Navigating boundaries: Brokerage and boundary work strategies in volunteer-paid staff collaborations

Nonprofit organizations increasingly integrate volunteers alongside paid staff to address growing demands for social services amid austerity measures assuming that they complement the expertise of paid staff. This study combines the frameworks of brokerage and boundary work to explore the strategies used by paid staff and volunteers to navigate boundaries in their collaboration. We conducted semi-structured interviews with 30 volunteers and paid staff collaborating in three different nonprofit organizations in Flanders, the northern region of Belgium. Our findings reveal three distinct configurations of volunteer-paid staff collaboration, ranging from minimal volunteer integration, where boundaries of the professional domain are strictly demarcated, to extensive volunteer integration, where volunteer expertise is blended into the professional domain. These configurations illustrate how paid staff leverage their coordinating roles to demarcate, span or blend boundaries with volunteers. Additionally, the study highlights the significant influence of volunteers’ perspectives on boundary negotiations.