There are many benefits to starting up an employee volunteer program in your place of work. But what exactly does this involve, and how do you go about getting started? Here’s a guide to the basics of starting up a volunteer program for your employees.
Why Set Up an Employee Volunteer Program?
There are many benefits of starting up an employee volunteer program. Firstly, it helps to bring your employees closer together. By working together in a different situation, they are learning teamwork skills, and it also builds other skills like planning, so there is a direct benefit for your company.
Another reason volunteering can be great for business is that it provides increased job satisfaction by giving your employees the opportunity to do something good that is also fun. This can be good for recruitment by helping to attract the best applicants to your job openings.
You can also improve your brand image and customer loyalty by demonstrating that you share the same values as your customers. And it can be good for your PR at the same time.
Decide on What You Want to Achieve
When you set up a program, firstly you will need to decide on what you want to achieve. What do your employees want to do? They will want to know that they are accomplishing something, so it’s important to have a clear vision.
Decide on the type of volunteering you will do. Consider basic issues such as how often your employees can volunteer and for how many hours. Also look into individual voluntary projects as well as group projects.
Work with a Specialist Organization
There are some organizations that will help you to put the whole program together. This is often the best way to get started, rather than trying to set up your own program.
They have specific programs that you can join, and they take a lot of the planning out of the process, freeing up your time to work on other things.
Or Find the Right Non-Profit
Another option is to team up directly with a non-profit in your area. Perhaps there is one in your local community that you could assist in some way? This makes it easy to arrange a schedule for your volunteers because they won’t have to travel far.
However, it will involve a lot of planning. You want to be sure that you spend a long time planning out all the details and exactly what you will all be doing to make sure everyone benefits.
Consider Volunteering Overseas
You might even want to arrange some volunteering opportunities abroad. These will provide a different type of volunteering experience. They will not be the sort of program you can do every month, but instead, you could turn it into an annual event for employees who want to experience something different.
Find out how to volunteer abroad by teaming up with a dedicated organization. These organizations have the programs in place, and they can arrange for groups, couples, and solo volunteers to join up.
Set Up Your Own Employee Volunteer Program
There are so many benefits to setting up an employee volunteer program, and it is not that hard to get started. Start thinking about what you could do to set up a program, and speak to your employees to find out what would interest them the most so that you can start working on a program that everyone enjoys.