We know that giving back and volunteering together unites people around a common purpose, giving them the opportunity to connect at the deepest levels of human meaning. This is true for us as individuals, and it’s true for us when we come together in community, whether that’s in our lives as private and public citizens, or in our workplace.
The time is right for us to increase our commitment to coming together in service to our world, to innovating together, and to engaging as communities of shared purpose in acts of compassion and kindness towards our fellows.
We often talk here at Causecast about the fact that employee engagement derived from social impact improves meaning and connection at work. Your social good efforts are not only beneficial for talent attraction and retention, they’re intimately tied to productivity and the business bottom line. They are key to building your authentic brand as a force for good in the world, and to sharing stories that inspire and engage other companies to do the same. In my mind, there is no doubt that doing good is literally the “how” in how the highest performing businesses are working today, and will only become more central to corporate missions as we move into the future. It is not a “by-the-way”. It’s core to all successful business strategies.
Given the growing importance of giving back and the increasing demands of our communities, there is an urgent need to equip leaders with the skills they will need to perform at their very best today and to think strategically to meet the challenges of the future.
That’s one of the main reasons I’m proud today to share that this year, Causecast is increasing our commitment to the way we serve the world. We are transforming our annual conference -- an event previously open only to our customers and close partners -- into a full-day learning event that will help leaders in the CSR, employee giving and volunteering, talent diversity and social impact professions dramatically increase their awareness, understanding and practical skills as leaders.
Together, we can do so much more. It’s time to take our collective knowledge and skills into the world and bring them to bear on the challenges and issues we all care deeply about.
The +IMPACT Conference will bring together over 100 industry professionals for a day of inspirational keynote speakers, powerful breakout workshops and expert best practice sharing and networking:
- We’ll help give voice to some of the most critical issues affecting our local and global landscapes
- We’ll inspire with experiences and stories of some of the most cutting-edge trends in the space
- We’ll share practical ideas to enhance employee communication and activation
- We’ll offer strategies for securing senior leadership buy-in and budgetary support
- We’ll offer new insights into exploring and using data and metrics
You can learn more and register for the event here today.
Are you feeling hesitant about if it’s the right time for you to expand your horizons, develop and enhance your skills and make vital new connections and step into your full potential as a social impact leader?
Look internally at your company and your programs and it’s going to become clear: your time is now. According to UnitedHealth Group’s 2013 Health and Volunteering Study, “64% of employees who currently volunteer said that volunteering with work colleagues strengthened their relationships.”
And, according to Double the Donation:
- 65% of Fortune 500 companies offer matching gift programs
- 59% provided paid-release time volunteer programs in 2013
- 50% provided pro bono service programs in 2013
- 40% offer volunteer grant programs
- Over 18 million individuals work for companies with matching gift programs. An estimated $6-$10 billion in matching gift funds goes unclaimed per year.
- Corporations gave over $17.8 billion to charities in 2014, a 13.7% year-over-year increase
Research has evolved to show that employee giving and volunteering programs do affect key business metrics like talent attraction and retention and the bottom line. Based on the CECP’s Giving in Numbers: 2016 Edition, companies that increased total giving between 2013 and 2015 by at least 10% saw higher median growth rates in terms of revenue and pre-tax profit.
What does all this mean?
Expectations of, and demands placed on, giving and volunteering professionals are becoming increasingly more rigorous and sophisticated. According to this report by the CECP, “giving and volunteering teams are not only expanding (full-time equivalent employees rose 3% from 2013 to 2015), but their prominence within the company is rising, with 29% of teams reporting closer alignment with the CEO’s office.” The report also showed teams are being called on to share materially significant data: 56% of companies say their corporate citizenship department provided ESG information to a particular investor or investor relations team.
+IMPACT is designed to give you the skills to overcome these challenges and make a lasting difference by supporting you in strengthening your practical ability to:
- Identify and make sense of global trends
- Solicit employee voice
- Build a nimble program strategy
- Secure stakeholder buy-in and budgetary support
- Measure ongoing program results
- Make decisions that drive process and program improvements
Being a corporate giving and volunteering professional comes with a range of heartfelt, and often heartbreaking, challenges. Practitioners in this space have historically struggled to feel they are making the highest level of contribution they are here to make. We know, because at Causecast, not only do we work with these professionals every day, our team members come from the world of employee giving and volunteering themselves, and we also run our own Causecast team giving and volunteering programs.
And, as I said earlier, I don’t believe that there’s ever been a better time for us to come together than now.
For +IMPACT 2016, we brought together an amazing group of people who are on the cutting edge of social impact and believe in collaborating for good, including:
Nzinga Blake, Creative Content Director of ForGood, American/Sierra Leonean actress and filmmaker, and creator of the “End Ebola Now” and viral #ShakeEbolaOff campaigns.
Matt Bauer, Chief Executive Officer and Co-Founder of Sparrow Mobile, the one-for-one mobile technology company, and one of the founding corporate members who answered President Obama’s Call to Action to join the White House Corporate Partnership for Refugees.
Pravir Malik, Founder and Fractal Architect of Deep Order Technologies, long-time organizational design expert and changemaker, who’s developing an entirely new model, bringing together the sciences of mathematics and mindfulness to transform the way organizations see and listen their way to social impact.
Gina Manis-Anderson, CEO & Founder, and C. Rich Wilson, Chief Operating Officer, of The Savii Group, the company that’s changing the way companies find their purpose, grow their profits, share their stories and track their impact, through proven and cutting-edge practices including augmented Virtual Reality (an experience which they’ll be sharing with our audience.)
Join us at +IMPACT. Learn, grow and share your wisdom and experiences side by side with other corporate giving and volunteering professionals seeking to solve big problems more effectively than they could alone. Through the power of community and collaboration, together we will build new skills and develop enhanced programming that achieves unprecedented impact for the causes and communities our companies and our people are most passionate about. We see a time when companies, and the employees who power them, are able to quickly and seamlessly act as forces for lasting change. And that time is now.
I look forward to seeing and learning from you in Washington, DC on May 15 and 16, 2017.