In 2018, your employees are ready to go the extra mile for the causes that they’re passionate about. Employees support organizations that balance the pursuit of profit with being a responsible corporate citizen. Companies have an opportunity to align with the personal and professional goals of their employees. Fortune 500 companies are leading the charge by creating structured programs about corporate responsibility and giving. Creating employees as brand ambassadors requires structure around your corporate philanthropic efforts.
1. Choose Causes Your Employees Care About
Not only do millennials want to work for companies that support the causes they care about, but they’re also more likely to become brand ambassadors if they’re able to get behind the cause that your company has chosen to support. In fact, 76% of millennials consider CSR when deciding where to work. That doesn’t mean that you have to poll your employees to find out what causes matter most to them. Instead, choose causes that you know your employees will be able to get behind-or better yet let your employees drive the choice!
2. Get Hands-On
Are you getting “hands-on” with local charities or organizations? In other words, are you and your employees giving more than money? Do you get involved with collecting meals for the hungry or help contribute to your local school system? When you get hands-on with your contributions, you’ll quickly discover that you–and your employees–feel much more involved with and connected to the giving process. When they’re hands-on, your employees will naturally become passionate giving ambassadors who are highly engaged in the entire giving process. Consider volunteering company hours with the charities you support to watch your employees’ connection to those organizations increase. Charitable donations may increase as well. If you are able to link directly with monetary giving, your Giving ROI begins to emerge.
3. “pool” your Resources
We’ll write about this in more detail but the power of giving together is real and many people thrive in environments where resources are pooled together to maximize impact. Consider the importance of social recognition and the benefits of employees working together as teams. It is a powerful but underutilized tool that many platforms offer.
4. Raise Passion
When giving is a secondary part of your company culture, it’s not easy to lite the fire under your giving efforts. You naturally give to the same charity every month; what is there to get excited about? If you want to see a substantial increase in employee passion–and therefore turn them into giving ambassadors who are ready to encourage giving in others–try some of these passion-raising strategies.
- Show what your gifts are accomplishing. Keep pictures throughout the facility or in your break room of personal visits.
- Discuss the potential impact of your giving projects on a regular basis.
- Empower employees to choose the next project or the next charity that you’d like to contribute to. When they’re invested, they’re more likely to care about the outcome.
- Consider bringing in people from the charity to talk about how your donations have impacted their beneficiaries.
Employees as brand ambassadors
Working to create employees as brand ambassadors out of your employees is an ongoing process and as an employer, you must go the extra mile. You want empowered employees talking about your giving efforts with their friends and family members, who acknowledge what the company is accomplishing and are proud of it.
With flexible individual giving accounts, Givinga allows you to give through your employees, not around them. With this unique benefit, your organization but can amplify the impact of charitable contributions. Brand ambassadors will capitalize on the crowdfunding amplifier to increase the total reach of your corporate philanthropic efforts. Contact us to learn how to turn your employees into brand and giving ambassadors.
Having employees as brand ambassadors are just one of the benefits of corporate giving. Discover more of the proven business benefits that make a corporate philanthropy solution a must-have for the modern workplace.
