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Year-Round Commitments to Charity Make Organizations Stronger
January 5, 2012
At AwareBase, we believe in giving back. Not just in giving back in a way that we’re cutting a cheque to a charity every year, but in a way that gets all of our employees on deck and engaged in helping others. It strengthens our organization in very real ways, not the least of which is increased employee engagement. All of the organizations that we give to are charities based in our local community in Edmonton that reach out and help people around the world.
Connecting Rwandans to the Web
Edmonton-based Ubuntu was created to help improve living conditions for victims of the Rwandan genocides in a particular village of 750 named Kimironko. One of the initiatives was to connect to the existing infrastructure with computers to get children onto the Web so that they could learn and be connected to the wider global community. AwareBase helped with this initiative by donating laptops and taking care of shipping them to Rwanda.
Adoption Options
AwareBase similarly provided computer equipment to Edmonton-based charity Adoption Options, a not-for-profit and Alberta’s leading adoption agency, and the pioneer of open adoptions in Canada. Their computer equipment was on “its last legs” and they were very grateful for the gift.
Why Your Organization Should Consider Hands-On Volunteer or Charity Work
There are two reasons for doing it. The first it is too easy to cut a cheque for a charity. Doing something like this is more gratifying and it gets employees involved. For our laptop donations, a few of our employees devoted a couple of hours to getting laptops ready for shipping with fresh software and scrubbed for previous data.
When people rally around a cause, it builds social bonds. This curbs attrition and helps improve employee retention.
The second reason for doing it is a more obvious one, and that is image and marketing. It works on two fronts that way, on future employees who are looking to join us and on helping to strengthen our brand through showcasing our heartfelt commitments. The benefits there are more heavily weighted in advertising ourselves to potential employees, who Google us and see that we are a worthy company to work for and they won’t just be punching a clock. It’s about 80% beneficial on the new employee front and 20% beneficial on the marketing front.
One of our press releases resulted in a half-page article in Alberta Venture magazine, a business magazine that many of our potential clients read. That helped to generate some brand awareness and reinforce our name.
We pick donations of laptops and other computer hardware because our staff of programmers can get very hands-on with the projects. Look at what the strengths are in your company and donate similar products or services that can get your employees on board, and you can enjoy the same benefits while helping out your community and society.