Those that oppose the use of volunteers in for-profit settings take the position that volunteers should only be asked to donate their time to organizations benefiting the public good, not to add to the profit of stockholders. They believe involving volunteers in a business is a form of exploitation. I disagree with this position and feel there is nothing inherently wrong with volunteers being used in a business setting. There is quite a bit of precedent for volunteer involvement in businesses that have a purely commercial purpose. For example, companies of all types routinely provide placements for student interns.
Employees always have to divide their time equitably over a whole patient floor or full caseload.
Whether successful grant writing or earned profit is the bottom line, much of the work volunteers do would never be in the budget anyway. The key to avoiding the ethical pitfalls of misusing donated time is to be thoughtful about why, when and how volunteers are recruited to help an organization. It is not necessarily wrong to ask someone to support a for-profit setting and it is not invariably right to ask someone to do anything at all for a nonprofit setting. It is important that any recruits be informed about the type of organization inviting their help. But, in the last analysis, the choice should always belong to the volunteer.