SUMMARY: Engaging your team can be tricky, especially when it comes to making the most of employee volunteering benefits. Here’s how OnHand users are doing it right.
Engaging your team can be tricky, especially when it comes to making the most of employee benefits.
Here at OnHand, 50% of all SME employees download the app within the first 3 months of launching with us. We’re pretty lucky that teams like what we do and want to get stuck in with doing good, but if your engagement rates are down and you want to get your team hopping on the feel-good, we’ve got some suggestions.
And don’t just take our word for it – there's a direct correlation between workplace happiness and employee engagement, with 87% of employees less likely to leave their roles than their disengaged counterparts (Corporate Leadership Council).
So, here are 10 things our partners have done to boost team engagement and encourage employees to do good with the OnHand app.
1. Lead by example
Softcat CEO Graeme Watt took a hands-on approach and was one of the very first to volunteer with OnHand and share his experience with the team.“Volunteering is a chance to donate time and emotional support,” Graeme said. “It provides an opportunity to help others, which in turn has a positive impact on your own wellbeing. It also helps me put my own challenges firmly into perspective.”
Softcat, with a team of 1000+ employees at the time of onboarding, saw 30% of staff engaging with our impact initiatives within the first 6 months of setup. Seeing the CEO and upper management teams getting stuck in is a great motivator to get your teams to do good.
2. Weekend volunteering = more holiday
When we say OnHand is an anytime, anywhere impact platform, we mean it. People are busy – we get that. Sometimes it’s just not possible to volunteer during work hours, or before or after you head to the office, but employees may be equally reluctant to engage in what is, technically, corporate volunteering on the weekends.DF Capital has set up an initiative for employees to take their weekend volunteering hours back as annual leave. This is a great way to incentivise volunteering during employees’ own time while rewarding employees for actively doing good outside of work – it’s a win-win!
3. Crown an OnHand Champion of the Month
What better way to engage your team than to crown an OnHand champion of the month?Specialist Motor Finance has started shouting out their OnHand champions on LinkedIn for all the good they’ve done over the last month. This one isn’t just about how many hero points they earn or how much CO2e they save – it’s also about the unmeasurable impact Specialist Motor Finance OnHanders make. It's for the community connectors, the OnHand heroes going above and beyond.
And a social media shoutout is pretty sweet, right? Flaunting your OnHand champions is a great way to not only show your employees you care about the impact they’re making, but also to get your team jumping in for the chance to snag that crown.
4. Put an electric bike on the line
DF Capital’s ‘Reduce the Juice’ competition is pretty simple. The person that saves the most CO2e over the course of a year, through pledges and missions, grabs the ultimate eco-friendly prize: an electric bike. What better way to incentivise volunteering than to set up a competition with a prize that just embodies do-good, feel-good CO2e-saving?On top of the ultimate electric bike prize, DF Capital also hands out monthly incentive prizes to keep the team chomping at the bit. Regular prizes like Everyman cinema tickets and Ocean water bottles (catered to employees and all eco-conscious) ensure the team are raring to go and are even more motivated to save as much CO2e as possible – the more people getting involved, the more carbon emissions we can prevent from going into the atmosphere!
DF Capital keeps up the hype by displaying comms around their office, encouraging employees to sign up to OnHand for a chance to nab that electric bike.
5. No volunteering, no bonus
Some incentives work better than others. At some organisations, employees’ end of year bonuses are all dependent on how many volunteering hours they put in during the year. Organisations encourage employees to get stuck in with this incentive on the line.Maybe it sounds a little unfair that bonuses are hinged on own-time volunteering action, but the great thing about OnHand is its accessibility. Doing good doesn’t have to take hours – it can take just seconds to accept a pledge to eat less meat, for example, and employees still get to make an impact and earn that bonus without giving up more time than they want.
6. Company-wide volunteering day
A common problem is finding the time to volunteer. How are your team supposed to find time to do good around meetings and unending work tasks?Cooper Parry’s solution was to set up a company-wide volunteering day. Over two-thirds of the organisation put down their work for the day and got stuck in with their local communities, up and down the country. The teams managed to complete 1,286 hours of volunteering action – all in a single day!
A company-wide day of volunteering can have various metrics of success, depending on how big your organisation is. Even though only two-thirds of Cooper Parry employees took part in the company-wide volunteering day, they still made a huge impact by making time for everyone to do good.
7. Make a big impact in one afternoon
If a company-wide volunteering day sounds tricky to organise, you can always encourage your team to take up a Big Impact Afternoon, just like ELVIS have done!ELVIS managed to increase employee engagement for OnHand missions by 425% in a single afternoon, thanks to their Big Impact Afternoon. Taking time to block off calendars and encourage collective action, whether it’s a whole day or just an afternoon, is a great way to get your teams interested in taking part.
8. Revolutionise Feel Good Friday
Sometimes engagement doesn’t come from your own team. At OnHand, we like to get stuck in with the feel-good, too.Our version of Feel Good Friday involves hand-picking our favourite OnHander selfies from the past few weeks, compiling them into a video, and shouting them out on socials. Not only does this encourage OnHanders to get stuck in in the hopes of getting a shoutout, it also encourages people to submit more selfies when completing missions and pledges. Using selfies is a great way to encourage your team to pick up more feel-good – after all, doesn’t seeing other people doing great things make you want to dive right in?
9. Be a community champion
Newcastle Building Society, a finance and insurance company, has been doing something pretty innovative…In the past, if customers came into an NBS branch and didn't seem to need that much financial assistance, but rather could use some help in other areas, NBS employees referred them to OnHand instead. This way, they’ve been going above and beyond to provide support to people who need it, thanks to their knowledge of the OnHand app and what it can do for local communities.
Showing your team the direct impact they’re making on local communities can do wonders for their engagement. Sometimes it’s all about going back to basics and remembering what OnHand is for: to help and to do good for the people around you and in your community.
10. Plant those trees
Different teams will enjoy different aspects of OnHand. For some, competition will be the biggest motivator; getting to the top of the leaderboard, saving the most CO2e, beating out their teammates will be the perfect concoction to getting them to engage.However, for those who aren’t as competitive, you can always go back to the basics.
Why use OnHand? To do good, of course! Every mission and pledge your team picks up has an impact – whether that’s on local communities or the climate. And, by the way, we facilitate tree planting for every ten missions an OnHander completes! That’s a lotta trees if we get everyone signed up and involved…
So, if the competitions aren’t working, just send out a little reminder – there’s trees waiting to be planted, and OnHand heroes can do something about it.
How to choose?
Did you know that employees who find a passion and purpose at work are more than 3 times as likely to stay with their organisations than those who don’t (New York Times)?Engagement looks different for every organisation, and is key to retaining some of your best talent. Some employees love competition; some employees would rather see their impact. OnHand can offer both, with a little bit of nudging. Our wherever, whenever volunteering platform enables employees anywhere in the world, whatever their motivation, to make an impact.
And, alongside these tips, why not also check out how OnHand makes volunteering worth your while?
