50%  reduction in average employee turnover at organizations with robust corporate responsibility programs.  ​(Comp Data)

Many generous executives dream of having their own corporate foundation or corporate investment program that is fully staffed and operated professionally just like the ones major billion dollar corporations have. In reality, most companies cannot afford to ramp up efforts to that level and other realize the need for a full time staff member or team isn't quite there yet.

Executives and managers labor over the endless requests for donations and many do not have a set routine or strategy for deciding who and what and when to give money away to their communities. They often send chains of emails back and forth to figure out who is covering the donation, how much to give, and have very little strategy behind. We want businesses of all sizes to be more strategic in their giving strategy so you can make big bets for the future. By professionally managing your giving campaigns, you'll know exactly where your money went, why it went there, and if you think the organization made an impact enough to continue giving in the future.  

• Building your giving portfolio
• Philanthropy audit  
• Mini impact analysis
• Annual LBR full analysis
• Gift and grant making development
• Rubric creation and goal setting
• Nonprofit research to source high-impact opportunities
• Develop a signature giving program
• Manage employee engagement
• Improve charitable giving recognition
• Structure gift making process
• Create strategy that merges financial returns with impact
• Charity event attendee management 
• Develop creation options for giving
• Assess impact of potential deals
• Negotiate event sponsorships
• Measure impact and outcomes of investments
• Determine and measure KPIs
• Board development activities
• Private training 1:1 and with entire team

Why does philanthropy matter to businesses?

• 70% of employers firmly believe that their employees expect them to be a socially responsible company. (Source: America's Charities Snapshot Employer Research)
• 70% of employees say it is imperative or very important to work for an employer where mission and value align. (Source: America's Charities Snapshot Employee Donor Research)
• 92% of companies believe that their customers expect them to be good corporate citizens. (Source: America's Charities Snapshot Employer Research)
• As social purpose’s role in purchasing decisions has increased, purchase frequency has also intensified: 47% of global consumers buy brands that support a good cause at least monthly, a 47% increase from 2010.
  • Not only are consumers making purchase decisions with purpose top of mind, but they are also buying and advocating for purposeful brands.
  • 72% of consumers would recommend a brand that supports a good cause over one that doesn’t; a 39% increase since 2008.
  • 71% of consumers would help a brand promote their products or services if there is a good cause behind them; a growth of 34% since 2008.
  • 73% of consumers would switch brands if a different brand of similar quality supported a good cause; a 9% increase since 2009. (Source: Edelman goodpurpose® Study)
• 90% of businesses indicated that partnering with reputable nonprofits enhances their brands. 89% believe partnering leverages their ability to improve the community. (Source: America's Charities Snapshot Employer Research)

READ "The Business Case for VolunteerING"

What's a philanthropy audit?
A philanthropy audit is a full review of the history of charitable giving for your corporation over a set period of time. Some companies prefer to go back just three years, Blackbird prefers to look at a 10-year giving pattern (if available) to make a full analysis of strengths, challenges, and opportunities. Once a philanthropy audit is complete, you'll be able to decide which steps to take next to create a giving strategy that is tailored to your company's goals and objectives.  Get started being strategic in your corporate philanthropy program and schedule an audit today. 

What is LBG measurement?
The London Benchmarking Group (LBG) is the global standard for measuring corporate community investment and philanthropy. The annual analysis provides a annual report of charitable giving for you to understand impact and ROI for your donations. In the LBG model, we measure inputs, outputs, and impact annually. Learn more about LBG.  


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What is a giving rubric?
A giving rubric is a set of scored guidelines and objectives for companies to determine which charities to support and which ones to pass up. It is carefully crafted by and unique to each company. No two giving rubrics are the same. In one company's rubric they may have a rule to award any charity with a staff member on the board of directors a annual donation of no less than $1,000. Another company may choose to only give to charities focused on Education or Housing issues. The giving rubric is an easy way for your company to jump head first into designing a custom strategy so  you can feel good and intentional about your community contributions. It also makes it easier and faster to say yes, and easier and faster to say no.   Reach out to us to work with Blackbird on developing a rubric today. ​

What can Blackbird do for your company?

Each company has different priorities for Community Investment. We'll sit down and listen to understand the full picture of your company's goals and current process. After making a complete assessment, we'll recommend next steps. For some, this may mean we jump into forming a formal strategy alongside your executive team. For others, you may have a great strategy and implementation plan in place and we'll head over to help out with the evaluation and monitoring component. 

Strategy

• Review existing strategy and complete a mapping exercise of current investments
• Identify the end objective and overarching goal for investment strategy
• Identify the primary stakeholders to benefit from investment
• Create or revise investment strategy to align to business strategy and overarching objective
• Identify short, intermediate and long-term targets and establish key performance indicators and baselines for measuring progress.

Reporting

• Communicate progress to stakeholders including inputs, outputs, outcomes and impacts;
• Be transparent about how reported measures are defined and calculated;
• Use a combination of quantitative and qualitative information to tell the story of investments; Be transparent about areas for improvement;
• Verify data and reported information.

Implementation

• Develop investment activities to achieve your objectives;
• Consider if any existing activities should be stopped;
• Consider how existing activities can be updated to align with strategy;
• Establish partnerships with other organizations to implement activities.

Monitoring and Evaluation

• Establish monitoring and evaluation processes and data collection techniques;
• Identify sources of evidence for meeting objectives;
• Collect data on inputs, outputs, outcomes and impacts;
• Use social impact assessment tools such as social return on investment (SROI) where appropriate;
• Focus monitoring and evaluation efforts on the most material activities.