What started as a modest operation in a garage during the Christmas season of 2012 has since transformed into a nationwide movement. 

Today, SHP operates 339 chapters across the United States, Canada, the Bahamas, and Bermuda and the organization has set an ambitious goal to build 365,000 beds by 2028.

Challenges

As Sleep in Heavenly Peace grew rapidly, it encountered several operational challenges. With over 250,000 volunteers and 339 chapters spread across the country, SHP’s growth quickly outpaced the capabilities of its existing tools. This rapid expansion demanded a scalable solution to maintain operational efficiency.

Coupled with a decentralized structure, it led to inconsistencies in how chapters were managed. This created challenges in maintaining uniformity while allowing individual chapters to address their unique local needs.

With an ambitious goal of building 365,000 beds by 2028, the SHP team needed to efficiently onboard and train volunteers including making sure volunteers were well-prepared and aligned with SHP’s mission was essential to its success.

Lastly, SHP recognized the untapped potential of its large volunteer base as a source of financial support. Encouraging volunteers to contribute as donors was vital to sustaining the organization’s ambitious goals. Addressing these challenges became pivotal for SHP to achieve its ambitious mission.

How Golden Helped

To tackle these challenges, SHP partnered with Golden to implement a comprehensive volunteer management platform tailored to its needs. 

Scalability

Golden’s platform seamlessly supported SHP’s rapid growth, enabling the organization to manage its vast volunteer network and 339 chapters efficiently. 

In 2023, SHP delivered slightly over 60,000 beds. By 2024, the organization delivered 75,669 beds, projecting a year-over-year growth of approximately 19.02%. This trajectory underscores the effectiveness of Golden’s solution in scaling SHP’s operations.

Centralized System

The platform provided a unified system that ensured consistency across chapters while allowing for customization to meet individual chapter requirements. This balanced approach addressed both the need for uniformity and flexibility.

Across all their chapters, Golden’s platform provided a stable and uniform experience for volunteers, ensuring that every chapter operated with the same level of professionalism and effectiveness.

Streamlined Onboarding and Training

Robust training modules and user-friendly onboarding processes made it easier for new volunteers to integrate quickly, alleviating administrative burdens on chapter leaders.

Within six months, 90% of SHP’s independently run chapters were onboarded with Golden. This included volunteers with diverse schedules, demonstrating the platform’s adaptability and ease of use.

“Golden’s onboarding and training was easily one of the best experiences we have ever had. The Golden support team and training has been amazing,” says an affiliated partner of Sleep in Heavenly Peace.

Self-Service Capabilities

Golden’s self-service tools empowered chapters to independently manage events and volunteer activities, enhancing efficiency and reducing reliance on centralized administrative support.

Optimized volunteer management processes resulted in a 30% increase in event efficiency. This improvement allowed SHP to maximize the impact of its resources and reach more children in need.

“Golden gave Sleep in Heavenly Peace the opportunity to completely revamp and improve our volunteer experience from registration to event,” says an affiliated partner at Sleep in Heavenly Peace.

Sleep in Heavenly Peace logged 506,980 volunteer hours in 2024 with 138,422 sign ups, helping them serve their communities and children across the country. At the end of 2024, SHP Chapters covered an estimated 77 million people in the United States.

Through its partnership with Golden and Fundraise Up, Sleep in Heavenly Peace successfully addressed its operational challenges and achieved significant milestones in its mission to provide beds for children in need. 

The scalable platform not only streamlined volunteer management and event coordination but also enhanced the volunteer-to-donor journey, ensuring financial sustainability. With these advancements, SHP is well on its way to reaching its goal of building 365,000 beds by 2028, ensuring that no child sleeps on the floor in their community.

For more information about Golden’s solutions, contact sales@goldenvolunteer.com or visit goldenvolunteer.com.

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Key Challenges

Prior to switching to Golden, BCH largely left the management of volunteers up to the discretion of each location to manage. “People who already had full plates serving as directors and supervisors, caring for very specific needs for vulnerable people and children, were also juggling volunteers which made it difficult for everyone,” says Acting Director of Volunteer Engagement, Kristyn Butts. 

Because there was no dedicated volunteer manager at each location, nor any way to utilize technology to manage volunteers, staff resulted in using paper waivers, calling volunteers for opportunities, and managing timesheets with paper forms. 

“We wanted to have volunteers but often it was an added piece to somebody’s plate and it became a lot of playing phone tag. A volunteer would want to serve and then have to wait to be called back,” says Kristyn. “Additionally we had people signing paper waivers and those waivers were located in thirty different offices. If we ever had to locate one, it was really challenging.” she continues. 

After their organization experienced a growth period coupled with an increase in locations and volunteers, it was apparent that Baptist Children’s Homes of NC needed to utilize a volunteer management platform to help continue to grow and meet their needs with excellence. 

How Golden Helped

With fifty locations now managing and tracking volunteers, it was vital to begin leveraging a volunteer management platform to help scale their efforts. The team began searching for a platform and discovered Golden during the search. 

Volunteer Relationships

“Much of my day-to-day is taking the needs and putting them into Golden. Now the local staff doesn’t have to make phone calls and search for volunteers. Those needs are publicly made and it’s been a huge turning point for us”, says Kristyn. 

With the help of Golden managing their volunteers, Kristyn’s team can easily reach out to volunteers and thank them for their service which has steadily increased their number of returning volunteers. 

Easier Reporting

Additionally, Kristyn can successfully pull reports on volunteer hours and the value of volunteer time to use when applying for grants and foundations. 

“Many foundations want to know if we are using volunteers. We’re able to say, ‘yes, we’re using volunteers,’ and giving them real data to support that,” says Kristyn. 

Since rolling out Golden ministry-wide to all their locations in July 2024, Baptist Children’s Homes of NC has engaged over 1,300 volunteers.  Additionally, during this period, those volunteers have contributed a cumulative 6,300 hours of donated time. By the end of 2024, Kristyn expects them to hit $200,000 in value of donated time from their volunteers.

“Golden is able to help us with calculating the overall value of time. If we had to spend that money on services that the volunteers have provided, we could not afford it; it really is priceless.”

Blackbaud Raiser’s Edge Integration

A priority for the BCH team was finding a volunteer management platform that would easily and seamlessly integrate with their CRM, Blackbaud Raiser’s Edge, as it was the preferred CRM by their development team. Being able to connect volunteer to supporter data was critical for their organization in order to map a volunteer to donor journey. 

With the Golden – Blackbaud Raiser’s Edge integration, their collective teams were able to successfully push volunteer data into their Raiser’s Edge system and see a full, holistic view of their supporters. To date, 1,100 volunteers have been added to their CRM database in just six months time through the integration. 

Easy Platform for All

One of the key necessities for migrating to Golden was the ability of all volunteer types to be able to find and register for opportunities with the organization. Baptist Children’s Homes of NC engages volunteers of all ages – from elementary school children to seasoned adults – in service work with their ministry. 

“Bringing a technology comfort level was something we needed to be cognizant of. I trained staff members at each of our locations, and they were able to assist volunteers with accessing the registration pages,” says Kristyn. 

Kristyn brilliantly leveraged multiple channels of communication to educate and inform their supporters how to utilize Golden for their volunteer needs. She created several Facebook videos explaining the new process, how to access it on their website, how to register, and how to sign up for an account. 

Want to learn more about how Baptist Children’s Home of North Carolina has leveraged Golden in their volunteer management strategy? You can catch the entire conversation on-demand here!

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An essential pillar to Piedmont Park Conservancy’s mission is its volunteer program. Each year, Piedmont Park hosts hundreds of park beautification projects, community cleanups, and other corporate days of service to advance their mission in the community. 

In 2023, Piedmont Park engaged roughly 2,800 volunteers totaling 9,500 hours of volunteer time. Through utilizing Golden as their volunteer management software, Piedmont Park Conservancy has been able to streamline their volunteer operations, deepen their volunteer engagement, and strategically leverage volunteers as donors to support the Conservancy’s mission.

Key Challenges

Piedmont Park Conservancy actively engages over 2,000 volunteers annually, most often through pre-planned volunteer events. Prior to joining Golden, Piedmont Park Conservancy had been tracking their volunteers through spreadsheets and papers, and realized that in order to scale their program they would need to invest in volunteer management software in order to meet the needs of their growing program.

Piedmont Park Conservancy knew they needed a volunteer management software system that could easily streamline their waiver collection process that was printed, signed, and digitally transcribed into Excel after each event. They also needed an easy-to-use system for volunteers to find and register for opportunities without having to create an account, and could coordinate corporate volunteer groups and large-scale days of service with ease. 

Lastly, as a donor and member-funded organization, they needed a software system that could fully integrate with their donor management CRM system, Virtuous, to seamlessly integrate volunteer and donor data in one centralized database. 

Golden Solutions

Piedmont Park Conservancy was already utilizing Golden as a member of the Hands On Atlanta network. When searching for a volunteer management database, they found that they could have more freedom and flexibility with their program if they were to obtain their own Golden Enterprise license to manage their program. 

How Golden Helped

Since joining Golden as an Enterprise user, Piedmont Park Conversancy’s volunteer numbers have returned to pre-pandemic levels. In 2021, while still managing their program through Excel, they engaged 2,024 volunteers totaling 6,180 hours of service. Last year, in 2023, the Conservancy engaged 2,800 volunteers totaling over 9,500 hours of service.

Overall they were able to increase their volunteer count by over 700 volunteers, and 3,500 increase in volunteer hours. Piedmont Park Conservancy has also been able to engage nearly 100 corporate groups.

They credit much of this success to utilizing Golden for their volunteer management system, including these key factors:

Automated Branded Email and SMS Texting Communications

Golden’s branded email feature allows for Piedmont Park Conservancy to deepen their brand awareness with their volunteer base. Golden’s SMS feature also allows for text messages to be sent instantly to volunteers in the event of last-minute changes due to weather or other logistical communications.

Custom Reservations and Signature Events

Piedmont Park Conservancy regularly works with large groups of corporate volunteers. Golden’s Custom Reservation feature reserves spots for these groups, and easily tracks their registration. Golden’s latest feature; Signature Events, can create roles for their large-scale service opportunities, allowing them to effortlessly create and assign roles for each event. 

Waiver Collection

Piedmont Park Conservancy no longer needs to collect paper waivers from volunteers. In Golden, organizers can easily upload waivers to each opportunity for a volunteer to review and accept before officially registering for an opportunity.  “Golden enables us to set our volunteers up for success before they even arrive at Piedmont Park. We are able to collect and share information, expedite the waiver approval process, and track impact thanks to this software,” says Loren Lownes, Volunteer Manager at Piedmont Park Conservancy.

Integration with Virtuous

Volunteer and event data seamlessly flows into Piedmont Park Conservancy’s CRM, Virtuous. With this integration, they can track and monitor volunteers and donors in a centralized database, and begin to strategically target certain volunteers and corporate groups for funding. “Having reliable volunteer data that integrates seamlessly into our CRM has set up our team for success!” says Anne Marchetta, Development Manager at Piedmont Park Conservancy.

“Partnering with Golden to seamlessly integrate volunteer data into Virtuous has empowered organizations to see the full supporter experience”, says Mallory Greer, Director of Partnership at Virtuous. “This integration allows teams to strategically engage with volunteers, transforming them into lifelong donors through responsive fundraising.” 

Donation Features with FundraiseUp

Golden and Piedmont Park Conservancy have recently partnered together to pilot a new donations feature with FundraiseUp that will prompt volunteers to make financial donations after completing opportunities or canceling their registrations. The ability to customize these tasks and target specific groups and events allows them to strategically continue to leverage volunteers as donors for their organization.

Future Outlook

Looking toward the year ahead, the Piedmont Park Conservancy is excited to utilize Golden’s Signature Events feature for their large service days to help assign volunteers to specific roles. In addition, Golden looks forward to enhancing our volunteer donation features to help convert more of Piedmont Park Conservancy’s volunteers into donors.

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CCAC is a national service program led by California Volunteers and implemented by Bay Area Community Resources (BACR) under the guiding framework of AmeriCorps. The program is dedicated to advancing climate actions that engage community members, cultivate change, and leave a lasting impact. 

Today, CCAC has continued to scale its program size and expand its impact to local communities across California. CCAC stands as a landmark climate program and an exemplary model for generating collective impact through service and civic engagement. In 2024, the Biden-Harris administration announced the establishment of the American Climate Corps—a landmark initiative with the goal of engaging over 2,000 AmeriCorps volunteers across 36 states and territories. The ACC has derived its program model from the structure and scalability of the CCAC and their commitment to providing accessible and impactful climate initiatives to volunteers and AmeriCorps members. 

Key Challenges

CCAC has significantly scaled its program since its inception in 2020. Each year they have continued to expand the number of NGO partners hosting AmeriCorps members and the number of volunteers participating in climate-focused service. In the 2022-2023 program year, they engaged over 15,000 volunteers and 100 AmeriCorps members, with the goal of growing that number to 25,000 volunteers and 325 AmeriCorps members for the 2023-2024 program year. 

Being a federally funded program meant that CCAC had to develop rigorous tracking systems to monitor volunteer data for compliance. They had previously relied on Salesforce to track their volunteer engagement data, with AmeriCorps members manually entering in volunteer data, with some members reported having spent 8 hours each week doing data entry alone. They soon discovered that manual data entry was not a valuable use of AmeriCorps members’ time, nor did it accurately capture volunteer records and attendance. CCAC realized that in order to meet the deliverables of their grant, they would need to invest in a volunteer management system that would centralize their network of volunteers and partners. 

Golden Solutions

BACR and CCAC discovered Golden through the California Volunteers, Office of the Governor, who had been using Golden to monitor their state commission efforts since 2022. CCAC found value in the fact that they not only had a centralized system to track their volunteer opportunities among their partners, but that they also had the ability to market their opportunities to the public through Golden’s branded volunteer portal. 

CCAC implemented Golden’s Aggregator model in the fall of 2023, and has seen significant program growth since. Prior to joining Golden, CCAC engaged 15,000 volunteers in service opportunities. In their first year of using Golden, CCAC has engaged 23,048 volunteers to date and is on track to meet their goal of engaging 25,000 volunteers by the end of September 2024 – a 10,000 increase in the number of volunteers in just one year. Looking to the year ahead, CCAC plans to continue to grow their program and services to more communities and partners throughout the state of California. 

How We Helped

Saved 6 Hours Weekly on Data Entry

Transitioning from Golden to Salesforce meant that CCAC partners could more easily track volunteer data. Rather than entering each volunteer record manually into Salesforce, partners utilized Golden’s spreadsheet upload feature to bulk upload participant data in a few simple clicks. Many of CCAC partners leverage Golden’s check-in feature enabling volunteers to quickly sign in and streamline administrative tasks.

Golden’s Insights feature, which captures new and returning volunteer data, gave CCAC the tools to remain in compliance with federal and state reporting requirements with almost no administrative time constraints.

CCAC estimates that because of Golden, AmeriCorps members save approximately 6 hours each week on data entry, and have more time to focus on their own climate initiatives.

Increased Statewide Visibility for Volunteering

Golden’s branded volunteer portal serves as a state-wide CCAC page with public events and engagements that any Californian can volunteer for. The Calendar view displays opportunities happening each day, and the Dynamic Map will filter events by location. This has been extremely helpful to match volunteers to the right opportunities, and allow CCAC to easily identify opportunities to promote to their leadership teams, lawmakers, and other stakeholders in California.

Through promoting opportunities in Golden’s branded portal, CCAC has been able to engage over 23,000 volunteers in the 2023-2024 program year, an increase of 8,000+ volunteers from the previous year. CCAC is on track to meet their goal of engaging 25,000 volunteers in service for the 2023-2024 program year. 

Shared Value Between Partners and CCAC

Golden’s Aggregator model allows partners to have their own dashboard to manage volunteer opportunities and track volunteer records, allowing for each AmeriCorps host site to have autonomy over their data and programs. As the statewide entity for the CCAC, data flows up directly from each partner into the main CCAC account.

Within their first year using Golden, CCAC was able to engage over 75 partners throughout the state of California, and over 325 AmeriCorps members to lead climate initiatives within their communities. 

Future Outlook

CCAC now serves as the national model for the ACC. As other states and commissions begin to roll out new climate initiatives, CCAC continues to scale and expand their program in the 2024-2025 program year using Golden to track, monitor, and market their volunteer program. Because of the significant success they have found using Golden for CCAC, BACR is now exploring a Golden subscription of their own to manage their other programs as well.

California and the CCAC will continue to be the leading model for effective civic engagement for climate resiliency. Because of Golden, they have been able to successfully scale their program while ensuring data integrity and time savings. 

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