JK Group Builds Houses and Friendships

This week, a small group of JK employees proved that with a few pieces of wood, a bucket of nails, and team work; they could make a difference in someone’s life.  On September 21^st the team set out to Trenton New Jersey’s Habitat for Humanity to help build a house for someone in need.

Scott McCosh, a programmer here at JK, had wonderful things to say about the experience. “I have some experience working on a house because I do a lot of repairs and updates to my own home, but you really don’t need to have experience to participate in this,” He said. “Habitat for Humanity is so organized; all you really need to do is show up.”

 

Scott explained that Habitat for Humanity does all of the planning, supplies safety tools, and any needed equipment. They also have a training session before you begin the project that outlines exactly what to do. There is no need to be intimidated by one of these projects.

Habitat for Humanity’s mission is, “To bring people together to build homes, communities and hope.” Habitat has an application process for those who need homes. The receiver of the home must also work on the home alongside the volunteers. Additionally, the home owner is given a no interest loan from Habitat for Humanity. The goal is not to give a house away, but to teach people how to finance a home, make payments, and to repair their home with some of the skills they learned while building it.

“I hope to be able to participate in this project again,” said Mr. McCosh. “It was great to meet co-workers who I don’t normally interact with on a daily basis, and it really helped build team work. We ate lunch together and had to rely on each other in order to get the project done.”

JK’s Volunteer Action Commitee Hosts Kick-Off

On Friday Aug 5, JK Group’s Volunteer Action committee hosted a Volunteer Kick-off event that was both fun and inspiring. The event’s focus was to collect backpacks and school supplies for children in our community who are in need. The Volunteer Action Committee (VAC) prepared weeks in advance for this event and encouraged all JK employees to participate.

 

On Kick-off day, the VAC’s hard work and enthusiasm spread JK-wide. Employees took their lunch breaks out to the lawn to pack back-packs, give blood, and enjoy the Trenton Area Soup Kitchen (TASK) Band. The VAC also made sure that the JK Group staff was well fed; we had a hot dog and snow cone vendors that added to the fun.

 

 Employees gave a lot of themselves that day. They lined up next tables filled with markers, crayons, pencils, and notebooks, waiting to fill a back pack for a child. Then, after the bag was packed, JK employees wrote personal notes of encouragement to tuck away inside the bag.

 

 The results of this event were two-fold. VAC was able to exceed their goals by collecting and packing 30 back packs for children in our area. Meanwhile, JK employees found camaraderie in a common goal.

 

San Francisco Business Times Names Top Corporate Givers

I am pleased to announce that several of JK’s clients have been recognized for their outstanding philanthropic efforts. The San Francisco Business Times recently named our clients as top corporate givers in the Bay area.At number one is Google. The technical company gave $27.6 million dollars to Bay Area causes in 2010. We are proud and honored to partner with Google in its philanthropic efforts.
I would also like to acknowledge that the San Francisco Business Times ranked AT&T, Wells Fargo, and Chevron as the second, third, and fourth, top givers respectively.
Here at JK we understand the hard work and many hours it takes to develop and execute a successful philanthropy program. We extend our deepest congratulations to these companies on this well-deserved honor.

SHRM Conference – Las Vegas

JK group recently had an exhibit at the annual SHRM conference in Las Vegas. I will admit that I had some doubts about whether this conference would be relevant to the CSR industry. The doubts disappeared immediately with the opening remarks. Sir Richard Branson opened the conference with his statement that business ‘should be [a] force for good.’ He went on to say “I don’t think it’s worth starting a company if you’re not going to make a real difference in the world.” His speech challenged attendees to help their communities.

My goal for the conference was to leave with an understanding of how corporate human resources groups intend to promote social responsibility within their organizations. Despite the understandable difficulty of trying to conduct a conversation with conference attendees outfitted in head to toe swag (my favorite conversation was with two guys from a Fortune 50 company wearing matching multicolor blinking strobe sunglasses), I learned quite a bit. I would summarize my observations as follows:

1. Like community affairs groups or corporate foundations, the primary focus for HR groups with respect to CSR is impact to the community. The HR managers that I spoke with are involved with at least one of their company’s community programs.

2. HR professionals are also focused on the power of community involvement to help build spirit and morale within their organizations. A recent Mercer report shows that nearly a third of the current workforce is ‘looking’. Employee engagement programs add to the employer/employee relationship and give value beyond the paycheck.

3. Volunteering is HUGE. While the entire spectrum of CSR and corporate philanthropy programs have been popular with Fortune 1000 corporations for some time, the program that seem to have the most appeal to middle market companies is volunteerism. The obvious conclusion would be that volunteerism’s appeal is that it does not cost nearly as much as other corporate philanthropic programs. The reality is that volunteer programs provide unique team benefits that are very different from fund raising.

4. Finally, I had many conversations with very small companies (even smaller than JK!) and did not meet a single company representative from any size company with no community activities.

I learned that no matter what the size or revenue of a company, all companies can benefit from CSR programs. Some of the larger companies have a departments dedicated to community relations. While smaller companies usually integrate CSR efforts into their Human Resources departments. No matter who is responsible, all agree that Corporate Social Responsibility continues to be an effective way to increase internal morale.

McKesson Recognized with Corporate Award of Excellence

At the National Conference on Volunteering and Service, one of our clients, McKesson, was recognized with the Corporate Engagement Award of Excellence. Carrie Varoquiers, President of the McKesson Foundation, accepted the award on behalf of her team and company. I would like to take this opportunity to congratulate the McKesson team on their hard work.

The Corporate Engagement Award was created by the Points of Light institute in 1993 to highlight companies that illustrate extraordinary efforts in workplace volunteering. The award is available to companies of all sizes and all industries so we are very proud of McKesson for raising the bar and winning this award. The intent of the Corporate Award of Excellence is to drive friendly competition among corporations, and encourage them create programs that align volunteerism with strategic vision and organizational goals.

McKesson’s program exemplifies how the vision and goals of a company can align with volunteerism. McKesson’s ICARE Shared Principles of Integrity, Customer-First, Accountability, Respect, and Excellence, that reflect McKesson’s business standards, also support McKesson’s volunteer mantra. The ICARE shared principles encourage employees to participate in corporate citizenship programs and to give back to their communities with high-quality volunteer projects.

JK is proud to be able to provide tools to help McKesson reach its volunteer goals. McKesson choose to use our Integrated Volunteer Management System (IVMS) tool, which allows employees to: submit and sign up for volunteer projects, record hours, and request volunteer grants. We are excited to partner with McKesson and to support such an impactful and outstanding volunteer program.

McKesson’s Chairman, President, and Chief Executive Officer, John Hammergren had this to say about his companies volunteer efforts; “McKesson is deeply committed to good corporate citizenship. We focus on making a difference every day through our core business activities, philanthropic giving, volunteerism, and environmental sustainability initiatives. We continuously strive to improve the health and Vitality of the organizations we serve and the communities where we live and work.”

Congratulations again, McKesson, on earning this prestigious award!

National Conference on Volunteering and Service

I just got back from the National Conference on Volunteering and Service in New Orleans.  I have always heard that this conference is a favorite of the CSR crowd and I now know why.  It’s an extremely eclectic mix of volunteers, non-profits, corporate CSR professionals and (of course) vendors.  They’ve really done an excellent job putting together all of the sessions – each time slot has around 25 sessions! The speakers and presenters were all very knowlegeable and enthusiastic.

In the exhibit hall, two interesting booths caught my eye.

The first is the L’Oreal Women of Worth booth.  This program is crowd sourcing based and looks to identify several women to receive both $5000 grants as well as a single $35,000 award.  The L’Oreal booth has a bank of pcs where conference attendees can nominate. 

Closer to home is the Toyota booth (apps.facebook.com/carsforgood).  JK Group is providing the back end charity vetting for this promotion.  Toyota solicited open applications from charities that would like to “win” a car.  A panel chose 500 of those organizations and each day (for 100 days). Then the Toyota committee narrowed it down to five charities to be voted on.  The winner receives a requested vehicle. The most requested vehicles are the Siena, Tundra, and Highlander Hybrid.  The four runners up receive $1000 – unbelievably generous.  Like L’Oreal, Toyota allowed people to vote at its booth.

CECP Awards 2011

http://www.corporatephilanthropy.org/pdfs/press/cecppr/2011_CECP_Excellence_Awards_PR_Final.pdf

 

The Committee Encouraging Corporate Philanthropy (CECP) kindly invited me to its 11^th annual Excellence Awards in Corporate Philanthropy on June 1, 2011.  The awards were presented to CECP member companies for outstanding philanthropic programs. This year’s winners are Goldman Sachs for its 10,000 Women program, Bristol-Myers Squibb for its Secure the Future program, and Donorschoose.org for Crate and Barrel for their collaboration.  Each of the programs is extraordinary in its own way.

Goldman, for example, won for its 10,000 Women campaign.  Obviously no one explains this program better than Goldman at www.goldmansachs.com/10000-women, but here are the basics.  Goldman works with 70 academic and non-profit partners to provide business and management education to underserved women in developing markets.  The company dedicated $100,000,000 to this effort, and so far they have over 5,000 graduates of the program.  Spend some time on the 10,000 women site and you will get a great understanding of what this is about.

What I found especially interesting about this program is how well it fits with the company’s expertise. Goldman successfully integrated core business knowledge with its philanthropic program in the following ways:

• Emerging markets – Goldman Sachs is an active financial force in the emerging markets, and has been for decades.  This expertise allows Goldman to understand the social, economic, and financial, environments of candidates for the program.
• Business and management skills – Wow.  Goldman clearly exhibits outstanding business skills.   Its long-standing expertise in business aids enormously in the success of the 10,000 Women program.
• Business education partners – The Goldman Sachs employee base is comprised of highly educated people from the world’s finest institutions. Goldman is able to leverage its connections with these wonderful institutions to form partnerships for the 10,000 Women program.
• Non-profit partners – Goldman’s foundation and other legacy philanthropic programs help foster relationships with leading non- profit organizations.

It is clear that effective programs must reflect the values and expertise of the sponsoring company. The 10,000 Women Program is an excellent example of how a company can make the most of its CSR program while encouraging business goals.

Look for more on CECP Awards and Bristol-Myers Squibb in a future post…

JK Group and Evolving CSR

Hello All,

My name is Brad Galle I am the CEO of JK Group – a company that provides high-end technologies that help our clients meet their philanthropic goals. We create the tools that allow companies to easily manage their Corporate Social Responsibility programs and we facilitate their strategic visions. We believe in the unique position of our clients to effect change in their communities and throughout the world. I am proud to be part of the JK and proud to provide the industry leading services that make it possible for more companies to give back.

I think it is about time that we share some of our ideas and inspire others to create effective CSR programs. In this blog, I will explore some of the latest trends in giving, and focus on new technologies that improve the way companies manage social responsibility programs. I hope that these posts and discussions will inspire new ideas and spark interests in corporate giving.

The intersection of social media and CSR has been a focal point for me these last nine months. Companies that are pioneering these efforts are doing a great service to the industry in general. I noticed that as more and more companies are creating Corporate Social Responsibility programs, there are also more and more advances in technology to drive strategy. I hope to explore this phenomenon as well as other social advances here. So, come join me as I explore the world of corporate philanthropy and its ever growing importance, as well as the advancement of technology and its impact on social change.