In VolunteerMatters, if you have a project that you want to allow group participation, you just need to configure the project settings to allow Group Sign-Up.

Once Group Sign-Up is enabled, there are two modes available which determines the method of attributing credited hours for this project and the enhanced ability to group the volunteers together.

These are "Individual Credited" and "Leader Credited".  These are set via the Group Sign-Up Mode configuration setting on the project setup. The leader is the volunteer who signed up the group.  

With "Individual Credited", or "Enhanced Group Sign-Up", the leader only gets credited for the hours they themselves worked and the system provides them with a Group Sign-Up Link where they can invite other volunteers to sign-up and join the group until all of the group slots are full. A Group Leader will also be able to see all the group members who have completed the sign up on their Volunteer Assignment page. This is only available in the Professional and above subscription levels. 

With "Leader Credited", or "Basic Group Sign-Up", the leader gets credited for the total hours the group worked and the slots signed up for are just that. There is no additional group sign-up link and all that matters is how many slots were selected. So, if the leader signed up 5 people (including themselves) for a 5 hour shift they would get 25 hours (5 hour shift times 5 volunteers). An Administrator and/or Organizer can also edit the Credited Hours any time after the assignment for either mode.

NOTE: In VolunteerMatters Growing, there is no Group Sign-Up Mode project setting and "Leader Credited" is set by default.  If you are interested in upgrading your subscription level, please submit a support ticket via email.

Enabling Group Sign-Up and Setting the Mode

To set up a project to allow group shift sign-ups and set the mode, you will need to edit the project in question, and then toggle the "Enable Group Sign-Up for Shifts" and select the mode via drop-down under Settings:

1. Log into your VolunteerMatters system with the proper security access roles and then click "Projects" (Briefcase Icon) from the main menu.
   
   
2. On the Project you wish to enable Group Sign-Up, click the "Dashboard" button ().
   
   
   
   
3. Click the "Manage" drop-down button () and select "Project Setup".
   
   
   
   
4. Click the "Edit" button () under the project summary panel.
   
   
   
   
5. Scroll down to "Settings" area and toggle the "Enable Group Sign-Up for Shifts" and then set the desired "Group Sign-up Mode" setting.  Reminder: With a Growing subscription, there is no Group Sign-Up Mode drop-down and the default setting is "Leader Credited".
   
   
   
   
6. Click "Save"

Volunteer Experiences

Leader Credited -  When the registered volunteer representative for the group goes to that project page and goes to sign up for a shift, they will see the following:

Where they will need to enter the number of volunteers they are bringing and click Sign Up. This will reduce the available number of slots on the shift by the number they enter and the process is done.  If a group needs to lower their number, the person who signed up can only withdraw, which removes the total number he/she pledged or reserved to bring, and then sign-up again with the different number. An administrator can also manually update the number on their behalf as well.  Click here for more information on managing shifts. This also only collects credential information from the single registered representative. If policy dictates you may need to have volunteers sign waivers on site before volunteering.

Individual Credited -  Similar to the "Leader Credited", when the registered volunteer representative for the group goes to that project page and goes to sign up for a shift, they will see the following:

After they enter the number of volunteers they are bringing and click Sign Up, the initial sign-up will reduce the available number of slots on the shift by the number they enter.  However, with "Individual Credited", or "Enhanced Group Sign-Up", the default My Assignment landing page will include the Group Sign-Up link they can copy and provide for the rest of their group to complete their sign-ups:

It will also display the Group Members who have completed the sign up to the Group Leader on their assignment page:

With the Enhanced Group Sign-Up, each time a group member signs up via the Group Sign-Up link, the number reserved will be lowered by one.  Conversely, if someone who previously registered with the group withdraws, one slot will be added back to the group leader for someone else to use. 

If the group needs to add to or lower their overall number, the group leader can not withdraw once a another group member has registers, so they will need to contact an administrator to manually update the number on their behalf.

Managing Enhanced Group Sign-Up

1. Log into VolunteerMatters with the Project Administrator or Organizer Administrator role.
   
   
2. Click "Projects" (Briefcase Icon) from the main menu.

3. On the project you wish to manage Group Sign-Up, click the "Needs" button ().

5. This will open the "Project Needs" page. You will see the various Project Needs: Shifts, Tasks, Items, and Positions.  On the top will be the "Project Shifts" panel. It will display the current shifts as well as a buttons to manage those existing shifts (), schedule new shifts (), and to manage shift roles ().
   
   
6. On the shift you wish to add a group assignment to or manage an existing group assignment, click the "Assign" button ().

7. This will open the assignment detail for the shift in question.  For shifts on projects where Individual Credited/Enhance Group Volunteering is enabled, there will be additional columns available for group volunteering designations.  This will include “Reserved”, “Group”, and “Group ID”. 

Reserved: This is the number of the slots the group is signed up for. This number will only be more than 1 on the Group Leader assignment. With Enhanced Group Volunteering, this number will decrease as more members of the group sign themselves up with the group sign-up link.  If a group member withdraws from the group shift, this number will increase by 1 up until the group leader number of slots originally entered.

Group: This one letter designation of L or M denotes whether the Assignment is the Group Leader (L) or a Group Member (M).  If there is no L or M, that assignment is a solo assignment. 

Group ID: This hyperlinked ID (which is the same for each member of the group on the assignment main page) is the Group ID which leads to the Group Assignment page.  Here the Project Administrator or Organizer Administrator can view the Group Assignment information. This information  includes Group Leader, Group Sign-Up Link, and Group Members information.

8. A Project Administrator or Organizer Administrator can sort by these columns (depending on browser width) or use the Search box with the Group ID to filter out anyone on the shift assignment not part of the group.  This can be useful, if you need to email all the members of a specific group.  They can also update the Reserved number on the Group leader to add or remove additional slots reserved for this particular group.
   
   
9. To edit the number of Volunteer spots "Reserved", click on the edit link () next to the current "Reserved" number.  This will open up the "Update Reserved Value" window and you can then edit that number and click "OK". This will update the number of reserved group volunteer spots accordingly for the contact assignment in question.

9. A Project Administrator or Organizer Administrator can also manually create a group for a single assignment by updating the Reserved value for an assignment that is not already part of a group. To do so, click on the edit link () next to the current "Reserved" number of a non-group assignment.  

This will open up the "Update Reserved Value" window and you can then edit that number and click "OK".  This will update the number of reserved volunteer spots accordingly for the contact assignment in question.

NOTE: To see the Group Leader designation and Group ID, you must refresh the page.  Once that is done you can visit the Group Assignment detail page and obtain the Group Sign-Up Link and provide that to the Group Leader who can then communicate it to the rest of the group.  Only volunteers can add themselves to a group via sign-up at this time.