Issue 9: The Winners of the European Employee Volunteering Awards

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The recently celebrated Employee Volunteering Awards recognised European companies that have developed successful employee volunteering activities that help people facing barriers back into work. The Awards were run by Business in the Community in collaboration with 22 partners from accross Europe and is the largest project that the CSR360 network has ever undergone together.

Following the sucess of the award scheme and 2011 being The European Year of Volunteering, CSR360 Magazine thought that it was timely to run an issue focussing on Employee Community Engagement.

All five of the award winners are celebrated in this month’s issue. The companies share their successful experiences in Employee Volunteering, pointing out the benefits to companies and society and creating inspiration for other businesses in setting up their own programmes.

We take a closer look at three of the winners by featuring their case studies which focus on the impacts to business and society. Norsys, a French Technology company, won the “Small Company” Category and describes how their employees have provided employability training sessions for jobseekers in France since 2008. Secondly, we look at MITIE Group from the UK who describes to us “The Real Apprentice” programme and it’s benefits for business as well as society. Thirdly we learn about The Office for Social Affairs of the City of Wiesbaden in Germany and their strategy of promoting community engagement among corporate employees.

In addition, readers are given the chance to gain more of an insight into the experience in Turkey through an interview with Oya Ünlü Kızıl, Director of Corporate Communications and External Affairs for Koç Holding. She has answered in depth questions about the inspiration for designing the project and the lessons learned throughout it.

The second interview is with Katherine Jenson who leads the CSR Strategy for Abbott. She explains how Employee Volunteerism is such a valued practice within thea company and how they are trying to support the decline in young people’s interest in science as a career in Ireland.

To add further context to the Awards process which spanned 22 countries across Europe, we also hear from the CSR360 Partners who ran the process in their respective countries. Marta Walkowska-Lipko from the Volunteer Center of Poland reflects in an article the panorama of growing employee volunteering activities among Polish businesses during the current economic recession, even though Poland has one of the lowest rates of social engagement in Europe.

In addition, Moritz Blanke from UPJ shares the challenges for the future in Employee Volunteering in Germany and the intricacies of galvanising the SME market there.

As always, we finish with David Halley’s blog. In this edition, he has collected some of his anecdotal experiences since 1997 from seeking the first partners of the International Network.

Enjoy the issue.

Ianire Molero Olmos,
International Team Officer in BITC as part of the Leonardo da Vinci Programme