What Are The Benefits of Employee Volunteering? Is It Worth It?

So you're considering offering paid volunteering time as a benefit to your employees. But is it worth it? Will your team even use the volunteer opportunities? Are you likely to see a ROI? What sort of impact can you actually make with corporate volunteer programs?

In this article we're going to answer all of those questions, and go through every benefit of corporate volunteerism for both you as an employer, and also the employees themselves.

Here at Matchable, we're experts in matching employees or teams with the perfect volunteering project for them based on their skills, interests, and availability - We have 1000s of innovative remote and in-person volunteer programs on our platform, all contributing to at least one of the UN's Sustainable Development goals - so we know what we're talking about!

Benefits For The Employer

When companies encourage employees to give back, they show that they care about doing good in the world, and they create a stronger workplace culture of shared principles. This for-purpose approach to business ('business for good' if you like), isn't just about ticking a CSR or sustainability box - it has real, tangible benefits for the company too like more engaged employees.

Attracting Top Talent

More and more candidates are searching for companies that not only align with their personal values, but that provide them with opportunities to weave those values into their work too.

An effective employee volunteering strategy can help companies attract, and motivate a workforce at the top of their field. The best and brightest are going to be receiving the best offers from employers, so if you're keen to attract the cream of the crop, you need to compete with a wide variety of genuinely valuable employee benefits. Corporate volunteerism is a benefit in high demand.

Employee Retention

A purpose-led, inspiring work environment can certainly attract more applicants, but it can also significantly affect staff churn for the better too.

With the emergence of remote working taking over most sectors, the physical and mental health of your team is more important than ever, and creating a sense of shared purpose through employee volunteering is one of the top ways to motivate and retain your staff!

Building a sense of community, and providing an opportunity for employees to give back can help you avoid falling victim to the 'great resignation'.

Increased Employee Engagement

So many employers are wasting money on ineffective solutions when it comes to producing a highly engaged workforce.

There are far too many employee benefits out there to chose from, and employers (and employees) can quickly become overwhelmed and demotivated to take action.

Traditional, old-fashioned corporate volunteering is broken. From start-ups to global enterprises, employers are waking up to the truth that organising 100% in-person, manual labour volunteering just isn't always feasible. Not to mention that the actual positive impact from what we call 'fence-painting volunteerism' is surprisingly low.

Here at Matchable, we're reinventing employee volunteer programs, by matching individuals with their perfect volunteer projects based on their skills, passions, and availability. So many employees are put off by the idea of committing to long, arduous projects that require you to travel.

We match you in minutes with a selection of volunteer programs perfectly suited to your skills, all online, and available on-demand when your schedule allows it! There's a reason our employee engagement rate is over 54%!

Up-Skilling and Identifying Future Leaders

Skills-based volunteering can create the perfect opportunity for employees to develop skills in their area of expertise in a new environment, or even learn something completely new.

Not only does this often lead to your team honing their skills, but it can often shine a light on talent you hadn't originally considered for a leadership position.

Impact Value

Corporate social responsibility is on everyone's minds these days, and there's more and more pressure from the public for companies to do business sustainably.

An employee volunteer program is the perfect way to make real positive change through your work, in a trackable, tangible way.

Offering corporate volunteering benefits to your staff provides charities, perhaps in your local community, access to highly-skilled, passionate volunteers for free!

The average impact value created from traditional volunteering is £13.20 per employee. But with skills-based, predominantly remote volunteering like on the Matchable platform, we're seeing an average impact value of £1,920 per employee project 🤩

If you're leading the HR, people, or sustainability team in your company, then an online volunteering platform can provide you with a proven way to engage employees in charity work, and clear stats on return on your investment.

We’ve actually created an article all about how employee volunteering can help you hit your ESG goals here.

Who's Already Beat You To It?

From consumer goods retail companies, to fintech innovators, a huge array of industries are now realising the value in offering employee volunteering as paid time.

Primark, Deutsche Bank, Indeed Flex, and GANT are just a small selection of brands already offering volunteer opportunities to their teams through Matchable.

Benefits For The Employees

Learning & Development

When employees volunteer, they have the chance to use their knowledge and corporate experiences to help others, while also allowing them learn something new, or apply their expertise in a different setting.

This can lead to a increase sense of worth within a workplace, and positively affect an employees' wellbeing.

Take one of our skills-based projects on the Matchable platform for example. An employee in a sales-based role can volunteer their time to develop a preliminary sales strategy for a women's domestic violence charity. Or someone working in the finance department could do a budget review for a marine conservation organisation!

Employee Empowerment

Corporate giving/donating to causes your team cares about is certainly a step in the right direction, but providing the employees themselves with ways to create a meaningful impact with charities personally can really help forge bonds between teams internally, and make employees feel valued in a new way.

By giving them hands-on charitable experiences, and the free reign to pick their own causes, you can enable employees to build a sense of pride and accomplishment. When employees see the impact of their volunteer work on the community, they feel a sense of satisfaction and fulfilment. This positive feeling can translate into increased job satisfaction and motivation in the workplace.

Conclusion

In conclusion...what are you waiting for?? 😉 Providing employees with volunteering opportunities is a great way for companies to give back to the community and invest in their employees' personal and professional growth. It offers employees the opportunity to develop new skills and build a sense of pride and accomplishment, while also benefiting companies through increased employee retention, a positive reputation in the community, and improved team building.

Encouraging employee volunteering is a win-win situation that can benefit everyone involved, and it is a practice that more companies should consider implementing.