Holding a successful kick-off event is the first step to engaging your employees in the campaign. Another excellent option is to let your employees get hands-on. United Way invites people to change their community by not only giving, but volunteering and advocating.
As part of this, the United Way Volunteer Center coordinates Days of Caring all year long for groups across the community looking to give back. Your United Way staff person would be happy to connect you with the Volunteer Center to help plan a project just right for your employees. Helpful hint: Permission for a Day of Caring is a good topic to bring up when you’re getting support from your leadership early on.
Click here to learn more about the United Way Volunteer Center.
You’ll also notice every week or two they have new featured volunteer opportunities around education, income, and health at the top of this page. These are a great tool to copy and paste into an email to your employees to give them easy options to engage with United Way’s work in another way.
Another way to engage employees with the campaign itself is to use special events or incentives. Here are a few ideas:
Incentives
Incentives are a great motivator. They don’t have to be expensive and can be awarded to individuals or departments. Ask your vendors to donate incentives or prizes. Or, consider offering one or more of the following:
- Paid time off
- Jeans/casual dress days
- Reserved parking spots
- Gift cards (grocery or gas)
- Giveaways through a drawing
- Lunch with the CEO
Special Events
Special events and other contests allow employees to have fun while joining together for a great cause. Be creative and tailor them to the interests of your company. Here are a few ideas:
- Employee bake sale
- Company picnic
- Lunch with celebrity (management) waiters
- Cookbook
- Jeans/casual dress days
- Silent auction
- Basket auction
- Penny wars
- Chili cook-off
Click here to download print-friendly version of Incentives & Events.