‘Managing volunteers’, Justice Connect
This Justice Connect guide outlines the key legal obligations organisations have towards volunteers. It provides practical examples, templates, and tips to help organisations navigate crucial areas, including the legal differences between volunteers, employees, and contractors; managing volunteer relationships; ensuring volunteer safety; addressing unlawful workplace behaviour; and handling intellectual property, privacy, and record-keeping issues.
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Volunteers can play a crucial part in the support and running of social enterprises. This guide from Justice Connect provides an overview of the key legal obligations organisations owe volunteers and provides practical examples, template documents and tips to assist in their understanding. The guide covers the following key issues:
- Volunteer, employee or independent contractor: the legal differences between a volunteer, employee and independent contractor
- The volunteer relationship: recruiting, inducting, managing performance and ending the relationship
- Volunteer safety: your organisation's responsibility regarding negligence, work health and safety, managing risk, insurance and child safe standards
- Unlawful workplace behaviour: protecting volunteers and other people your volunteers interact with from behaviour such as sexual harassment, discrimination, bullying and victimisation
- Other legal issues: intellectual property, privacy and record keeping
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