Welcome to the Volunteer Nation Podcast!
Weekly interviews, big hat thinking, quick wins, and smart strategy to help you
engage your community and make a bigger impact.
Welcome to the Volunteer Nation Podcast!
Weekly interviews, big hat thinking, quick wins, and smart strategy to help you
engage your community and make a bigger impact.
The Volunteer Nation Podcast
Join Tobi and her special guests each week to learn how charities, causes, campaigns, congregations, and companies leverage the power of volunteerism to create a better world.
About the Show
Nonprofit leadership author, coach, and expert Tobi Johnson shares weekly tips to help charities build, grow, and scale exceptional volunteer teams. Discover how your nonprofit can effectively coordinate volunteers who are reliable, equipped, and ready to help you bring about BIG change for the better.
Rather than continuing to “do more with less,” achieve abundance for your organization by engaging community talent that helps you do more with more.
Society is evolving and so, too, is volunteerism. With over 25 years of experience working in nonprofits, public sector agencies, and grassroots campaigns Tobi is known for her modern “big hat” thinking and straight talk about what it takes to achieve success in today’s world.
You will learn how to coordinate volunteers, improve the volunteer experience, recruit volunteers, appreciate volunteers, and do it all more efficiently with the right volunteer management software and digital tools. It’s a mix of interviews and solo shows you’re not going to want to miss.
So, if you’re ready to ditch the stress and harness the power of people to fuel your good work, you’re in exactly the right place. Hit subscribe and let’s DO this!
Your Host
Tobi Johnson, MA, CVA is an internationally sought-after expert, consultant, advisor, and master trainer in volunteer engagement. She is known for her modern thought leadership, highly practical evidence-based strategies, and innovative, “big hat” thinking around engaging, supporting, and acknowledging the work of volunteers. She is the President of Tobi Johnson & Associates, a consulting firm whose mission is to help nonprofit organizations make connections with remarkable volunteers. In 2015, she founded VolunteerPro, an online training and networking community for leaders of volunteers. She is also co-host of the Time + Talent Podcast with Jennifer Bennett of VolunteerMatch.
Tobi has over 30 years direct experience in nonprofit management, program development, program coordination, training delivery and learning design across a wide range of charities and government agencies. She wrote Chapter 1 of Volunteer Engagement 2.0: Ideas and Insights for Transforming Volunteer Programs in a Changing World. Each year, her firm also conducts the Volunteer Management Progress Report, a global state-of-the-industry survey. In 2022, over 1,300 professionals from 28 countries participated.
A native of the Pacific Northwest, Tobi is a graduate of the University of Washington and has a master’s degree from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago. She now lives in East Tennessee with her husband and feline office assistant, Bailey.
Latest Episodes
169 – How to Meet 3 Core Volunteer Needs Right from the Start
July 3, 2025 Episode #169: How to Meet 3 Core Volunteer Needs Right from the Start In this episode of Volunteer Nation, Tobi Johnson dives into the essential human needs that drive a meaningful and rewarding volunteer experience—safety, connection, and purpose. [...]
168 – Note to Nonprofit Execs – Supporting Volunteers is Everyone’s Job
June 26, 2025 Episode #168: Note to Nonprofit Execs - Supporting Volunteers is Everyone's Job In this episode of Volunteer Nation, Tobi Johnson addresses a persistent and deeply rooted challenge in the nonprofit sector: the lack of buy-in and active support [...]
167 – Keeping Civic Engagement Alive Despite Funding Cuts with Sam Fankuchen
June 19, 2025 Episode #167: Keeping Civic Engagement Alive Despite Funding Cuts with Sam Fankuchen In this episode of Volunteer Nation, Tobi Johnson is joined by Sam Fankuchen, founder and CEO of Golden, about how nonprofit organizations can stay resilient and [...]
166 – Train Volunteers with This Simple 4-Step Framework
June 12, 2025 Episode #166: Train Volunteers with This Simple 4-Step Framework In this episode of Volunteer Nation, Tobi Johnson shares a simple yet powerful four-step framework to help you train volunteers more effectively. Drawing on decades of experience in instructional [...]
165 – Let’s Make Volunteering Accessible for All with Allyson Ferrari
June 5, 2025 Episode #165: Let's Make Volunteering Accessible for All with Allyson Ferrari In this episode of Volunteer Nation, Tobi Johnson is joined by Allyson Ferrari, Director of Connections at Lighthouse for the Blind and Visually Impaired, to explore how [...]
164 – Moving from Volunteer Compliance to Building Your Nonprofit Community
May 29, 2025 Episode #164: Moving from Volunteer Compliance to Building Your Nonprofit Community In this episode of Volunteer Nation, Tobi Johnson unpacks a powerful mindset shift in the nonprofit world: moving beyond volunteer compliance and toward building a thriving volunteer [...]
163 – New Research from Points of Light with Jennifer Sirangelo
May 22, 2025 Episode #163: New Research from Points of Light with Jennifer Sirangelo In this episode of Volunteer Nation, Tobi Johnson sits down with Jennifer Sirangelo, President & CEO of Points of Light, to explore why volunteerism is not just [...]
162 – The #1 Secret to Deep Volunteer Participation
May 15, 2025 Episode #162: The #1 Secret to Deep Volunteer Participation In this episode of Volunteer Nation, Tobi Johnson dives into one of the most powerful, yet often overlooked, tools for volunteer engagement: human connection. Tobi reminds us that it's not [...]
161 – Leadership Principles for Sparking Change – Part 2 with Jenni Field
May 8, 2025 Episode #161: Leadership Principles for Sparking Change – Part 2 with Jenni Field In this powerful follow-up episode of The Volunteer Nation Podcast, Tobi Johnson continues her insightful conversation with Jenni Field, diving deeper into the leadership principles [...]
160 – Leadership Principles for Sparking Change – Part 1 with Jenni Field
May 1, 2025 Episode #160: Leadership Principles for Sparking Change – Part 1 with Jenni Field In this episode of Volunteer Nation, Tobi Johnson sits down with leadership and communications expert Jenni Field for an insightful conversation about what it really [...]
159 – How to Hire a Future Proof Volunteer Coordinator
April 24, 2025 Episode #159: How to Hire a Future Proof Volunteer Coordinator In this episode of the Volunteer Nation Podcast, Tobi Johnson breaks down exactly what it takes to hire a future proof volunteer coordinator who can lead with confidence [...]
158 – Nonprofit Capacity Building with the Community Foundation for a greater Richmond
April 17, 2025 Episode #158: Nonprofit Capacity Building with the Community Foundation for a greater Richmond In this episode of The Volunteer Nation Podcast, host Tobi Johnson sits down with Diana Villarreal and Gail Cavallaro from the Community Foundation for greater [...]