Looking beyond your company to help others allows you to be active participants in your community and around the world. While many employees will be willing to donate and volunteer without any reward, offering incentives can help create positive emotions around the experience. Plus, recognizing and rewarding charitable activities helps develop a company culture where these activities are valued. Consider some of these low-cost ideas of how to reward employees for their charitable contributions.
Casual days: If your workplace has a dress code that is not strictly necessary for employees to stick to every day, offer casual days as a reward for charitable contributions. For example, give employees one casual day per can of food they bring in for a canned food drive. If employees need to dress up for client meetings or other purposes, specify when they are allowed to use their casual days.
Thank you certificates: Create a certificate for employees each time they participate in a volunteer activity or give a donation. Although a certificate won’t cost your company much at all, employees are likely to appreciate the recognition. Set up a template to make it easy to create certificates whenever you need them.
Monetary donations for volunteer hours: Allow employees to increase the impact of their volunteer hours by matching each hour they volunteer with a dollar from the company to the charity of the employee’s choice. This can be the organization where the employee volunteers or a separate one the employee designates.
Special parking spaces: Designate a couple of parking spots right next to your building for special achievers. Each time you have a donation drive or volunteer effort, award these spaces to the employees with the highest levels of participation. This can be a very desirable award if you have a large parking lot!
Volunteer recognition banquet: Public recognition for a job well done can provide a significant emotional boost to employees who volunteer. Organize an annual banquet and invite all employees who have volunteered or donated during the year. If a full dinner banquet is out of your budget, consider a dessert banquet instead.
