Engaging employees in CSR

One of the most important elements of creating a successful CSR campaign is engaging and empowering employees through the programme.

We’ve worked on many successful CSR campaigns for global and local brands, and one thing they all have in common is having an engaged workforce.

Your employees should be fully engaged in your CSR campaigns. They should feel empowered to have their say in organisations your business supports and programmes it gets involved in, particularly through volunteering.

Why is this so important?

Businesses might think CSR campaigns start and end with financial donations.

While this is fantastic and should be commended, a truly impactful CSR campaign goes beyond writing a cheque.

An impactful CSR campaign will have a demonstrable impact on a community or a group of people, and this typically involves financial support, logistical support, product donations, volunteering and employee fundraising.

It's difficult to pull all of that off without the support of your employees.

This might sound like a lot of work – and we understand that often, resource in organisations is tight when it comes to putting these programmes in place and measuring their success. However, there are small, incremental steps you can take to engage your employees in your CSR programmes.

Here are some of our top tips to help you achieve that.

Communicate

Whether you have two employees or 20,000, communication is key. Engage your team at the very beginning of your CSR journey.

Explain what’s happening and how they can get involved.

This is simple and doesn’t need to be overly complicated. Here’s a rough guide of what you should be telling them at the start of the CSR programme:

• What you’re doing

• Why you’re doing it

• How they can get involved

• Who to contact for more information

That’s it! Once you’ve done that, it’s time to move on to the next stage.

Engage

Your employees know what you’d like to achieve, and now it’s time to engage them in the programme. We find the most impactful way to do this is to involve them in the process of which organisations or causes you’d like to support.

By offering an opportunity to help decide the direction of your CSR programme, you increase the chances of your employees becoming engaged and helping to drive the programme forward.

A great way to do this is by presenting some options of charities or organisations to support, and then asking employees to vote on causes that matter to them. You can also ask employees which organisations they’d like to support and encourage them to come forward with nominations.

Another benefit of engaging employees in the causes your business should support means they’ll be more like to volunteer or get involved in fundraising. The more this happens, the greater the impact will be for your CSR programme. And it will also be more measurable, which is hugely important – organisations need to understand the impact their programmes are having in the real world.

Execute

You’ve told your employees what you’d like to achieve, and they’ve helped to pick a charity partner. Now it’s time to execute your CSR strategy.

This can take a variety of forms, but these are the most common:

• Volunteering – encourage your team to volunteer with the organisation you’re supporting. Remember – it’s not all about financial donations.

• Fundraising – if an organisation you’re supporting has a national event – for example a coffee morning – then encourage your team to get involved. Match the money they raise.

• Promotion – some charitable organisations, particularly hyper local charities, don’t have a high profile. You can help them to grow their profile, attracting more interest and helping improve their fundraising, by talking about your CSR programme in the press, on your social media channels and through internal communications.

Evaluate

Evaluation is a crucial part of a successful CSR campaign. Did it work? What was the impact? Involving your employees in this is a great idea. How did they feel about it? Do they want to do something similar next time, or move in a different direction?

By getting your team involved in the evaluation of a CSR programme, you will not only make them feel more included, but you’ll get valuable information from the shop floor of your organisation that will help to shape your community relations programmes going forward.

In summary

By taking small steps to communicate and involve your team, your CSR programme will be infinitely more successful. In our experience, the majority of employees at forward-thinking organisations are engaged in CSR programmes. While not everyone wants to play an active role, being a part of the process makes them feel included and gives them the opportunity to talk to others outside your organisation about the great work you’re doing.

Ultimately, the more engaged your business is, the greater the CSR programme will be.

Your company will benefit. Your community will benefit. Your team will benefit.