The Australian Centre for Philanthropy and Nonprofit Studies, qut
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- Skill-based workplace volunteering
Australian contextThere remains a paucity of data and broad analysis on workplace volunteering in Australia in the published literature, including in SMEs and in large companies. Over the past decade, a range of studies and surveys have found relatively low but increasing levels of workplace volunteering. According to 2006 research conducted by Sensis, and cited by Volunteering Australia (Volunteering Australia 2007) in a guide for the Prime Minister’s Community Business Partnership (2007): ‘… [relating to workplace volunteering] 36% of SMEs are already volunteering their support. Their motivations are varied but they may be responding to requests for help, seeking increased exposure in the community [this is a very cost-effective form of publicity], wanting to demonstrate their commitment to their local community, or their motivation is coming from a dedication to a particular community cause.’ In the National Survey of Volunteering Issues a large proportion of organisations using volunteers said they had not used employees volunteering through a business volunteering program (Volunteering Australia 2010). The company membership-based CCI measurement and impact organisation, the LBG, reported that its 47 member companies contributed almost 500,000 volunteer working hours in 2013–14 (London Benchmarking Group 2014): ‘The number of employees who volunteered decreased this year and the average number of hours by participating employees also decreased from 14 to 12. We observed this downward trend in 2013, when the average hours reduced from 16 to 14. However as a% of full time equivalent staff, the average participation rate has increased this year from 8% to 13%. The proportion of members offering a workplace giving program dropped from 63% to 59%, yet the average participation rate remains virtually unchanged. Both workplace giving and employee volunteering programs have great potential to generate benefits for employees and the business, while also meeting a community need. Such benefits are evident in both research and practice, however it would seem the value is yet to be realised by many companies.’ The LBG’s figures do not include hundreds of other corporations operating in Australia that facilitate and encourage workplace volunteering, though its annual data have tended to be indicative of workplace volunteering and broader corporate giving trends across Australia. In 2016, the State of Volunteering in Australia (PwC 2016) report found that only 6% of volunteers who responded to their survey of volunteers had participated in an employee volunteering program over the past 12 months. The majority of those 97 respondents contributed up to 20 hours annually. However, while the number of volunteers remain relatively low, the report suggests growing recognition of the importance and the potential of workplace volunteering to support the sector (PwC 2016). Compared to the 2012 report (Volunteering Australia 2012) which afforded only cursory attention to workplace volunteering, the 2016 research included a survey of corporate organisations and included questions focused particularly on employee volunteering programs (EVPs). It should be noted that results from this survey should be treated with caution, as only 33 fully completed responses were obtained. However, the data supports anecdotal observations on the growth of EVPs. It found that 75% respondents had an employee volunteering program, with a higher percentage in larger organisations (88% of organisations with over 1,000 employees) compared to smaller organisations (38%). The report also identified that the key drivers of voluntary activity in corporate organisations include the organisation’s core values, commitment to corporate social responsibility, as well as their strategy or mission statement. Latest research, key issues and emerging trendsKorngold (2005) identified six key factors that motivate businesses to get involved with nonprofit organisations (NPOs), including via volunteering: developing leadership facilitating team-building enhancing appreciation of diversity fostering loyalty and a sense of community building visibility and goodwill, and promoting economic development. The leading academic centre focused on business giving in the US, the Boston College Center for Corporate Citizenship (Boston College Center for Corporate Citizenship 2009), views workplace volunteering as an element of what it and many US-based corporations define as EVGPs. The Center for Corporate Citizenship notes what it concludes drives EVGP activity among US corporations. It cites the next step in evolving business giving is for corporations to maximise the impact of their giving: ‘…the body of knowledge relating to employee volunteering is finally robust enough to begin identifying the EVGP components that lead to meaningful and substantive impact in the community and the company. Research findings on what generates impact are now codified into six Drivers of Effectiveness for EVGPs:
Cause-effective Configuration Strategic Business Positioning Sufficient Investment Culture of Engagement Strong Participation Actionable Evaluation. Having made it to the mainstream, however, employee volunteering is now challenged to make an impact. As would be expected of a nascent field that has lacked research-informed feedback, existing EVGPs are far from the ideal state of effectiveness established by the drivers. The overwhelming majority of Fortune 500 respondent companies have a compliance with the drivers of less than 50%. As a result, EVGPs are not maximizing their impact.’ (Boston College Center for Corporate Citizenship 2009) The Centre for Corporate Public Affairs, the Center for Corporate Citizenship, and LBG report that nonprofit and charitable entities are the main beneficiaries of workplace volunteering (Centre for Corporate Public Affairs 2007; Boston College Center for Corporate Citizenship 2009; London Benchmarking Group 2014). This is the also view of Hills and Mahmud (2007), who focused their research and analysis on corporations in the US and Europe: ‘The most common beneficiaries of corporate volunteering were nongovernmental organizations (NGOs), and only a few programs benefited multilateral organizations, government agencies, private businesses, or individuals. While some corporations work directly with individual organizations to plan volunteer assignments, many corporations partner with a non-profit intermediary that manages placement logistics. Program measurement remains elusive, as only a few corporations have conducted structured evaluations to understand the impact of ICV [international corporate volunteering] program investments.’ (Hills and Mahmud 2007, p. 5) According to Hills and Mahmud (2007) the primary areas of focus for corporate volunteering are: health education economic development, and environment. LBG reports that the primary focus of the CCI of its members (London Benchmarking Group 2014) — including but not confined to workplace volunteering — is education/young people, health, social welfare and other areas in Australia; and education/young people, health and other areas internationally (see Figure 11.2). 
Figure 11.2 The primary focus of the corporate community investment in Australia and internationally (adapted from London Benchmarking Group 2014) Figure 11.2 shows the CCI levels in different sectors, including education and young people, health, economic development, environment, arts and culture, social welfare, emergency relief and other areas. Australian and New Zealand percentages are given and indicate that the majority of investment in these areas goes to education and young people, health, social welfare and other categories in Australia. Internationally, the majority of investment goes to education and young people, health and other areas.
The literature on workplace volunteering since 2005 identifies skills-based volunteering as a trend which can potentially offer more mutual benefit to nonprofit entities and corporations than volunteering not structured around the skills that businesses and their employees can offer (The Allen Consulting Group 2007; Boston College Center for Corporate Citizenship 2009; Hills and Mahmud 2007). The Center for Corporate Citizenship (Boston College Center for Corporate Citizenship 2009) concluded that ‘providing volunteers the ability to use work skills normalizes the volunteer experience and attracts employees who may not otherwise volunteer.’ Though there is a lack of in-depth analysis of employees working as skilled-based volunteers in a nation other than the one in which they are based, increasingly there are references to multinational and global corporations offering their employees skilled-based volunteering opportunities abroad: ‘At least 27 Fortune 500 companies currently operate such programs, up from 21 in April [2010] and six in 2006, according to a survey by CDC Development Solutions, a Washington, DC, nonprofit that designs and manages these programs.
In its 2007 research The Allen Consulting Group stated that skills-based volunteering can be pursued by a corporation at the same cost (time and monies) as more general workplace volunteering, but frequently offers more value to the nonprofit or community organisation that is the beneficiary of skill-based volunteers. Hills and Mahmud (2007) estimate that 40% of large corporations in the US and Europe that manage workplace volunteering also support international corporate volunteering (ICV) for their employees. Figure 11.3 illustrates the impact they conclude is achieved through international skills-based workplace volunteering. Hills and Mahmud (2007) stated that: ‘[ICV] engages employees in service projects in countries outside a company’s headquarters country. The two principal models of ICV are: Local Service: Employees based in countries outside headquarters volunteer in their local communities; and Cross-Border Service: Employees travel abroad to volunteer.’ 
Figure 11.3 High impact international workplace volunteering occurs when there is a high level of corporate assets and expertise, coupled with strategic business motivations (adapted from Hills and Mahmud 2007) Figure 11.3 shows on one axis that as level of corporate assets and expertise moves from low (e.g. nontechnical service, low leverage of corporate resources) to high (e.g. skills-based service, high leverage or corporate resources), traditional corporate volunteering becomes high-impact volunteering. On the other axies, Figure 11.3 shows that as business motivations move from general (e.g. corporate citizenship, reputation, employee morale) to strategic (e.g. priority stakeholder relations, customer focus, competitive context, leadership development), traditional corporate volunteering becomes high-impact volunteering. The highest impact volunteering will occur in the business setting which is characterised by strategic business motivations and high levels of corporate assets and expertise. In contrast, traditional volunteering will occur where business motivations are general and there is a low level of leverage of corporate assets and expertise. Directory: wp-content -> uploads -> 2016 2016 -> 2017 afoCo Landmark Scholarship Program 2016 -> Instructions for the Preparation of Camera-Ready Contributions to the Conference Proceedings 2016 -> Step student Scholarships for Year 10-13 2016 -> The united church of canada 2016 -> Idan raichel biography – May 2016 Brief Producer, keyboardist, Lyricist, composer and Performer Idan Raichel 2016 -> An introduction to centre’s interventions expanding access to justice 2016 -> Sanchar Shakti 2016 -> Unit analysis should help here. We want number of bananas 2016 -> The Autobiography of Elder Joseph Bates 2016 -> The Great Heat and the Rhode Island Deep Water Bay Scallop (Argopecten irradians) Fishery 1875-1905 Download 4.28 Mb. Share with your friends:
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