Volunteers are coordinating bus transportation for teams, running to the store for toothpaste for players, sanitizing practice courts, doing laundry for the teams, beautifying the city with new trees, picking up trash, setting up seating pods in the venues and assisting out-of-town media and other guests with just about anything they may need.
Perhaps the least glamorous—yet important—volunteer task for March Madness has been collecting, washing and drying the dirty uniforms for the players and personnel for 68 teams in the tournament.
Indianapolis-based Selfless.ly is using its software to pull together an army of volunteers to help keep COVID-19 vaccination sites humming at optimal speed.
It’s a big pivot for organizations that traditionally create high-visibility fall projects to call attention to volunteerism and community service. In the process, they help dozens of neighborhood groups and scores of not-for-profits, from the United Way of Central Indiana to Keep Indianapolis Beautiful.
This week, Indianapolis tech firm Selfless.ly partnered with Serve Indiana—the state commission on volunteerism and service—to launch an initiative to identify a cadre of ready volunteers and match them with volunteer opportunities that can be accomplished while social distancing.
Josh Driver, founder of Selfless.ly, which sells cloud-based software for managing corporate social responsibility programs, says volunteer PTO is an increasingly important part of benefits packages. In fact, nearly one quarter of companies now pay employees to spend their time and energy with a not-for-profit.
Employees are not always fulfilled by their work. That can lead to expensive turnover, poor performance or disengagement. Empowering your staff to find purpose during work time creates loyalty to your company and helps fill the gaps their employment may not be creating at the moment.
“Our central focus as a company is always to make lives better. … It’s a value that is core to every single employee who works here. So if we can have programs that reinforce that we are a company that is focused on making lives better, then we are doing something that connects to our mission and reminds our employees what really matters to us as a company.”
Business leaders recognize today that they and their companies have the ability to positively impact their community through volunteerism efforts. Many see it as a responsibility.
Experts in corporate social responsibility, or CSR, say such programs are at least in part driven by millennials in the workforce and are almost necessary today to attract and maintain top talent.
The donation will be used to establish the Miller Family Fund for Success, which will help support Goodwill’s education, health and employment programs.
Business and political leaders at the annual Engage Indiana event stressed the importance of public and private collaborations in helping improve communities and retain workers.
Host Mason King talks with Athenaeum Foundation President Cassie Stockamp about why she’s choosing to leave the group she has led through a reinvigoration—and why she’s doing it now.
Super Service Challenge, a national not-for-profit aimed at helping charities raise money and in-kind contributions, is launching a new e-platform designed by Indianapolis-based Sells Group meant to connect companies, volunteers and not-for-profits in a whole new way.
IBJ reporter Lindsey Erdody participated in a recent poverty simulation conducted by the United Way of Central Indiana and hosted by Kronos Inc. and TechPoint.
For Indianapolis to thrive, its businesses need to share their resources for civic-minded efforts, N. Clay Robbins told attendees Friday at the Engage Indiana event for corporate philanthropy.
Some companies are offering employees money to donate to charities with no strings attached, while other initiatives are designed to reward volunteer efforts.
Companies across central Indiana are banding together to publicize a drive for food, beverages and other essential items needed by those displaced by the hurricane and tropical storm.
Christoper Handberg will begin his role after a period of growth for the not-for-profit community group.
Since 2012, Indianapolis not-for-profits have been participating in their own version of the annual NCAA college basketball tournament and have raised more than $1.5 million.
