As an employer, employee or CEO, you may wonder how your company can make a difference in your community. Your efforts, no matter what route you choose, can mean a lot to other members of the surrounding area and influence other businesses to do the same.
Using corporate philanthropy in your workplace can make your company a valuable pillar in your community while creating a strong bond with your fellow employees. Take a look at the benefits of corporate philanthropy that can make a difference in the world through your company's efforts!
What Is Corporate Philanthropy?
Corporate philanthropy is the practice of building a strong relationship with the surrounding community through donations, charitable events and fundraising opportunities. Employees and family members of those working in the company can participate in these special moments where your organization can be a part of a bigger cause.
The feeling of being involved in charitable events allows all employees to make a significant difference in the community and work as a team to accomplish these goals. Ultimately, these efforts improve workplace culture and unite workers as supportive givers.
Many employees want to start participating in these fundraising opportunities in their workplace. Studies show that 66% of United States workers felt it essential for companies to be philanthropic, and 42% reported that employers should match their employees' charity donations to give back to a more significant cause.
With these statistics in mind, you can spark change in your community with the support and dedication of your valued employees.
How Is Corporate Philanthropy Different From Company Match Giving?
While corporate philanthropy and company match giving can look similar, the outcome in the community differs.
Company match giving is the employer's or CEO's ability to match an employee's donation to a charitable fund. For example, if a worker decides to donate $50 to help aid in cancer research, the company would match this contribution by giving $50 toward the same cause. While this type of charity is still beneficial, this action is more individual-focused than driven by making a true difference in the community.
On the other hand, corporate philanthropy is a company-wide effort to participate in the cause itself. Partnering with an organization that supports a change, hosting a fundraiser or raising awareness in the community improves employee engagement to unite the team around a shared passion for giving back to others in need.
When to Get Involved: Examples of Corporate Philanthropy
All year round, there are several opportunities to start encouraging corporate philanthropy in your workplace to benefit a cause. Summer is the perfect time to donate to an aquatic wildlife foundation to save endangered species or coral reefs. The holidays are great for hosting a drive and donating toys and clothes to children in need, a local children's hospital or foster families in your community. These are only a few examples of ways you can make a genuine difference through the actions of your fellow employees.
Partnerships are also an excellent way to keep up to date on beneficial volunteering opportunities that significantly impact organizations and causes worldwide. A few examples of partnerships you and your company can join during various parts of the year include:
- Four Diamonds' Play For The Kids™: During September, you can encourage your fellow employees to participate in fun activities to promote online and raise donations for Childhood Cancer Awareness Month. Host a sports tournament in your workplace, update the company's social media with employees' fitness activities or have an ice cream social in the neighborhood for all to enjoy and share online. These efforts are fun for everyone and can raise awareness for kids who might not be able to participate in these activities.
- Round Up Campaigns: Even the smallest donations can spark change in your community. Encourage your fellow employees to round up their totals at the local grocery store so they can donate to a worthy cause in the area or nationwide. These efforts can take a few seconds out of your day but significantly impact someone else's life who could use the support.
- Jersey Mike's Month of Giving: During March, you and your co-workers can host a sub luncheon or a community-wide sub-sale with Jersey Mike's, where each meal supports a local charity. Members of your organization and others living in the area can enjoy a tasty sub while making a difference.
Why Participate: The Competitive Advantage and Benefits of Including Philanthropy in Your Company Operations
The benefits of corporate philanthropy can range from increasing corporate employee engagement to improving the quality of life for those in need.
Even when these opportunities sound positive for your company, you might wonder how to encourage these efforts in your workplace. Luckily, there are numerous advantages of corporate philanthropy you can discuss with your employees that can enable them to participate in a company-wide change to benefit the community.
The following strategic philanthropy examples and benefits can help unite the workplace and make a difference.
1. Strategic Philanthropy Increases Employee Engagement
Before finding a specific cause to support along with your fellow employees, evaluate the company's culture to match a similar value from charity organizations in your area or nationwide. Donating to any cause is beneficial, but you can encourage a more notable change by including your company's mission statement or daily mindset. Establishing similar goals that your company and a charity share allow employees to relate and see the reason to participate in these efforts.
For example, suppose your organization values teamwork and building a better future for the next generation. In that case, you can find a partnership that supports planting trees around the surrounding neighborhood through group volunteering. If your mission statement revolves around innovation and spreading optimism throughout the community, your company can learn how to help kids fighting cancer so they can have a bright outlook on life.
When you engage in strategic philanthropy like the examples above, you can find countless ways to improve employee engagement since they can work together toward a positive change they're familiar with at work and after clocking out. An impressive 93% of employees who volunteer with their company report being happier in the workplace. With the chance to increase employee engagement and retention, you can also increase volunteering within the workplace by encouraging everyone to vote together on a cause they want to support the most.
2. You Can Build a Better Workplace Culture
Teamwork creates a strong bond between employees because they have a similar goal to work toward during and after hours. Through regularly scheduled charitable efforts from all workers within the company, positive group interactions and close bonds begin to form automatically. Passion and shared experiences truly work like magic in the workplace.
Volunteering or donating to a cause that connects with your company can bring these benefits to your workplace culture:
- Encourage leadership skills: Success of a charitable project is possible with the help of a passionate, dedicated and experienced leader to hold the reigns. Assigning a leader to each event the company sponsors allows one employee to feel personally connected to the cause while arranging an effective effort toward making a difference in the community. Everyone can have the chance to be a leader through various charitable opportunities, creating a positive, eager and heartfelt workplace culture among employees.
- Gain a broader perspective of the community: It's easy to clock in and out of work without taking in the surrounding environment outside the company building. Working with your co-workers in a fundraiser or charity event can open your eyes to the needs of the community. When you recognize the efforts you and your co-workers can put toward making the surrounding area a better place, you can create a dedicated workplace culture supporting the same effort as a team.
- Relate to co-workers through shared experiences: Volunteering can happen through various projects your company organizes. While you can contribute to these events, discussing with your fellow employees how they can relate to the shared volunteering experience is essential. Maybe they feel deeply for the cause of benefiting the environment, the lives of community members or the company's future. These conversations give you a chance to look at your co-workers as individuals with deep values that you share, building a stronger workplace culture bond.
3. You Get to Give Back to Your Community
Many employees value having a way to connect to their workplace on an emotional level. While you continue to support your company through your daily efforts as an employee, you can dedicate a portion of your personal life to making a difference in the community that supports your business daily.
Several fundraising opportunities rely on social media posts and shares. Your online efforts can create a domino effect, influencing other companies to make a difference in their own community. A simple repost or sharing a story on your online profile can raise awareness about the cause you're supporting, increasing the information people receive about the event and how it can benefit the community.
Customers and clients of your company can also see the efforts that employees make to benefit the community, which is incredibly important for those who invest time and money into the products or services you offer. The more support you receive from your consumers, the more you can give back to the community as an organization. Encourage customers to donate to the same cause, or spread information about future charity events they can participate in during their free time.
4. It's Easy to Involve Everyone
One of the most significant ways to increase employee engagement in your workplace is company-wide charity efforts. Involving every employee, representative and founder can quickly lead to change and influence a positive role within the community as an organization. Volunteering for a good cause can give the company a sense of purpose outside of gaining profits, which makes working feel more personal when you strive toward a shared goal with other employees.
Charity efforts and volunteering can be fun for everyone who wants to make a bigger impact on the community! Host a project that lets your co-workers make a change in someone's life and have a good time outside work.
How to Pair Corporate Giving Initiatives and Philanthropy Events
While donating to a cause of any kind is important for any company, you can look at your organization's values and find a partnership that reflects this culture.
Some companies decide on their partnerships by what their employees have experienced in their personal lives. If your co-worker has a child living with cancer, you can learn how to help kids fighting cancer to support that individual in the workplace and their home life. Through hosted fundraisers or charitable events involving the whole company, your efforts can raise awareness and funds for cancer research while showing your co-worker how much you care for their family.
You can also use your community as inspiration for your company's next charitable event. Suppose reconstruction could benefit local homes or establishments. In that case, you can help organize a company-wide volunteering day for a clean-up and building project that can speed up the timeline for new structures in the area.
Don't be afraid to ask your co-workers what local and national partnerships they feel strongly toward that also speak to your company's values and culture!
Improve Employee Engagement With a Corporate Philanthropy Partnership Today
You can make a difference in your community and workplace by learning about corporate philanthropy opportunities through Four Diamonds. There are countless ways to spark change for children in need, including hosting a benefit in their honor, supporting student leadership initiatives and coming together as a team to create unique events to raise awareness for childhood cancer.
With these company-wide possibilities for charity, you can unite your fellow employees in a sincere effort to make the world a better place. Join other companies in supporting children fighting cancer, a cause that benefits the future of kids worldwide.
Your company's thoughtful contributions will allow children to receive the superior care they need to feel comfort and support during their treatment. Donations and fundraising efforts help ensure that no Four Diamonds family will have to see a bill for their child's cancer care, as we're committed to covering 100% of our families' out-of-pocket medical expenses.
Your support also impacts the lives of children across the globe. The generous donations from companies and individual contributions fund pediatric cancer research through Four Diamonds' vast network of researchers and consortiums. As a member of several national consortiums, your efforts support innovative research that is finding answers to the medical field's life-saving questions about cancer.
No matter the difference you make in your community alongside your company, we appreciate your efforts toward a brighter future. Contact us today to become a partner in the fight against childhood cancer and learn more about how you can make a difference in the life of a child.