New Research: The Challenges and Solutions of Going Global

By Angela Parker

What’s the Fuss All About?

Several years ago, a corporate executive told Realized Worth he is tired of not being able to answer news outlets when they ask: What is your company doing with volunteer programs around the world? “I need to know what’s going on globally,” he told us. In 2007, LBG Associates and LBG Research Institute had anticipated this need and publishedGlobal Community Involvement, a research study that provided the first comprehensive look at companies taking their community involvement programs global. That study led companies to better questions and new solutions, so LBG Associates took the research one step further.

What Do We Do About it?

In July of 2014, LBG Associates and LBG Research Institute published Global Employee Engagement: Challenges and Solutions. This research looks beyond simply what’s going on globally and focuses on the particular challenges of global engagement and the solutions companies are using in the real world to overcome or minimize these challenges. To gather this information, LBG Associates interviewed 36 multinational companies and six service providers. They also gathered benchmarking data on the various employee engagement programs via online survey.

Global Engagement Challenges & Solutions

Realized Worth had the privilege of assisting LBG Associates in recruiting sponsors and participants for this research. We had high hopes for the results of the study and we’re excited to say, our expectations have been exceeded!

First, here are a few highlights:

• More than three-quarters (72%) of respondents have a workplace giving program for their employees in at least one location.

• 11% said they offer workplace giving at all locations and 44% said at selected locations.

• About 17% said workplace giving is only offered in the U.S. In this study, workplace giving is most commonly offered in the U.S., Canada, the United Kingdom, Ireland, Australia and India.

• All of the companies in the study have a formal volunteer program in their home country. The majority (78%) said that the corporation supports the volunteer program as opposed to the foundation.

• Fifty-three percent hold a company-wide service event in the headquarters country and 38% hold such as event outside the headquarters country.

• Nearly 74% of companies in the study have a Dollars for Doers (DFD) or volunteer grant program.

• Half of the companies require 21 to 40 hours of service for a volunteer grant. Thirty-two percent require 20 hours or fewer and 18% require more than 40 hours.

View the study for more!

Here are a few examples of challenges addressed:

1. Global Program Management – “It is impossible for a few corporate citizenship staff members at headquarters to manage multiple programs in multiple countries by themselves.” We couldn’t agree more. CSR practitioners should be managing a process, not individual people. LBG’s study breaks the challenge of Global Program Management into three distinct categories: Managing Across the Miles, Communicating with Volunteer Councils and Champions, and Communicating with Employees. For each section, solutions are offered with best practice examples.

2. Nonprofit Vetting – Vetting outside of a company’s home country presents a major challenge for companies across the board. Who does the vetting? How can we more effectively gather information from nonprofits? What about controlling costs? How do we hold global nonprofits to corporate equivalency standards? These questions and more are addressed in the study with relevant solutions.
3. Global Volunteering & Employee-Directed Giving – Within Corporate Citizenship programs there are two main tactics for engagement: volunteering and employee-directed giving. Each tactic presents specific challenges such as sustained participation and finding appropriate NPOs. Each one of the study’s participants face these challenges and have implemented solutions detailed in the study.

4. Disaster Relief & Recovery – We were not surprised to see Disaster Relief listed as a major challenge companies face. Most companies have local or global locations that have been directly affected by disaster and they need to offer employees a meaningful way to respond.”Companies with comprehensive disaster response plans have already established processes and procedures for determining the when, where and how they will respond.”The study outlines examples of what “established processes and procedures” look like and provide suggestions for companies that do not yet have such methods in place.

These are just a few of the multiple challenges addressed in LBG’s research. At Realized Worth, we hear about these challenges on a daily basis from companies around the world who are looking for the very same solutions offered in the study. Take a look and share with others in the field – together, we’re changing the conversation and taking employee volunteering and giving to a new level of maturity.

Angela Parker
Co-founder/Partner, Realized Worth

Realized Worth works with companies to design and implement corporate volunteering programs. Our focus is on engaging employees in these programs in a way that fosters leadership development. Give us a call, email us, or comment below to discuss how we can partner with you to reach your goals. (855) 926-4678 or contact@realizedworth.com.

About LBG Associates
LBG Associates is a woman-owned consulting firm focused on designing, implementing, and managing corporate citizenship and community outreach programs and initiatives. Founded in 1993 by Dr. Linda Gornitsky, LBG Associates is committed to providing clients with creative and innovative solutions in a personal, professional, cost-effective, and timely manner.

About Angela
Co-founder and senior partner of Realized Worth. Focuses primarily on business development and account management. Prior to launching Realized Worth, Angela spent more than 10 years addressing the challenge of building programs relevant to both the volunteer and the community being served. Angela is currently an MBA candidate at IE Business School in Madrid, Spain. She is also working on expanding Realized Worth’s global thought leadership through workshops, webinars, and speaking engagements.