As the good Sir Cliff says, there?s a time for giving and the team at Creative Blend commit?ten hours of their time?and expertise per month to benefit independent charitable causes who have little or no budget for digital, but great ambition. Being an ethical agency has challenges, but also great rewards, so we wanted to?share with you what we?ve learnt so far about giving more for less.
Choose organisations who mean something to the team
Many people have been affected in some way by illnesses such as cancer or dementia, and these are often popular choices for fundraising or donating time to, but why not ask each member of your team to suggest a not for profit organisation or charity to support? If you have been approached by an organisation, consider their values and work ethic, to ensure it aligns with your company and team to ensure everybody is benefiting and feeling good about the project.
Defining and managing clear expectations
When donating time, it?s important to set out clear expectations from both sides of the coin. Discussing and agreeing exactly how the arrangement will work will save any confusion later down the line, and we?d encourage creating a plan or calendar to signpost what tasks will be done when and the input needed from both parties. Often there’s a lot to do – so prioritisation is important too – what are the tasks that will make the most difference? Sometimes doing one thing spectacularly well is better than trying to fix everything a little bit.
Learn from experience and take time to reflect
Each year we change the two charities we work with, to ensure our time is being spread fairly and we are reaching different areas of the community. At the end of each year, we debrief with our team and contacts at the organisations to ensure we take constructive learnings from both sides to improve what we can offer going forward. Hearing the empowering impact our time and skills have made to people who work so hard for charitable causes are well worth the effort put in.
We?d thoroughly recommend thinking outside of the box (and beyond the bottom line) in order to bring a sense of fulfilment to your team and company ethos – it?s certainly worked for us.
