Volunteering Your Time
I expect you know that donating your time as a volunteer is a way for you to strengthen the bonds of your community as well as bringing help to the needy. Traditionally, however, freeing up the time to volunteer often actually wastes some of that very same free time. Keep in mind that you’ll have more fun volunteering when your colleagues are getting involved right along with you!
Thus, a number of companies are making themselves into initiatives to help their employees give back to the community. A leader in this field is Adaptive Marketing LLC of Connecticut who developed programs such as At Home Rewards.
If you were asked for examples of company-backed volunteer work, you’d most likely talk in terms of blood drives, perhaps a Christmas donation drive, but this is simply no longer true. Shoe recycling programs and more active work like tree-planting events — these and other activities have been arranged by Adaptive Marketing for its workforce. In these cases, the dates, times and locations that had been arranged were announced, ensuring that staff knew what to expect, and the exact amount of time each event might specifically require from them. Giving volunteers a say in which initiatives the company supports is essential. Firms involved in this like Adaptive Marketing, (who offer to the public programs like At Home Rewards) allow their employees to select from a wide range of initiatives in their community. Earlier projects have included work in areas as diverse as aid and assistance for children and young adults, environmental awareness activities, and events cultivating the area’s artistic projects. Adaptive Marketing’s employees will be sure to have something they enjoy to volunteer for, ensuring they’ll enjoy the time they spend volunteering. Most often a company-supported volunteer initiative — getting involved with a local school or assisting at a homeless shelter — is either done on a regular schedule or as a one-off event. Regardless of how short the time you can spare, you’re sure to find some activity to suit, and consequently time is no obstacle to volunteering. You’ll find plenty of examples of firms supporting the people who live nearby. The activities of the staff at Adaptive Marketing and other firms create valuable good feeling in their home community. Helping around your hometown leaves you feeling like a better person — which is just the sort of feeling to motivate members of staff in both their regular work and their volunteer activities, too. Promoting volunteering among your members of staff is rewarding in some very concrete ways, as we hope we’ve shown.