Staff volunteering on company time builds morale and expands an employee's skill base, writes David Maida
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Allowing staff to do community volunteer work on company time can be a win/win situation - but only if proper practices are followed, says Susan Peterson, chairwoman of the Corporate Responsibility Council for ANZ National.
"There is definitely a big benefit to be had if it's managed properly. If it's managed poorly it's not so flash.
"Poorly can mean that rather than having one person giving one day a month and knowing the charity well, you can end up having lots of people, but knowing nothing deeply about the community work," Peterson says.
About 32 per cent of ANZ's 9500 or so staff take the company up on its offer to work at least one day's paid volunteer leave each year. It amounts to some 24,439 hours of volunteer work a year.
Peterson says it's money well invested.
"It's an important thing for the engagement of our own staff and them feeling that they've been given the opportunity to make a more valuable contribution outside.
"I tend to personally think it builds team morale and a general good feeling across the organisation as a whole."
At a time when companies might not be able to donate as much cash but could spare some employee work time, corporate volunteering makes good sense. The wealth of mostly women volunteers from generations past is no longer available because so many are in the workforce.
"That whole body of folk are no longer available. That whole bit of free resourcing has kind of gone," says Peterson.
For business, volunteering is not just about good PR. She says it helps with team-building.
"Often what happens is teams across the bank choose to do something together. We've seen quite a variety of activities undertaken by various teams across the bank, ranging from planting trees and upgrading facilities like painting Plunket buildings, assisting at food banks, helping out retirement homes and schools and community days."
Peterson says it's best to work in teams with partnered organisations so companies can provide targeted and continuous volunteers. ANZ National measures employee feedback through surveys which repeatedly rank the company's contribution to the community as very important to them.
ANZ employees volunteer mainly outside their area of specialist expertise. Dr Louise Lee, academic at the Department of Management at Massey University, says often volunteers want to do something different than the work they usually do and it can be a bit of a balancing act. "There are tensions around the fact that lots of employees often don't want to do what they do at work. Whose needs are most important in the relationship?"
It can be hard to set up a volunteer programme that accommodates everyone's needs at once.
"Some businesses are putting more resourcing into it and understand that if you're going to do this, then it does require a commitment of resources and thinking through how this might work for the business and the employees and of course the community organisations that they work with," Lee says.
She has written a research study on business and community partnership programmes in New Zealand and says there is a growing formalisation with the volunteering structures.
"Businesses are increasingly getting more strategic about, 'What do we get out of this kind of relationship as well?' I think that's only likely to continue. Obviously in tighter economic times, they're going to be looking at, 'What value do we get out of this? How do we build on that value?'"
In reality, businesses simply want the most bang for their buck, Lee says.
"There are internal benefits in terms of that feel-good factor with staff, staff satisfaction, team building and greater internal cohesion. But there are also benefits around enhanced reputation and being a good corporate citizen."
Community-based organisations are also thinking more strategically about the help they seek and the businesses they align themselves with.
"I think there are opportunities for community organisations to be thinking, 'Well, how can we work with businesses to get what we need out of this relationship as well, instead of being recipients?'"
Volunteer centres are set up in the main cities to help match businesses with the appropriate community organisations and vice versa. Some centres charge businesses for their specialist expertise. Peterson says there has been a growing interest from businesses in the past few years for these services and it is not an easy job.
"They're working with quite a diverse mix of needs."
As the executive director of Volunteering New Zealand, it's Tim Burns' job to balance those needs. "It can go wrong if you don't think about how you're doing it and don't do it right," he says.
Often, office workers will want to do something outdoors with their volunteering time. "You'll get employee volunteers who say, 'Look, I want to do something completely different from what I do in my day-to-day life'."
But not every office worker can suddenly pick up a trade or start painting a building.
"If you take people out to do something and they've actually got no skills and the job does require some skills and they botch it up, then you haven't made progress."
There are also health and safety issues to consider on worksites. To match the right employee with the right community organisation, Burns says, you also have to make sure any potential sensitivities are considered.
"People have to be sensitive to the organisation they're going to and the nature of the service they're providing. Be sensitive to what the organisation that you're going to thinks will be of value to them. Look for challenges or events that will actually be manageable for your staff."
Sensitivities are particularly important when working with people with disabilities and the elderly. But Burns says volunteers can accomplish a lot when properly managed.
"If they've got a specific project like the refurbishment of a premises of a community group that may not have the resources or the dollars to do it themselves, it's amazing what you can do in a couple of days."
Contact David Maida at: www.DavidMaida.com
