Employee Volunteering

Dollars for Doers supports employee volunteerism by matching employee volunteer hours with corporate cash contributions. A Dollars for Doers (DFD) program is a great benefit for employees because they can contribute both volunteer hours and cash to a community organization. Instituting a DFD encourages employees to get engaged in the community and recognizes their efforts in so doing. It also encourages employees to report their volunteer hours and ties-in nicely with the companies volunteer time off policy or can operate independently if a volunteer time off policy does not exist.

The talent and expertise of a company's employees may be its most valuable asset. Sharing expertise and talent with non profit organizations in board leadership roles can help communtiy benefit organizations increase social impact and provide great leadership development opportunities for key corporate employees. Additionally, serving on a nonprofit board exposes employees to a broader set of community issues, organizational practices, and team building skills. Companies may wish to develop a formal program to match employees to nonprofit boards to ensure maximum benefits.

Several organizations help individuals and corporations find volunteer opportunities. Having a list of volunteer opportunities, or minimally, links to volunteer organizations, for employees encourages employee participation in community activities. Many companies reinforce these lists with a Volunteer Time Off Policy.

Group volunteer activities enable corporations to bring groups of employees together and enjoy the benefits of team building, leadership development and enhanced communication facilitation between employees and work groups. Examples of group volunteering are helping to build a house for Habitat for Humanity, sorting food at a food bank, or environmental restoration work, such as trail clean up. Group volunteer activities can be informal or strategic depending on the goals you set out for the activity ahead of time.

Skills-based Volunteerism is similar to Volunteerism in that the individual gives time energy and talent to an organization and does not receive any compensation. The major difference between skills-based volunteerism and volunteerism is that employees leverage a specific professional talent, expertise or knowledge to further an organization's mission and organizational capacity.

Volunteer Time Off Policies formally support the volunteer interests of a corporation's employees while allowing for accurate tracking and measurement of outcomes of the company's employee volunteer program.

Recognizing volunteers is a task that EFNT staff hopes every participating company thinks about - and does! It is a very important, yet sometimes forgotten, aspect of community involvement. There's not any "right way" to recognize volunteers but here's a list of a few ideas that might work at your company.

As the impact of Corporate Employee Volunteer Programs continues to grow and Corporate America reports that information, it is important to apply standard definitions to our work. These standards allow the Corporate Volunteer Community to track trends, benchmark our programs and encourage better practices. These standards were created by and for Corporate Community Volunteer Professionals. We hope they aid your work and add to your tool kit.