What does your organization do to recognize and appreciate your volunteers?  Volunteer of the month? An annual dinner? Random treats throughout the year?  I'm looking for any ideas and the feedback you received.  Thanks!

For our volunteers:

• We annually do a Volunteer Potluck in late January/early February (because we are in a tropical climate this is when most of our snowbirds are in town along with our regular volunteers) where everyone brings a dish to pass, the shelter pays for a small bar tab and I give out about 10 volunteer awards to recognize really special work certain volunteers do. 
• During Volunteer Appreciation Week in April we put out snacks and goodies for the volunteers to be able to eat throughout the week.
• Our community does an Unsung Hero award every January where every non profit has a chance to recognize one volunteer, or a pair, that did extraordinary work over the past year.  This volunteer gets a certificate, a special lunch with the other nominees and their picture in an article in the local paper.
• Each month I send handwritten anniversary cards to celebrate volunteers' start anniversary and celebrate how many years they have been a volunteer.
• Once volunteers reach a certain amount of hours, we give them a free volunteer shirt.
• We do a volunteer spotlight on our online volunteer center monthly to highlight someone that has really stood out that month.

We hope to do even more when we move into our brand new shelter like a recognition board, etc but hopefully this is helpful to you!

Have you had any volunteers express concerns of being left out?  I want to ramp up our appreciation for our volunteers but other staff members have expressed concerns with singling out volunteers.

As long as you and your staff are showing the basic appreciation throughout the year to all, like thank yous, how grateful you are that they are there, doing temperature checks to make sure they are enjoying what they do, then expressing gratitude through awards for those that go above and beyond throughout the year shouldn't be an issue.  The point of awards and doing something extra for those volunteers is to show the organization recognizes that they are giving more than normal, whether it's time, a home for fosters, etc.  If certain volunteers express irritation with these awards, then ultimately their time volunteering isn't about volunteering and giving back, it's about themselves. We've never had anyone say that they were upset about the individual praise for others, however that doesn't mean someone didn't feel "left out".  We do change the awards every year, recognize the most outstanding "new volunteer", etc so it's not the same people every year.  But I find it's more important to praise those volunteers that make a significant difference at our shelter rather than worry about the repercussions or backlash of doing something extra for certain volunteers.  However, I can't stress enough it comes down making sure there is day to day acknowledgement of everyone that volunteers.  This will help with anyone that doesn't get an award at the end of the year.

we have a volunteer of the month, dinners during the year and capped off with the Humanitarian award

We do appreciation parties, and other types of gifts for special projects. We had 17,000+ volunteers contribute in the past 18 months, so we don't select a volunteer of the month for fear of leaving people out. And I also want to add that heartfelt, sincere appreciation goes a long way.  "Thank you" is free.  Cultivate a culture of appreciation within your organization.  Your goal should be that volunteers feel like they're partners in the work with the staff, and it's not us vs them. Be organized, don't waste their time. And make sure you communicate the impact that their work is having. What kind of a difference are they making? My favorite quote on this topic is "A well-run volunteer program is some of the best recognition that you can offer a volunteer." - - Volunteer management: Mobilizing all of the resources in the community, McCurley, S., & Lynch, R. (2011).

Thank you!  Unfortunately organization hasn't been the strong suit but that is changing.  And I love the quote!

We have an appreciation board where staff can post thank you messages to the volunteers.  Each month we draw one name out of the submissions to win a prize.  We always have a few little tokens of our appreciation that we have on hand for any volunteer that is going above and beyond.  Pinterest has about a million ideas you can use.  We have thank you cards available to our staff to write hand written notes of gratitude. We cap off the year with  our annual champagne brunch for our volunteers at out shelter.   The staff prepare and serve the volunteers.   Everyone really seem to enjoy it.

Thank you!  I like the random drawing and the thank you notes.  I appreciate it!