I think this is consistent with the general perception I’ve had about why charities have volunteers, which is that the work the volunteers do is net negative but it’s helpful to get them invested in the charity and therefore donate later. To a lesser extent, volunteers are sometimes a good pool to draw future employees.
There’s an analogous situation in the corporate world, where interns do net negative work but companies have them anyway, because interns are useful as a hiring pool to draw future employees from.
I think this is consistent with the general perception I’ve had about why charities have volunteers, which is that the work the volunteers do is net negative but it’s helpful to get them invested in the charity and therefore donate later. To a lesser extent, volunteers are sometimes a good pool to draw future employees.
There’s an analogous situation in the corporate world, where interns do net negative work but companies have them anyway, because interns are useful as a hiring pool to draw future employees from.