A charity golf tournament is a lucrative fundraising idea for nonprofits of all types and sizes. It’s a great way to not only raise dollars, but connect with donors and supporters, forge partnerships, and expand your organization’s donor base.

That being said, golf tournaments come with a lot of moving parts and tasks to manage. And to make your golf truly memorable, you’ll need the help and commitment of volunteers. Your nonprofit’s volunteers are one of your most valuable assets and can make a good golf tournament a great golf tournament.

As you recruit event volunteers to help your tournament run smoothly, you’ll want to be strategic about assigning planning tasks and day-of responsibilities to make the most out of their time and a positive impact on your event. This guide outlines some of the most useful volunteer roles for your golf event. 

1. Pre-Tournament Organization

Volunteers can be especially useful before the event, not only for help knocking out time-consuming to-dos but also for providing valuable contacts at local businesses and companies you could utilize when selling sponsorships. Some common pre-tournament volunteer jobs might include:

• Assembling sponsor pitch packets
• Making introductions to potential sponsors
• Sending promotional emails
• Assembling golfer and sponsor gift bags
• Prepping the registration list
• Putting together hole signs
• Managing raffle or silent auction items
• Pulling together supplies for the day

2. Manage Registration & Check-In

Staying organized during this part of the tournament is crucial and sets the tone for the day. Is it going to be a chaotic, disorganized mess, or a smooth, streamlined process? The goal is to make check-in quick and simple, so having several volunteers at the registration area armed with the list of golfers is key to keeping things flowing smoothly.

Enlist your volunteers to:

• Greet participants as they arrive
• Direct golfers to registration and bag drop
• Check golfers in
• Provide golfers with materials, instructions, and more
• Sell raffle tickets, mulligans, game passes, and collect donations

An easy way to make sure volunteers are prepared for this role is to use golf-specific software solutions. GolfStatus recommends using golf event management software that automates registration, provides all the information volunteers need at check-in, and has robust support resources in case of any snags.

3. Distribute Food & Beverage

Whether you provide a continental breakfast before the round, a boxed lunch at the turn, snacks and drinks on various holes, or a post-golf banquet, you’ll need volunteers to help manage food and beverage stations. This is a good option for any newer volunteers who might not have experience running other elements of a charity golf tournament. Consider setting up several distribution stations manned by volunteers to mitigate crowding and stick to items that can be easily distributed.

4. Run Games & Other Activities

If your charity golf tournament doesn’t have extra games, contests, or side activities to complement the main tournament, you’re missing out on an opportunity to raise extra money and enhance the overall experience. Some of these activities and contests might include:

• Hole-in-one contests
• Closest to the pin contests
• Putting contests
• On-course games, like a blind putt hole, a Wheel of Fortune hole, or a golf ball cannon hole

Managing these activities is a great job for volunteers! They can engage with golfers and sponsors and be part of making the tournament fun and memorable. You can also have volunteers help with other non-golf-related activities, such as setting up a silent auction or selling raffle tickets.

5. Golfer Engagement

Having volunteers available to greet golfers and direct traffic at the beginning of the day, drive around the course to ensure things are running smoothly, and take time to visit with golfers and sponsors as the round progresses is a great way to boost engagement and keep folks coming back year after year. If you’re live-scoring your tournament, they can be on hand to help answer questions about the live-scoring solution.

It’s important that these volunteers are familiar with your organization and how a golf tournament functions so they can answer questions and address issues as needed. These volunteers could also be in charge of taking photos and videos for social media content throughout the day.

6. Volunteer Management & Onboarding

This might seem like an odd assignment, but you can certainly leverage your volunteers to onboard and manage other volunteers! Using volunteers to manage your other volunteers can help newcomers feel welcome and forge connections within your volunteer community, which can lead to higher volunteer retention rates.

You and your planning team may be busy with selling sponsorships and other higher-level planning tasks to be able to respond to volunteer questions in a timely manner, so enlist one or two seasoned volunteers to act as points of contact for new volunteers who haven’t helped with the golf event or worked with your nonprofit before. They can take point on managing volunteers before and during the event, from recruitment to onboarding to execution. They could also be the point person for any volunteer issues on the day of the tournament to run interference between the myriad of volunteers and the planning team.

You’ll want to work with this volunteer or volunteers to ensure they can set other folks up for success by effectively onboarding them. Work together to create “job descriptions” that outline all the pertinent responsibilities, details, and information for them to complete their assignments. 

Wrapping Up

After the event has wrapped, be sure to thank your volunteers for their hard work with a handwritten note or a small token of appreciation, such as branded merchandise. You might also ask your volunteers about their experiences and ways you can improve for the future to help boost volunteer retention and satisfaction.

Keep in mind that this is not an exhaustive list of volunteer roles and responsibilities for your next charity golf tournament, but it’s a good place to start and make sure you have volunteer coverage and set your golf tournament up for success.