The ultimate guide to Corporate Volunteering

Ebook

The ultimate guide to Corporate Volunteering How to build a winning corporate volunteering program?

Table of Contents What is corporate volunteering and why does it matter?

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What is a corporate volunteering policy?

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What is virtual volunteering?

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Rolling out your volunteering program

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Reporting on your corporate volunteering program

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Corporate volunteering benchmarks

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What is corporate volunteering and why does it matter?

Corporate Volunteering What does it actually mean?

Corporate volunteering is a way for businesses to enable their employees to give back and contribute to communities. It’s usually accompanied by volunteering time off (VTO) or other policies that empower employees to work with a larger purpose outside of their world of work. Corporate volunteering is a pillar of a company’s corporate social responsibility (CSR) and/or employee engagement strategy .

Corporate volunteering programs came about to build more engaged and valued workforces. At the same time, they answered a demand for businesses to be more globally conscious. With 9/10 employees willing to earn less to do more meaningful work and customers being 4-6x more likely to purchase from purpose-driven companies, corporate volunteering programs rose to form a sturdy ESG pillar for our economies and our planet.

Corporate Volunteering - What does it actually mean?

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What are the different types of corporate volunteering?

There are a few different types of corporate volunteering available to businesses. Take a look at what’s available, and consider what would work best for your business model and people structure.

Field volunteering Field volunteering is when employees go directly on site in-person, for example, volunteering at a local soup kitchen, or visiting a retirement home. It’s a popular and engaging way for employees to get out of their day-today routines, while connecting and contributing to a cause.

That’s why it’s a great way for you to engage non-desk employees too. Whether you’re a globally-distributed company or you’re in an industry that doesn’t traditionally host a workforce at a desk, there are plenty of field volunteering options you can include to keep your workforce engaged and filled with purpose.

What are the different types of corporate volunteering?

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Virtual volunteering Online volunteering programs also allow you to unite a fulldistributed workforce or non-desk employees. However, virtual volunteering can be that much more inclusive for those that can’t get to a physical place. It can be hard to unite people worldwide, especially when they’re in exceptionally remote locations. Yet, if they’ve got a good internet connection and time, this type of volunteering could be the perfect fit.

What are the different types of corporate volunteering?

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Skills-based corporate volunteering This type of volunteering refers to specific in-demand skill sets needed to be a success. When many people think about volunteering, they think about the traditionally labor-orientated tasks or field volunteering.

However, particular areas of volunteering require skills that your workforce is in a unique position to deliver.

That’s where skills-based volunteering comes in: It’s when a volunteer uses their knowledge and abilities to benefit a worthy cause, often completed virtually in discrete periods of time.

"We try to encourage skills-based volunteering, because we see a lot of value for our partners and our employees in the skills-based piece. Our employees can choose from a variety of assignments where they can teach, mentor and coach - mostly children or young people because that’s our main target group, but also the staff of the organizations themselves.”

DANIELA BERTOLI

Deputy Director Credit Suisse Foundation

What are the different types of corporate volunteering?

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For example, mentoring or coaching youth or other beneficiaries to enter the professional world, translating documents or a website, or preparing communications like external newsletters or designing a brochure. It’s a valuable way to develop employees’ skills while helping the community. PwC did precisely that with their skillbased volunteering program, as did Johnson & Johnson.

Corporate volunteering programs bring a structure to the type of volunteering that fits best with your business, its people, and the employee purpose program you’re developing. Your plan should aim to tie preferences together and offer volunteering opportunities that are interesting and attainable for all employees.

What are the different types of corporate volunteering?

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What are the benefits of corporate volunteering?

There’s an entire world of benefits out there for your business to start a corporate volunteering program.

Employer branding & recruitment Deloitte found, nearly two-thirds of Gen Y employees prefer employers that let them volunteer skills.

Simultaneously, 83% of Gen Z candidates say a company’s commitment to diversity and inclusion is essential when selecting their next employer.

Your volunteering program can help lift your employer reputation and competitive hiring position to better appeal to those candidates looking for purpose-driven companies.

What are the benefits of corporate volunteering?

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Talent Attraction Employer branding aside, if you’re offering a skills-based volunteering program, it can be an extremely appealing factor for talent on their roadmap to upskilling and reskilling.

Plus, 73% of adults said they would not apply to a company whose values do not align with their own. It’s hard to grab the attention of top talent. Yet, if you’re playing your cards right—with this strategy—it can certainly help.

What are the benefits of corporate volunteering?

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Positive impact Of course, we cannot forget the genuine positive impact for our planet and its people each and every volunteering program can achieve.

For example, Adidas is “driving innovative sustainable solutions designed to transform our industry and our planet.” Anne Lewis Strategies “strive to increase inclusion, equity, and justice around the world.” Ben & Jerry’s “stand together for refugees, so that all the world’s people have a home, safe home.”

Little or large, companies across the globe are making positive impacts that resonate with their mission, vision, and employees.

What are the benefits of corporate volunteering?

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Investor appeal The CEO of Blackrock, Larry Fink, stressed climate change efforts for new investments. While T. Rowe Price said, ESG disclosure was now the number one topic for its engagements with company management.

Plus, a Morgan Stanley survey showed 80% of asset owners are integrating ESG into the investment process, up 10% since 2017. There’s no questioning the pressure on —and from—investors for companies to be developing strategies in line with CSR and ESG, like volunteering programs.

What are the benefits of corporate volunteering?

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Engaged workforce People who say they are living their purpose at work have 4x higher engagement. Corporate volunteering programs are most successful when they emerge from your business purpose, and you manage to get everyone on board. Plus, employees who can act pro-socially show increased levels of affective commitment to their organisation.

Once you’ve convinced your CEO to focus on a best-inclass volunteering program, you’ll see a more engaged, happier, and effective workforce.

Consumer engagement 60% of Millennials and Gen Z customers say they plan to buy from businesses that have taken care of workforces and helped society during the pandemic. Customers are more aware than ever of businesses’ CSR intent, and if they disapprove, they’ll let you know!

What are the benefits of corporate volunteering?

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Corporate volunteering benefits for employees It doesn’t stop at benefits to businesses to introduce a volunteering strategy. There are plenty of benefits for employees, all of which will improve their work and general lifestyle.

Soft skills Things like public speaking, communication, teamwork, adaptability, problem-solving, work ethic, and time management are all soft skills that volunteering opportunities can help toward.

Johnson & Johnson implemented a corporate volunteering program that helps their employees “develop new perspectives and stretch their skills”— Emelie Dorlin, Senior Manager, Community Impact, Johnson & Johnson Switzerland.

Accenture found 76% of volunteers say they developed core work skills. Some of these core skills are developed around “intentional moments of critical reflection and sense making.” When these sorts of skills are learned by your business leaders, they become more responsible and adaptable workers—enabling them to contribute your company’s overall resiliency.

Corporate volunteering benefits for employees

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Wellbeing Employees who say they work with a sense of purpose report 5x higher levels of wellbeing in the workplace. This is due to a similar brain chemical to endorphins which is released when doing a good deed—it’s otherwise known as the helper’s high.

"Employees whose employers implement volunteering programs are more engaged and report higher levels of both autonomy and support from their co-workers and supervisors.”

FRONTIERS IN PSYCHOLOGY There’s no arguing that corporate volunteering programs promote positive workplaces and mindsets for employees. In fact, 89% of employees reported increased job satisfaction.

Corporate volunteering benefits for employees

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Mental health A whopping 99% of employers and 97% of workers agree that businesses are responsible for employee mental health. Connecting employees with mental health awareness organisations or purpose-driven nonprofits can help raise awareness around the topic and improve employee mental health.

The American Journal of Preventive Medicine found that adults over 50 volunteering 2 hours a week or more have: Reduced risk of mortality Greater physical activity Greater psychological outcomes: optimism and a sense of purpose Corporate volunteering initiatives also help combat loneliness. Loneliness can affect personal and professional wellbeing, yet it’s one of the biggest problems with remote workforces. Corporate volunteering programs can help combat this and give employees a common ground to connect—outside the workplace. This helps employees feel connected, surrounded and helps tackle loneliness.

Corporate volunteering benefits for employees

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Living with purpose 72% of the next generation of workers, students, said a job where they can make an impact is important to their happiness. The benefit you can bring as an employer to helping your employees find their purpose is undeniable.

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"Our program has evolved over the last 25 years from a philanthropy program towards a sustainable skills-based model that aims to generate long-term impact for communities. Our employees decide how, when, and where they engage with local or global communities.

We call it ‘Engage With Responsibility.’ The objectives are to create meaningful, measurable impact for associates, for Novartis, our partners and society.”

ESTELLE ROTH

Global Head Engagement and Volunteering at Novartis

Corporate volunteering benefits for employees

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Benefits of corporate volunteering to nonprofits and society When partnered well, nonprofits can see massive benefits from corporate volunteering programs.

Firstly, if the nonprofit truly resonates with your business’s mission and employees’ purpose, you’ll have a more engaged and dedicated workforce to see your volunteering program succeed. 77% of nonprofits believe that skilled volunteers can significantly improve their organisation’s business practices; it’s just making the match. What’s important to remember here is to partner with the nonprofit and understand their needs.

Secondly, the nonprofit will reach a new audience that’s equally as passionate about their cause as they are. It gives the nonprofit the exposure they otherwise never have had. The same can be said for a societal need; it’s just a case of finding a cause that resonates.

Benefits of corporate volunteering to nonprofits and society

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What are the costs of corporate volunteering programs to companies?

When leadership hears ‘program,’ their mind jumps to resources. How much will it cost? How much time will it take away from your current responsibilities? That’s okay; it’s understandable.

Of course, building a meaningful and impactful employersupported volunteering program is not something that will come entirely free. It requires a certain level of financing to organise and manage. It also means you’ll lose hand-on staff hours throughout the year. However, the ROI it can bring to your bottom line financials due to a more engaged, loyal, and purposeful workforce is well worth it.

Research suggests that companies with good volunteering programs spend roughly $179 per employee per year (regardless of whether an employee is volunteering or not). When we compare this with an average of $1201 per year per employee that undergoes a skills-based training program—corporate volunteering schemes are barely a dent in the budget. For the skills and other benefits they can give back, it’s well worth the investment.

What are the costs of corporate volunteering programs to companies?

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Quartz at Work found those companies with an active volunteering program have more engaged, productive, and loyal employees. When we compare this with other research, our financial returns start to look a lot better.

The Society for Human Resource Management (SHRM) estimates the average cost to replace an employee is around 6-9 months of their salary. So strategies you can create that revolve around retaining talent are well worth the time.

No matter how much your business is making, when you start applying figures like the above, it’s clear the financial benefits your business can reap against the costs of starting a corporate volunteering program.

What are the costs of corporate volunteering programs to companies?

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What is a corporate volunteering policy?

You need a company volunteer policy to protect all stakeholders within your volunteer scheme. From nonprofits to volunteers, your brand reputation to your investors’ reputation—a volunteer policy will ensure everyone is aligned and covered. It helps to manage expectations for all parties.

At the same time, there are plenty of benefits to a corporate volunteering scheme, which can help to flesh out your CVP. Plus, this type of policy lets your volunteers know you’re taking volunteering seriously. Lastly, this policy adds a layer of formality to your volunteering scheme and should help cover your business if there is a legal dispute.

If you’re not in a position to start writing your volunteer policy, then no problem. You can skip the next part of the article and jump straight into different types of volunteer policy examples for some inspiration.

What is a corporate volunteering policy?

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Things to consider when writing a policy When you set off writing your corporate volunteering policy, you need to consider a few steps along the way.

By covering these steps when writing your policy, you’ll be sure your policy is as much of a success as it can be.

1. Align volunteering efforts with Employee Purpose or CSR program 2. Identify the benefits of hosting a volunteer program 3. Define key stakeholders 4. Define project scope, resources, cost & budget 5. Set the project plan 6. Write a policy that’s simple & clear (KISS principle) 7. Communicate your policy

How to structure your policy The shorter you can make your policy without missing essential information, the better. Your policy is here to be read by as many people involved as possible; it’s important to be cautious of their time —and their attention spans!

Things to consider when writing a policy

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Chapters to include in your policy Introduction What does your organisation do, and what CSR efforts do you have that align with your mission? How do you hope your volunteering scheme will double-down on these efforts?

Showcase the importance of volunteers to the success of your project/s. Your introduction sets the tone for the rest of the document. Keep your sentences short and concise, be clear with your messaging and avoid industry jargon. This is where you need to get people hooked enough to read the rest of your policy.

Put top-level volunteer benefits and offerings here. Are you giving paid time off? Are you rewarding volunteer champions in some way? Bullet these benefits in your introduction. Give a holistic overview of your volunteering policy.

Chapters to include in your policy

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"Our approach is to offer one day per year for our employees to engage in a social or environmental concrete field action. Globally, we have five scopes of action that are quite broad, to allow each country to cover them depending on the local context and needs.

Our five are: acting for employment, disability, fighting exclusion, intergenerational solidarity, and environment.

Most of our actions must be accessible to the majority in order to maximise participation. In addition to Citizen Day, the Group is suggesting new ways and forms of solidarity engagement which we are currently considering in a near future.”

DANIELLE BRYNER

Corporate Communications & Sustainability Director, L’Oréal Switzerland

Chapters to include in your policy

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Volunteer recruitment & registration Define how your business will go about recruiting volunteers for your cause/s. How vigorous will your selection process be? It’s also a good idea to get a little more technical in this section. If you’re able to map out the recruitment workflow down to the tools you’re using, then this is the moment to do it.

Remember that certain volunteering schemes require specific skill sets, or perhaps even background checks if your volunteers are working with vulnerable people. This chapter is the place to put all of this important info.

It’s also a good idea to include the volunteer registration process here. This registration process should include important info like: How to ask for leave and who to ask for approval Where to input information on your volunteer request Volunteer days offered and how they can coincide with teammates Donation matching applications Work hours requests and out of work requests Volunteer event specifics: guests, budgets, location etc.

Chapters to include in your policy

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Be as inclusive as possible in this chapter.

Put policies in place for all types of employees, including non-desk or shift workers. When it comes to recruitment & registration, which types of workers are eligible?

For example, do part-time workers or contractors have the same policy as full-time employees?

Chapters to include in your policy

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Volunteer training Even if your volunteering scheme doesn’t require volunteers with a great number of technical skills, or skills in certain areas, there’s still a need for training. Your volunteers are out there representing your company; whether they're doing fieldwork or virtual volunteering, your business reputation is in their hands.

At the same time, these volunteers will be exposed to new situations and environments. Perhaps their volunteering program will require them to use new tools and tech they’re not familiar with. This chapter outlines the volunteer training that all volunteers will receive as well more specific training volunteers will go through to participate in niche services.

Chapters to include in your policy

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Expenses & reimbursement Your volunteers are already considering donating their time, knowledge, and labour to help your causes. It’s a lot to ask of someone, but many are more than happy to do it. Therefore, it’s important to manage expectations when it comes to financial support for volunteering efforts.

Will your business support volunteers with travel costs, meals eaten during fieldwork, and any other expenses deemed necessary for volunteers to successfully do their work?

Define the financial support all volunteers will receive and the process for each. If they’re spending their own cash, volunteers want to know when they can expect to be reimbursed, as well as how to go about that reimbursement process.

Chapters to include in your policy

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Volunteer champions A volunteer scheme will introduce new cross-team collaboration, as well as new micro-hierarchies within your business. Your volunteer policy should provide an overview of who volunteers can turn to and for what, within the company. Plus, let them know who is managing the overall volunteer scheme.

This may be a good time to identify your volunteering champions or ambassadors. These are not necessarily people in management positions. However, the people are packed with knowledge and are normally more than willing to help the volunteering scheme succeed.

Identify, and recognise these champions. Check with them first that they’re happy to be named as a resource, and if they are, give a note of thanks to them in your policy.

Chapters to include in your policy

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Health, safety & insurance Your volunteer scheme may involve volunteers participating outside of their traditional settings. Field volunteering may require employees going to new environments, using new modes of transport, and doing things they’re not used to.

It’s not necessarily dangerous, but you need to assure volunteers that they’ll be covered by insurance if something were to happen. At the same time, link to your health and safety training resources so volunteers can prepare themselves as best as possible.

Clearly outline your insurance policy or insurance coverage that all volunteers receive so they can volunteer with peace of mind.

Complaints procedures As much as we’d love to think our corporate volunteer scheme will run smoothly, things happen, problems arise, and complaints may need to be addressed. That’s okay; each one is a learning curb for improving your policies, training, and relationships with stakeholders.

Chapters to include in your policy

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Let employees know that if they’re ever unhappy, have a problem, or would like to make a complaint about their experience that it’s okay, and you’re listening. Outline the procedures they’ll need to go through, provide contact details, and give them a timeline they can expect to hear back from you.

Confidentiality & sensitive information This is largely depending on the type of volunteering you have available. However, there’s a chance your employees will be presented with sensitive information. If so, it’s important to involve a confidentiality agreement in your policy for the safety of the people and nonprofits you’re helping. This will make everyone feel better and more secure about the work they’re doing.

Chapters to include in your policy

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What is virtual volunteering?

Virtual volunteering benefits are largely the same as traditional volunteering benefits, as long as you’re delivering a successful volunteering scheme. You should begin to see a lift in: Employee engagement Employee purpose Employee retention & acquisition Brand sentiment Investor appeal Employer branding Bottom-line ROI Employee upskilling Aside from the traditional CSR benefits corporate volunteering can bring, there are a few benefits unique to virtual efforts.

What is virtual volunteering?

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Benefits to virtual volunteering

Employee and contractor inclusivity

Your business will be able to include more contractors and remote employees than you were before. People are no longer limited to their geographical location—which often meant that exceptionally ‘remote’ employees missed out on these team-building opportunities. In turn, this will build stronger links and bonds between teams that live across different locations.

Health & safety Given the world’s ever-changing situation, virtual events are much more safety-conscious as they are all done in the comfort of someone’s home.

Flexibility One of the biggest issues with in-person volunteering events was logistics; timings, travel, time-zones, seasonality, calendar availability. It was a lot to coordinate, and the slightest thing could throw out the timings and success of an entire group.

Benefits to virtual volunteering

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Virtual events are that much more flexible, some volunteering efforts are not time-specific, and there certainly won’t be any chance of traffic!

Nonprofit reach Taking your volunteering efforts online means you suddenly cast your CSR net globally. You’re no longer limited to fieldwork for those nonprofits within a 3-5 mile radius of your office. Now you can take your pick of global nonprofits that resonate best with your employees and your company mission and find online ways to support them.

Nonprofits benefit more Skills-based volunteering is more beneficial for nonprofits.

Hands-on volunteering has been valued at an estimated 25$ per hour, whereas skills-based volunteering is estimated at 195$ per hour. That’s a 680% increase in dollar-value—hinting at the overall value for nonprofits.

Simply put, your employees have a massive chance to make even more impact.

Benefits to virtual volunteering

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Requires less volunteer time off (VTO) 89% of companies offer paid volunteer time off for volunteer programs or at least flexible scheduling.

However, usually, VTO takes into account travel time, lunch breaks, and other factors. An employee could be losing an entire working day for volunteering efforts that only take three hours.

Digital volunteering eradicates buffer hours, allowing employees to be as efficient as possible with their VTO.

Virtual volunteering ideas

Virtual brainstorming sessions

Brainstorming sessions are a sprint-like event where a group of talented individuals combine their skill-sets to solve specific issues a nonprofit organisation is facing.

These sessions are much like the hackathons of the design world but are usually with a larger net of talent.

Virtual volunteering ideas

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For example, PwC Switzerland shifted their usually inperson teambuilding Intern Day to a virtual brainstorming session. Across the span of an afternoon, the interns combined their skill-sets and knowledge to help solve problems for causes from medical research to the environment, from Laos to Switzerland.

Virtual volunteering ideas

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DIY online workshops DIY workshops typically consist of hosting workshops in your home or office, encouraging people to rally together, build and distribute something for a good cause. Your DIY workshop can be with a close-knit circle of people or in a digital space, whatever is available to you.

For example, Clean The World allows you to build ‘soap saves lives’ boxes.

Employees can now order their DIY kits to their home and switch the box building session to online calls. This way, everyone can still participate, teams are no longer restricted by geography, and multiple organisations in need can benefit from a team’s efforts.

Virtual volunteering ideas

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Support for the elderly or isolated A big fear of virtual volunteering is that it always needs to be skill-orientated. It doesn’t! There are plenty of volunteering opportunities out there that require time and a kind heart. Supporting the elderly or those that are isolated is exactly one of these cases.

For example, your team can create holiday greeting cards or thank you cards for people who are isolated or away from their loved ones, such as people in retirement homes. Many nonprofits are looking for volunteers to pick up the phone and simply have a conversation with the person on the other end. It doesn’t take much to do and can dramatically improve someone’s day.

Virtual volunteering ideas

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Virtual cleanups Possibly one of the most satisfying volunteering projects for instant results. These cleanups can also shift to online and socially distanced or household efforts. This doesn’t mean they need to be a lonely affair.

For example, Drains to Ocean provides clean up kits you can have sent to your employees to focus on their microcommunities. Barrel Bag hosted a digital event, educating people on plastic pollution and how people can become environmental advocates in their daily lives at home.

Cleanups will not stop, they’ll adapt.

Virtual volunteering ideas

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Another great example of virtual cleanups is pick-up trash bingo. It’s a way to gamify your teams’ efforts while uniting people if they cannot do the clean-up side by side, or participate in breakout groups rather than full teams. The bingo challenge acts like real-life bingo but with certain items of trash instead of numbers, take a look at the example below. BINGO!

Virtual volunteering ideas

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Online coaching Coaching is a relatively simple volunteering opportunity that you can shift online. Especially if it’s a one-to-one coaching experience. Online coaching can utilise popular video platforms like Zoom, Google Hangouts or Skype. Or, as a mentoring service, you can use email and phone calls.

Coaching the unemployed For example, the employment delegation of the social cohesion department in the city of Vernier is looking for business professionals to help simulate interviews for job seekers. Or, simply lend advice on a job seekers CV and professional growth plan. Your employees don’t need to be experts; they’ll surprise themselves by how much they know from personal experience.

Virtual volunteering ideas

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Career coaching teens This nonprofit allows you to coach young people that are looking to start their careers. They will present their ideas and visions based on their strengths, upon which you’ll provide feedback and suggestions for their best growth path.

Virtual volunteering ideas

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Online coaching Coaching is a relatively simple volunteering opportunity that you can shift online. Especially if it’s a one-to-one coaching experience. Online coaching can utilise popular video platforms like Zoom, Google Hangouts or Skype. Or, as a mentoring service, you can use email and phone calls.

Coaching the unemployed For example, the employment delegation of the social cohesion department in the city of Vernier is looking for business professionals to help simulate interviews for job seekers. Or, simply lend advice on a job seekers CV and professional growth plan. Your employees don’t need to be experts; they’ll surprise themselves by how much they know from personal experience.

Career coaching teens This nonprofit allows you to coach young people that are looking to start their careers. They will present their ideas and visions based on their strengths, upon which you’ll provide feedback and suggestions for their best growth path.

Virtual volunteering ideas

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Career coaching aspiring professionals Nonprofits like Mary’s Place are on the hunt for people from all walks of life and in all types of careers. They hope to guide and provide insight to other individuals seeking a career in similar industries.

You can record a video about your professional experience and how you prepared for your first few interviews. Then, submit them to the nonprofit. It’s a great option if you’re struggling with lining your calendar up with a particular incentive, as it’s something you can do in your own time.

A day in the life coaching Other nonprofits, like Tower Hamlets in the UK, are determined to give young people valuable insights from those who have walked the path before them. The coaching volunteer opportunity allows you to inspire and tell your story to primary or secondary children. It also aims to broaden knowledge and horizons by sharing stories from different cultures with children that have not been exposed to them previously.

Virtual volunteering ideas

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Raise awareness and funds virtually There are plenty of ways you can raise funds or awareness for your Purpose campaigns. What’s more, these efforts don’t always need to be in real life. Virtual events are continually thriving, and with the right promotion and message behind them, they can do a great job of helping you hit your goals.

For example, the team from reinsurance company SCOR hosted a virtual sleepout to raise awareness and funds for Covenant House International: supporting young people overcoming homelessness. For a night, the entire team ‘slept out’ of their bedrooms. Some slept in other areas of their homes, while others took it to their gardens. The team managed to raise $23,000 for their cause.

Virtual volunteering ideas

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"Every year since the SCOR team has participated in the Reinsurance Sleep Out for Covenant House, I always come away feeling that I receive as much as I give.

I feel fortunate to be able to contribute to Covenant House’s efforts.”

JEAN PAUL CONOSCENTE SCOR Global P&C CEO

Virtual volunteering ideas

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Things to consider when implementing virtual volunteering Virtual volunteering needs due consideration when you’re setting up processes. There’s a lot that will be different compared to your hands-on volunteering opportunities.

It’s important to keep in mind it’s not always about sharing skills. Whether someone doesn’t feel like they have the skills to volunteer online or simply wants something less mentally taxing, there are plenty of other opportunities out there.

Feel free to use this part of the article as your checklist for setting up a virtual volunteering strategy.

Technology & tools First thing’s first, do you have the tech and tools to get your work done? Doing this manually can be timeconsuming, hard to roll out, and may not provide you with valuable data insights.

Ensure you have the necessary tools, like Alaya, to facilitate volunteering activities easily. Enable people to find and register for virtual volunteering opportunities that resonate with them. Your tool also needs to track and report on the impact of your program and your volunteers.

Things to consider when implementing virtual volunteering

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Internet access This is specifically the case for non-desk employees, who generally have limited or no internet needs for their work.

If your workforce is in an area with limited internet access, you’ll need to keep this in mind for your virtual volunteering activities. This doesn’t mean to say those employees can’t participate, but you’ll need to create other ways they can participate that don’t rely on highspeed wifi.

For example, where information can be shared and referred to asynchronously, give people a central place to get the information needed. This way, you include everyone across time zones, shift patterns, and general calendar availability.

Think of those projects or goals ‘offline’ employees can work on without the internet to contribute towards a larger scheme online. Try to include them as much as possible in a way that facilitates their circumstances.

Things to consider when implementing virtual volunteering

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Volunteering guidelines As the way we volunteer shifts, our guidelines, processes and policies need to shift too. If you’ve got guidelines from your in-person volunteering efforts give them a thorough update.

These guidelines will include a code of conduct, VTO rules, and new communication processes. Ensure everyone is up-to-date, so we can focus on doing great things, not how we do them.

Pro Tip: You’ll also need to create unique guidelines for your volunteer ambassadors or champions. Show and empower them to lead the way so that others follow their example.

Accessible causes Depending on your resources will affect how much you can put into finding causes. Look for those causes ready for remote volunteer options. If you have the bandwidth, try to ‘brainstorm’ ways to convert close-to-heart previously hands-on NPOs to digital nonprofits and keep relationships thriving.

Things to consider when implementing virtual volunteering

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Rolling out your volunteering program

Start with your core purpose and values You probably already have these documented in your mission or purpose statement. But, if you don’t, now is the time to do it. The purpose of corporate volunteering and giving programs is to contribute to profit, people, and the planet (the so-called “triple bottom line”), and is often linked to both your CSR and HR strategies.

It’s an effective, authentic way to show your shareholders, customers and employees that you share values and that you take action on those values. Corporate volunteer programs are when companies take a structured approach to implementing a framework or even policies for their employees to volunteer, often with paid time off for volunteering.

When you set your core program principles, be as open and transparent as possible with your organisation about your why. This will help eliminate any scepticism. Show your employees that they can count on your support in leading purpose-driven lives.

Rolling out your volunteering program

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There are a few ways to select what cause to support.

This can be top-down, where you and upper level management can choose the causes. Alternatively, you can survey or talk to your employees to see which causes they want to support or are already supporting. Either way, make sure you share the why behind the causes you want to support.

The best way to go is usually a combination of both: you can have some central campaigns focused on “top-down” causes, while also empowering your employees to choose what causes to support at a local level as well.

Questions to ask at this stage: Are your core values clearly expressed in your mission statement?

Are your employees aware of your values, and do they share them?

Who are your stakeholders, and do they share your purpose and vision?

Where does your company actively volunteer already?

Toward what causes do your employees already actively volunteer?

Are there any themes / patterns in the ways your company and stakeholders are already giving?

Rolling out your volunteering program

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Set your goals Clear and measurable goals are key to launching a successful corporate volunteering program. Consider how your program goals can contribute to your company’s overall strategy and identify metrics to translate these objectives into measurable outcomes.

Here are some examples for inspiration: Reducing turnover Improving your employer brand/gaining recognition as a great place to work or a responsible company Increasing positive impact in the community Increasing participation in your existing giving and volunteering program.

Millennials value social responsibility by default and prefer to work in a purpose-driven workplace than one that pays more. Your workplace volunteering and giving program can become a key factor in recruiting and retaining the best talents in your industry.

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Remember When you set your goals, bear in mind your resources.

How much time will you be able to put into this? What’s your budget? Implementing a best-in-class corporate volunteering and giving program is a journey, you can start with specific projects and then grow it over time to introduce more opportunities for your employees to get involved and maximise your impact.

QUESTIONS TO ASK AT THIS STAGE

What are your company’s short- and long-term goals for a workplace volunteering program?

Who are your stakeholders, and what are their goals?

How are you collecting the data / information on stakeholder goals?

How will you inform and involve employees in these goals?

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Setting up the framework and action plan Now that your purpose and goals are clear, the next steps are to map out your action plan. How are you going to get employees to engage with your program?

Will you launch an annual volunteering day on a specific (or flexible) date per office? Or will it be an ongoing program? Or ideally, a combination of both?

If your CSR strategy is tied to the UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), for instance, you can tie these into your volunteering and giving program. As inspiration: you could launch themed campaigns linked to different SDGs. That way, your employee giving program will be clearly tied to your purpose or CSR strategy.

QUESTIONS TO ASK AT THIS STAGE

How can you tie your employee volunteering program to your CSR goals?

Is it important that you tie your CSR goals into your purpose program?

How will employees participate in the program?

Will employees be able to participate year-round?

Or will it be specific campaigns? Or a mix of both?

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Engage the right teams Setting up a corporate volunteering program is a common effort, and it’s important to involve the right teams from the get-go. We’ve found that buy-in from the following teams is particularly important: Company leadership Executives need to set the tone and lead by example.

They should act as role models by contributing and engaging their teams in the program. When the executive team shows they’re purpose-driven, employees will believe in the program more.

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REMEMBER

Leadership will usually push for a plan that best meets business objectives. It’s important to address them, but also to balance them with the needs of the community and nonprofit partners.

Human resources This team will help create a framework for your company’s corporate giving and volunteering program.

This might be your team, in which case, consider what policy you will put in place to support your employees, and at which moments during the employee experience you’ll embed this program (such as during onboarding of new hires, donation matching, Dollars for Doers, rewards/incentives, or offering paid time off to volunteer).

Internal communications This is vital to ensure clear and aligned communications with employees. With teams spread out across a lot more locations, it’s all the more important to communicate through the right channels to reach them.

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Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) / Sustainability Team or Company foundation This might be your team! This team will ensure the program fits in with your overall CSR strategy. Do you have existing non-profit partners? Are there particular causes to champion? What other CSR initiatives do you have in place?

IT It’s the era of remote and virtual programs. IT will be important for a smooth launch from a technical standpoint, such as compatibility and whitelisting.

Legal Involve them to review data security and privacy requirements, or other legal concerns.

Tip – Present your volunteering program during your onboarding process to new team members. You can even include a ½ day of volunteer work into their first work week, which can show newcomers the importance of helping the community in your organisation.

QUESTIONS TO ASK AT THIS STAGE

Who are the key stakeholders involved?

Who can be responsible or the representative from each department?

What are the goals of each department?

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Engage key internal champions In addition to engaging leadership, communications and HR teams with the program, start looking for key champions at all levels of your organisation. This is particularly important for global programs, so you can best adapt the initiatives to each culture. Their role is to support and advocate for the program internally, to help you to put the program into practice and to adapt it to the local culture.

They may even be able to help you understand the team: would some healthy competition help motivate them? Or might this particular team prefer to collaborate toward a shared purpose? Let them help you understand your employees’ culture at a local level.

This will also save you time, as ambassadors can help you educate and answer any questions from employees. Be sure to train them before the launch, so they are equipped to support your program in the best way. This can be through workshops, webinars, and training videos made available on-demand. If you’re working with a technology partner, this training can sometimes be provided to help you kick-off your program.

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How can you find the key champions?

Look out for colleagues who are committed, passionate about the program, willing to promote it among other employees, and ready to collect feedback and ideas to improve the program. Let them know that this is a valuable growth opportunity to develop their leadership skills in a fun, meaningful way.

This can be your first communication about the program.

Reach out to teams: ask people managers to nominate people on their teams, send out a survey for volunteers in the company, or to start making their teams aware that you’ll need their support.

TOP TIP

Spread out across multiple locations? As a rule of thumb, having at least one champion per office is a good rule of thumb when developing your program.

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In the era of remote working, online volunteering opportunities are even more important than before. So make sure your ambassadors are familiar with online opportunities and knowledgeable enough to be able to help and inspire others to use online tools as well.

Tip – A well-organised and engaged network of champions to support the program before and during the launch can increase participation in the first 3 months by up to 77%.

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Find a digital tool or platform to use In pre-2020 volunteering and giving programs, having a virtual option was a nice-to-have. But today, it’s not as simple as “going volunteering” anymore. It’s important to offer an online option.

Finding a way to make it accessible to everyone, regardless of where they are, is a good way to show your dedication to the cause. There are strong digital platforms to help host and manage your employee giving program, and even more volunteering opportunities online.

A partner can help you find the right causes that are aligned with your company values.

A digital platform lets you reach both desk and non-desk workers. Plus, online solutions let everyone involved see everything that’s happening in real time.

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An online solution has numerous benefits: your employees can easily access and browse through projects, you can centralise and manage the whole program in one place, and you can track the impact of your program and share the results with your organisation.

An online platform also boosts employee engagement, because it makes it easy to log in from anywhere and follow projects in real time even when your teams work remotely. It brings the volunteering options to your employees and makes participation easy.

Further benefits of online platforms Easy way to track employee volunteer hours Keeps donation counts and hours volunteered up to date Track how many people participated No need to manually work through spreadsheets Manage events (physical and virtual) online

Taking your program digital cost savings & benefits DOWNLOAD

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Expand your volunteering options There are plenty of volunteering opportunities available for your work corporate volunteering program. Below, find both online and field volunteering ideas you can implement.

Online, skills-based volunteering is a flexible and impactful way for your employees to help non-profits, regardless of where they’re located. Purpose-driven activities that encourage positive actions and learning also work well here, like involving the team in a sustainability challenge, such as going meatless for a week.

Here are a few examples of projects that can be managed 100% online and that are in high demand from nonprofits.

Some of these are also possible as team activities in the form of an online brainstorming session or even over longer term group work: Preparing communications like external newsletters or designing a brochure Virtual coaching or mentoring Translating documents or a website Creating a financial plan Finding new fundraising sources or preparing grant proposals Conducting an IT audit of technology used

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Field volunteering involves going out to physically help a nonprofit organisation and is also a great way to combine team building with community impact. For example: A Trash Challenge, where employees go to a local park, beach side, or another community area and pick up trash, and leave it better than they found it!

Helping local farmers to maintain their pastures, or cleaning a riverbed to support the ecosystem.

Hosting a workshop to coach people with a migrant background find a job Consider broadening your definition of volunteering to include actions to help colleagues and teammates within your organisation: Weekly online meditation class to your colleagues to relieve stress and improve focus 15-minute workout break for the whole office in the afternoon Online cooking class or book reading for employees’ kids to entertain the whole team’s kids, so they can focus on work Fun, everyday Challenges that teams can do together virtually, like planking every day for a week, or going meatless.

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And lastly, you can organise initiatives to help the community as a whole: Giving blood Collecting food donations or delivering them Helping elderly and risk populations with their pharmacy runs and grocery shopping See what inspires you most, and then set out a plan following the best practices in this article.

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Prepare to launch your event A well-planned communication strategy is key to engaging your employees from day one. And it can all be done online. We’ve found that the most impactful launches are ones where companies have a specific campaign to show their support and is well worth the investment to launch your program on the right foot.

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Here are some ideas for launch activities: Collect testimonials Get testimonials from champions or the management team (or both!) and share them through your social media and internal communications channels. Nothing will convince your employees to participate better than a positive comment from a colleague or leader.

Introduce the program via online workshops Share the objectives of the program. Why would employees want to participate? Include fun activities to get your employees motivated to start contributing to your program.

Some examples of fun activities could be: An interactive online presentation from a nonprofit A “pub quiz” about some of today’s environmental issues Create a video Get together with the leadership team and champions and create a teaser video to get your employees excited about the launch.

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Empower everyone to pick a cause with a voting campaign Give your employees a voice in your program to truly engage them from Day 1, by letting them vote for a cause, for example, from a selection of projects related to your corporate purpose. This works particularly well for donations, which you can also tie in with a donation matching campaign. If you have a grant budget, it’s well worth it!

Match donations over your launch period You can also combine your voting campaign with donation matching, by offer to match donations made during your launch to show your support. As an example, if an employee decides to donate $20 to a Nonprofit close to their heart, the company commits to donate $20 as well, to the same Nonprofit. There are lots of variations with a similar objective, to boost awareness and participation by offering meaningful rewards and incentives to your employees.

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For example: Offer a randomly-assigned donation credit: Employees are randomly assigned a donation credit and find out upon creating their account.

Offer donations for platform signups Plant a tree for good actions taken: Some platforms have built-in gamification elements like a virtual points system that accumulates as your teams take action. You can associate a certain number of points with a tree planted to encourage action!

Step count challenge: Combine wellbeing and positive impact by matching every step taken by your employees with a donation.

Match volunteering hours with donations (aka Dollars for doers) Support employee volunteering with a Dollars for Doers initiative (this can also be a year-long policy), where each hour of volunteering made by an employee is matched with a set donation from your company. For example, for every 1 hour of volunteering, your company can offer $10 the same nonprofit. If you’d like to encourage volunteering, this is a meaningful way to show employees you care about what they care about.

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Reward your early volunteers with meaningful goodies Many nonprofits produce goods like ethically-sourced tea, sustainable notebooks, reusable water bottles, and even upcycled bags! Champion sustainable consumption and offer your first X volunteers these rewards. Not only are you supporting a good cause, and boosting participation, you’re also raising awareness about the causes through their products!

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Reporting on your corporate volunteering program

Corporate volunteering programs are big. While leadership buy-in to launch is key, keeping track of your efforts and showing progress is important so you can keep the momentum. Your company might also have regular CSR or ESG reporting, like the B4SI/LBG or GRI, which your corporate volunteering metrics can contribute to.

Corporate volunteer reporting can help to do a few things: Continue to communicate program benefits for all stakeholders Aid HR with employee recognition and reviews Optimise future CVP efforts and help to benchmark goals Recognise volunteer’s time and effort Contribute toward larger business growth reports Win financial support from leadership for future initiatives That being said, tracking is tricky. For example, when you’re partnering with nonprofit organisations, it depends on whether they have the resources and capabilities to measure the impact. That’s why inputs like volunteering time or donations made can be a good first start to show your commitment and to start connecting the dots toward impact.

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We’re about to dive into 19 quantitative and qualitative metrics you can use to track your program’s success.

Constantly think of how you can align these reporting metrics alongside your program’s initial goals and prove that you’re on to a winning recipe.

Tie your efforts back to the company purpose, greater CSR reporting efforts, and highlight the benefits your corporate volunteering program has brought everyone.

You have the power to positively influence employees stakeholders communities brand customers and so much more. But, if you’re not reporting on your efforts, then no one knows to what effect you’re successful.

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"We try to track as much as we can. We have a long list of KPIs, including impact KPIs, quantitative KPIs, qualitative KPIs, and we really try to bring that together. We want to present hard numbers, but we also need to provide context and the human element, because there are beautiful stories out there. It’s a fine balance between hard numbers, and the more heart-warming and illustrative stories that you want to tell."

DANIELA BERTOLI Deputy Director Credit Suisse Foundation

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Qualitative data to track Qualitative reporting can help to add context and a human element to your quantitative reporting. They can be stand-alone research pieces or come in to support numbers that need a little more explaining.

Employee stories These are the first and possibly the best-written showcase of your corporate volunteering program.

It’s so important to gather employee success stories. Ask employees what they enjoyed about their time volunteering, how it made them feel, and what they think they learned.

These stories will help to entice their peers to the cause, verbalise the employee impact to project stakeholders, and allows employees to better reflect on their experience.

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Nonprofit feedback Nonprofit feedback can also highlight the impact of your volunteering scheme. It can be so valuable for a volunteer to get feedback on their time with a non-profit and better understand what they’ve helped achieve.

Nonprofit feedback can also allow you to improve your working relationships and give the organisations even better-matched volunteers in the future.

Customer-feedback This feedback is best collected with your NPS survey. Ask customers if their perception of your brand has changed since witnessing your corporate volunteering program.

Ask them if they heard about it at all? If they didn't hear about it, how can you change tactics in the future to ensure they do?

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Employee skills utilised or developed A huge benefit to employee volunteering programs is the soft and hard skills they learn when volunteering.

However, measuring these newly-acquired skills can be a tricky task.

It’s a good idea to ask multiple-choice questions or openended questions asking employees what skill sets they feel they’ve learned or improved because of volunteering.

This metric is good for your business to know and also good for employees to realise so they’re more tempted to volunteer again in the future.

Case studies The beautiful moment when all of this data comes together!

Look for opportunities to build corporate volunteering case studies. These case studies can combine all of your quantitative and qualitative data and showcase the goal you hit or mission you’re working towards in one concise piece of work.

Use a mix of visuals, video, copy, and infographics to bring your case study to life.

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Case studies will look very different depending on who they’re for, so think about your reader. Are you building case studies for: Stakeholders Customers Committed volunteers Future volunteers Non-profits Once you’ve understood your audience, you can build case studies that resonate with the things most important to them.

How Frontiers reached over 50% employees through purposedriven employee engagement in 7 months

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Quantitative data to track

Volunteer participation rates

This is a helpful opening statistic to any corporate volunteering success presentation. How many employees are participating in your initiatives?

You can keep track of this figure on spreadsheets or some corporate volunteering platforms can help you automate this process to save you time. You can measure this by using the following equation: Volunteering participation rate = number of volunteers / number of employees.

In-platform participation rate = employees who make a contribution on platform / total number of accounts on platform.

These percentages will give you an idea of how active your entire workforce is with your CVP initiative and is an indicator of how relevant and easy it is for them to participate.

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This metric will change depending on how often you need someone to engage in determining them as an engaged user. For example, if employees receive one day per year of volunteer time off, their engagement may only be required once a year.

Consider what engagement means at your organisation, and it can help you contextualise this metric.

Employee engagement per activity type Employee engagement dives deeper into those active contributors in your corporate volunteering platform. It determines how engaged employees are with your initiative/s.

How many contributions did you see within the time measured? We’re not looking at the value amount of those contributions, simply how many single contributions. Contributions can be financial or time dedicated to a project or actions taken through positive actions if this is part of your program.

Concretely, we’re talking about number of employees who are donors vs. volunteers, for example. It can help you see which activities are driving more engagement.

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Number of activities created Suppose you’re empowering employees to start their own positive impact volunteering initiative. In that case, this metric can be a fantastic insight into how engaged your employees are and help identify your volunteer champions.

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Number of hours volunteered per employee This is a statistic to showcase on your CSR company page. You can either average this out across your entire workforce or just look at those employees that became volunteers.

Number of total hours volunteered Again, this metric is fantastic to showcase your hard work and the work of your employees. Put this front and centre on your end of year CSR reports. This number reflects your entire business.

It’s also a good benchmark to help push volunteers to contribute more in the coming years. Let people compete against their own personal bests.

Estimated dollar value of hours volunteered This is largely dependent on the time of volunteering your employees are engaging with. Research shows that hands-on volunteering is valued at $25 per hour for a non-profit, whereas skills-based volunteering is at $195 per hour. Count up the hours for the different types of volunteering your employees have done, and take this number with a pinch of salt.

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Money raised This metric can serve many functions. It’s great for employees to see a total for their efforts. If you offer donation matching, then you’ll need to get this number down too. Plus, it’s a good number to showcase on your CSR page for customers and external stakeholders.

Amount of dollars matched Employer-employee matching initiatives are becoming more popular by the day. The amount your business matches can be a fantastic number to encourage employees to do even more in the future.

Whether you’re matching dollars for dollars or following a policy like dollars for doers, collect up the numbers and showcase them to measure the impact of your corporate volunteering program.

For example, ADM start matching volunteers after 20 hours volunteered for an NPO, and they do 1:1 matching on dollar giving.

It’s a good idea to set a maximum per employee. Another metric around this data to further encourage volunteer engagement is the amount matched vs the maximum amount your company could have matched.

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Number of goods collected Not all volunteering donations come in the form of cash.

Yet, they’re still valued and need to be accounted for.

Goods collected can be anything from items of clothing to food for the homeless. It can even be the number of plastic bottles for the bottle bank! What are your employees collecting to do good?

Employee Net Promoter Score (NPS) Corporate volunteering programs have been shown to improve wellbeing, mental health, soft skills and a sense of purpose in the workplace. All of these factors should be positively affecting your Employee Net Promoter Score (eNPS).

Be sure to run an eNPS survey before your corporate volunteering program starts and after enough time for it to get going.

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Customer NPS To take it to the next level, you could also measure your customer Net Promoter Score; you should begin to see more promoters and fewer detractors. 70% of consumers agree they are more loyal to a company that outwardly showcases a corporate social responsibility policy, and your volunteer program is a large pillar of that.

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Number of press mentions Whether you have a PR team, or it’s something that your marketing team looks after, a good corporate volunteer program can win press attention.

Make sure you’re tracking press mentions, as this can be a large contributor towards your brand reach and help build a positive brand affinity.

Social media reach, engagement & impressions Last but not least are your social media metrics. It’s a good idea to introduce a hashtag to your volunteering content if you’re talking about it online. Your social media management tool will be able to track this hashtag, its reach, it’s impressions, and conversations happening around it.

It’s a fantastic metric to align alongside branding and can help showcase how your volunteering efforts are aiding your brand to consumers and potential applicants.

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Customer NPS Quantitative volunteer program reporting can also highlight any areas that may need greater analysis. For example, if you see you’re not getting a great participation rate, you can use qualitative research methods like pulse surveys to dive deeper into why employees are not participating as you hoped.

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Corporate volunteering benchmarks

Before we close out this guide, we want to leave you with some corporate volunteering benchmarks to help you set your own CVP goals. If you’re setting up a corporate volunteering program from scratch, it can be difficult to know what’s a success and what can be better.

Of course, take these benchmarks with a pinch of salt. It depends on your company, workforce, industry, company culture, employee culture, company size, and resources behind the program to help drive it to success.

If you don’t have 100% on all of these fronts, that’s okay.

Don’t stress about comparing yourself too much to those that have long-established CVPs.

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There are 6 drivers for effectively tracking and benchmarking your Corporate Volunteering Program:

EFFECTIVENESS

Is your CVP effectively supporting your chosen social causes and nonprofits?

BUSINESS ALIGNMENT

Soes your CVP contribute towards your overall business success in some way? For example, this can be via audience reach, revenue growth, or even staff retention.

INVESTMENT

Does your CVP have access to resources to make it successful? It could be people, finances, or technology.

ENGAGEMENT CULTURE

Does your company culture encourage employees to actively contribute toward the CVP?

PARTICIPATION

Are employees actively taking part in CVP initiatives?

REPORTING

Are you tracking your efforts? If you’re not, not to worry, that’s what we’re here for!

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It’s ok if you don’t have all of these principles in the works from day one. Many businesses struggle to create CVPs that have all of the above. Some of the biggest struggles for top companies, which you may be able to relate to, are: Utilizing assets Insufficient resources A disconnect from the business’s core mission Low employee engagement Inadequate reporting systems Now we’ve laid out the drivers for a successful program and highlighted some hurdles you’ll need to conquer along the way, let’s get into 6 CVP benchmarks to set.

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Alignment with 6 CVP drivers The first benchmark for you to use when building your CVP is your compliance with the 6 drivers for a successful program. How many drivers is your CVP managing to hit?

You’ll want to aim for around 50% or higher, meaning 3 or more drivers to give your corporate volunteer program the best start possible.

Remember, it’s okay to not be hitting them all, even those with corporate volunteering programs that have been in the business for years still don’t hit them all. What’s important is you’re aware of them and you understand your areas for improvement.

"Whenever possible, we measure the impact of our actions – improving means measuring. However, measuring the number of direct and indirect beneficiaries of an action is not always easy. We measure when we can.”

DANIELLE BRYNER Corporate Communications & Sustainability Director, L’Oréal Switzerland

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Increase in customer sales A study found that customers are 4-6x more likely to purchase from and champion purpose-driven companies.

Once your CVP is up and running and you’re showcasing it successfully, you should see an increase in sales.

Another way you can measure this with an A/B test cohort analysis via an email nurturing campaign. Show one customer cohort your CVP efforts in your nurture campaign, and don’t show your efforts to the other cohort.

This study suggests the cohort that saw your CVP efforts should have a higher sales conversion than the other.

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Increase in employee development & culture A study by CIPD of 1,000 employees that chose to volunteer in schools found those employees increased specific skills and motivations for and in the workplace.

The study found: 80% of employees increased communication skills 79% said it improved their sense of mission at work 68% said they were more motivated at work The specifics of these benchmarks would change depending on the volunteering opportunity and the potential skills or mindsets it can create. For example, teaching is great for public speaking; however, a trach collection may make someone more conscious about the planet.

Define your benchmark topics first, for example are you looking for an increase in communication skills, or a sense of mission at work? Next, ask employees how they feel about these topics before and after the volunteering experience. You should see between a 60-90% lift in employee development & culture according to the above data.

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"Virtual volunteering helps overcomes social isolation.

The increased belonging, connectivity, and link to the company purpose offers many health benefits, e.g. decreasing the risk of depression or stress."

ESTELLE ROTH

Global Head Engagement & Volunteering, Novartis

Increase in talent acquisition and retention Multiple research has found that candidates want purpose-driven employers. For example, a Deloitte study found that 89% of people believe companies that support volunteerism offer a better working environment than those that don’t.

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This includes Gen Y & Z through to older generations.

What does this mean for benchmarking? You could start to see an increase in applications from multiple generations, as well as an increase in staff retention.

A study found that an effective CVP program can reduce employee turnover by up to 50%. If you can achieve even half of that with your benchmarking, you’ll save your business hours of time and other resources.

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Increase in employee engagement Many employers today are looking for new ways to engage employees. Engaged employees make for happier workplaces, increased staff retention, and a more profitable workplace. Set a benchmark for your CVP to see an increase in employee engagement.

An ROI study found that a well-designed program can: Increase employee engagement by 7.5% Increase in productivity by 13%

"Our program results in higher levels of employee satisfaction, of purpose, and professional and personal development. People who volunteer believe there is a positive impact on corporate culture—loyalty, and trust."

DANIELA BERTOLI Deputy Director Credit Suisse Foundation

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Increase in bottom line financials In general, corporate volunteering programs and CSR initiatives have proven time and time again to increase a lot of business results. This includes statistics around staff productivity and development, investor appeal, customer acquisition and retention, and so much more.

All of these factors contribute to your business’s bottom line financials. Research shows that doing this successfully can increase revenue by up to 20%. Of course, this is a huge number and can do wonders for any business—big or small.

It’s also a number that has a lot of other business missions to consider and can be a little hard to ultimately pin down to your CSR efforts. However, if you’re doing a great job then regardless of what you’re doing elsewhere in the business, you should see a lift in revenue that you can attribute toward your Corporate Volunteering Program.

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Important things to remember when benchmarking your CVP It’s fantastic that you want to set some benchmarks to help measure your corporate volunteering program’s success. Before you start, there are a few things we’d like to share with you to ensure this final step goes as smoothly as possible.

Set benchmarks in percentages There’s absolutely no harm in comparing your corporate volunteer program to that of other companies. We should champion those that have them successfully implemented and certainly learn from them. However, don’t expect your results to be as drastic as theirs when it comes to numbers.

Perhaps they’ve got thousands of employees and dollars to match for a Dollars for Doers initiative.

You may simply not be in a position to offer that many resources. So, rather than saying: “we fell short because only five employees volunteered, whereas our model company saw 600 employees volunteer.” Switch things to percentages. Perhaps you had 10% of your workforce volunteer, and so did your model company—suddenly, your numbers are that much more accommodating to your situation.

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Allow for a growth stage If you’re starting from zero, your percentages are probably going to look high in your first couple of months.

For example, let’s say you introduce a CVP and see a 7x increase in employee engagement, 120% increase in qualified candidates applications and more fantastically high numbers. Then, after 4-5 months, these numbers are not so drastic.

Don’t worry! We often see a spike because everything is starting from zero. This kind of growth also tapers off for more mature programs. It’s near impossible to achieve this growth month-on-month. That doesn’t mean your CVP is failing; it simply means it’s steady.

The benchmark you need to look at is retention. Are your numbers that created these great growth statistics remaining the same? Are they decreasing? Focus on keeping volunteers around—that’s long-term success.

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Measure everything before It’s important to set benchmarks and use those that are already doing it as an example. However, you also need to set benchmarks against your own data. How did your CVP do in the previous year, for example? Or, how were your employees feeling about their workplace purpose before they started volunteering?

Try to gather data before your action takes place. This way, you’ll be able to see more accurate growth metrics, and you’ll be able to measure success from day one. Use this data and try to predict growth benchmarks. For example, if you saw a 3% increase in employee productivity last month, push that bar higher for the next month!

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Wrapping up benchmarking your CVP It’s a great idea to benchmark your corporate volunteering efforts. The data you find will help to push your internal efforts and make for a more successful program. Benchmarking is not something you do for external purposes.

If you see numbers you’re not happy with, don’t worry about it. It’s important that you know you’re not reaching the industry standard, but it’s more important that you work towards getting there. This comes from benchmarking, objectively assessing your CVP efforts, and finding creative ways to re-engage your workforce with your initiative.

Don’t be afraid to bring your results to leadership, good or bad; you’ll be better off with more smart heads finding innovative ways to push your CVP toward success.

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Build an impactful Corporate Volunteering Program today A purpose-driven corporate volunteering program is a critical pillar of your corporate social responsibility.

Hopefully, this guide has given you everything you need to know to create a corporate volunteering program that helps your company, your employees, and our world to thrive.

Be patient with your program. By introducing volunteering options, you’re helping to reshape your company culture, which means change. Your CVP needs to be given a transition period. This grace period, if executed well, is your opportunity to proactively and positively introduce a new culture across your entire workforce.

The data in this guide has proven the success, benefits, and psychological science behind volunteering. It’s also provided you with exactly how to introduce a CVP to your business. If you have any questions along the way, you know where to find us!

Important things to remember when benchmarking your CVP

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