Welcome to Ask an Adviser, EBN’s weekly column in which benefit brokers and advisers answer (anonymous) queries sent in by our readers. Looking for some expert advice? Please submit questions to
One key to keeping the best employees on board may lie in how well companies give them the opportunity to put their own skills and interests into action, and toward making a difference in the world.
In a recent LumApps/CMS poll regarding “The Great Reflection” among workers, it’s clear that employees want to work for companies that walk the walk when it comes to corporate social responsibility. Employees’ passions for social issue involvement contribute toward helping their company’s overall impact efforts, and also help those workers feel professionally fulfilled: 76% of survey respondents are looking for corporate social responsibility and 73% want to choose employers with a reputation for supporting diversity, equity and inclusion.
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Just as businesses have unique abilities and resources to solve problems for their communities, their employees have their own set of talents that can add a rich dimension to the company’s social-impact profile. Unleashing those talents can be as simple and informal as assigning appropriate roles to your employees for a volunteer project. If there’s a photographer on the team, for example, have them take photos at the event. Have a group that loves to haul things in their pickup trucks? Put them in charge of collecting the cans from your office locations for your food drive.
Over time, of course, you can become more intentional and strategic about how you use your employees’ skills. We do an employee survey or focus group with our client teams to identify employee interests such as public speaking, strategic planning, committee leadership, budget planning and more. Effectively leveraging these skills and interests helps extend our clients’ impact footprint in the community, even with limited formal staff resources.
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Employees, especially the younger workforce, are looking for a deeper meaning in their work and to feel as though they are contributing to something impactful. Millennials are especially vigilant about researching and weighing the values and cultures of companies they want to work for. Gen Z is following suit, looking for authentic commitments from their employer to take action to solve the world’s problems.
Employers are understanding that social impact is a critical component to an effective business strategy. In today’s connected and interdependent world, employees increasingly demand that businesses and their suppliers take part in creating solutions to the world’s most pressing problems. It’s time to fire up those special talents and passions to build engagement and loyalty.
