A couple things to mention as a serial volunteer:
The volunteer positions have a bit of a hierarchy with varying levels of responsibility. Also, as a volunteer you have to find what you like and what you are good at.
Several of the key volunteers are responsible for the safety of every single guest that attends an event. Believe it or not, there is extensive training for how to handle scenarios like:
Before getting to all of this, you need prove you can make it through and entire day and function well in all the basic conflict resolution scenarios of being a typical volunteer, and like:
- "Hey fellow field reseter, I thought we agreed we would inbound all balls that went out of bounds this way"
- "Hey other Inspector, I think you are really allowed to let 5 amp breakers on that 10 amp circuit, they don't have to have a 10 amp breaker"
- Q: "Hey Zebra at another Tablet, weren't we supposed to call that a G-21 penalty on 1406 last match?"
A: "No man, remember what Head Ref said before we started today, they need to be doing that with the game object in possession"
And before that! you need to prove that you will show up, stay at your job for the duration of the event, and accomplish your mission to the best of your ability.
So, in conclusion, start volunteering when you want to, show up every year, do what you are supposed to, do it better than anyone else and ask for more, show up early. Do a variety of positions at different events! (Queuing and Inspecting have more transferable skills than you would expect).
Bonus tip: Those who listen and execute well, and show up the earliest for every day (and volunteer for field set up and tear down, usually move up faster than those who show up at 8:30 on event only days.