after your little one ages out of the league.

The odds of you “burning it all down” are basically zero. If you get overwhelmed, pause, take a breath, and ask for help. There’s almost always someone nearby. This could be the grandmother in the stands who, unbeknownst to you, started the snack bar fifty years ago or someone right beside you who has worked the snack bar before and can lend a hand.

You’ve got this and be sure to try the nachos!

About the Guest Contributor:

Jordan Lane is a serial volunteer. His service spans youth and adult sports programs - including soccer, softball, basketball, and hockey - as well as a variety of community-focused efforts.

Jordan has served on a Scouting board, supported adults with developmental disabilities, helped feed the hungry, and continues to contribute to numerous other local initiatives. He lives in the Los Angeles area with his wife and daughter.

Subscribe now

Leave a comment

It’s Saturday morning. You’ve juggled snacks, cleats, water bottles, and an 8-year-old’s mood swings to get to the field on time. But when you arrive there’s already another event on the field.

Confused parents gather. Coaches look at their phones. A board member gets a call. Somewhere, something went wrong.

Was it a mix-up in the schedule? Miscommunication? It doesn’t matter much at that moment, because to the families standing on the sidelines, the league looks disorganized.

That one moment can have a lasting impact on the league.

The Snowball Effect of Poor Planning

That double-booked field didn’t happen the morning of the game. It started weeks or even months earlier.

It might have started when:

• A board member:

  • Made a small mistake in a spreadsheet that ended up on the website

  • Published a schedule change to the website, but didn’t send an alert to parents

  • Missed a scheduling update from another league that also uses the field

• The town:

  • Double booked the field for a fall festival

  • Forgot to inform the league they were making field improvements that day

  • Didn’t have a back up plan for the field maintenance team that called in sick
    

• A new volunteer didn’t know there was a separate process for field approvals.
  

• Or maybe, a well-meaning coach made a last-minute change that never got communicated up the chain

The Hidden Cost

When a mix-up like this happens, it’s not just about logistics. It’s about trust.

• Board members feel deflated

• Parents get angry

• Kids leave with broken hearts

All of this means future registration numbers can take a hit because parents talk and a reputation is formed in the community. All from one scheduling error.

Why Structure Matters

Every volunteer board is made up of people who genuinely care. But good intentions aren’t enough to keep a league running smoothly.

An effective operational structure ensures everyone can do their job without tripping over each other. It’s about continuity, clarity, and shared accountability.

Volunteer leagues are a business but we haven’t operated them like it. Just like any business, when our operations fail, the customer, in this case the community, suffers.

Learning from Each Other

Every volunteer board has stories like this. This blog exists so volunteer board members can share what they’ve learned, learn from others, and keep volunteer run organizations in their place as a pillar of our communities.

Subscribe now

Leave a comment

For a child, there’s nothing quite like that moment.

You unzip the bag. Inside is the crisp new uniform, the hat that’s slightly too big, the pants you’ll scuff up before the season’s over. It’s the moment the season becomes real. You’re not just signed up, you’re on the team.

But that jersey didn’t just show up. Behind that one magical moment are dozens of late nights, spreadsheets, group chats, and volunteer hours - the quiet work of community.

This is life on a volunteer board.

The Invisible Assembly Line

Months before a jersey ever reaches a player, volunteer board members are already in action:

• One member launches league registration from their couch on a Saturday night.

• Another assembles the rosters over several weeks during breaks, juggling dozens of spreadsheets and parent requests to build balanced teams.

• Someone matched sponsors to those teams, because community businesses don’t just appear on the back of jerseys by magic.

• And somewhere, a team of volunteers attacks a pile of uniforms in a garage and starts sorting: pants in one pile, hats in another, belts and socks in labeled bins. Player by player. Team by team. Bag by bag.

Until, finally, those bags are ready to hand out. Each one representing hours of unseen effort, made possible by people who have already worked their first and second jobs that day.

The Third Job in Action

It’s not glamorous. There are no bonuses, retreats, or public recognitions. Just ordinary people doing extraordinary work so kids can have that jersey moment.

But it’s also work that could be easier to manage. With the Third Job Blog, we aim to share tips, playbooks, and experiences - both good & bad - from volunteer board members across the country.

We want the volunteers who make it all possible to spend less time managing chaos and more time enjoying special moments like jersey day.

Leave a comment

Subscribe now

Volunteering sure can feel like another job sometimes. You know, the one that comes after your career and your family obligations. The one you get to on lunch breaks, nights and weekends.

Volunteering is the job you have the least amount of time for and the one you’re doing for free. You raised your hand to make a difference and likely ended up taking on more responsibility than you signed up for.

Before you realize it, you’re asked to join the volunteer board. “We only meet once a month”, they say, and pretty soon you have yourself another job.

This job, however, is the one you happen to enjoy the most, and the one that brings you the most fulfillment. Being a volunteer board member gives you the opportunity to leave a legacy behind for your family, your neighbors, and your community.

But only if you have the time for it.

The reality is that life gets in the way. Our careers and obligations tend to dominate our time.

Our first job provides an income, and at its best can drive personal growth and lead to lifelong friendships. But we know it also creates plenty of stress; projects, deadlines, & TPS reports.

Our second job, our commitment to family, brings joy to us through meaningful relationships. But it too can pile up on our list of to-do’s; child care, elder care, grocery shoppping, & endless home maintenance.

The emotional toll of managing both your career and family obligations can create enough stress for a lifetime.

That leads us to our Third Job.

Roughly 76 million selfless Americans volunteer their time every year.

Research shows this brings purpose & fulfillment. The number of people who report to be “very happy” rose 7% among those who volunteer monthly and 12% for people who volunteer every two to four weeks.

And yet, ask any volunteer and you’ll probably hear that familiar line: “This feels like another job.” A typical volunteer board member spends ~10 hours / month volunteering, while the Board Chair spends more like 20 hours / month.

There are only so many hours in a week.

Third Job is a newsletter and blog for people who serve after hours.

Through conversations we’ve had with fellow volunteer board members across the country, we have found common issues and frustrations with volunteer board operations; resource constraints, volunteer turnover, & a non-stop list of tasks to accomplish without any direction on how to complete them.

But we’ve also heard countless stories of overcoming those obstacles with creativity and grit. We’ve found that volunteer board members are more than happy to share their learnings with others going through the same thing. They’ve just had nowhere to share that. Until now.

Introducing The Third Job Blog: We’ll spotlight volunteer board members building real community results and we’ll share the playbooks that aim to reduce the burden and administrative overload of being a volunteer board member.

Our mission is simple:

1. Tell the stories of volunteer board members making a difference in their community

2. Share playbooks for helping your volunteer board make a bigger impact

3. Make volunteering feel less like a third job, and more like an opportunity to leave a legacy that lasts

Please stay tuned and if you would like to share your story, we’d love to hear from you!

Leave a comment