CHARITABLE WORKSHOPS AND EMPLOYEE ENGAGEMENT

Charitable workshops are the gold standard for effective employee engagement and team building because:

  1. they create a sense of community among participants;
  2. the office-hierarchy is suspended for a few hours;
  3. the company’s commitment to corporate social responsibility is fulfilled 
  4. the whole experience adds value to the community-at-large.
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Charity is good medicine

Shortly after the pandemic gripped the world, the U.S. Centers for Disease Control [CDC] reported this: “During June 24–30, 2020, U.S. adults reported considerably elevated adverse mental health conditions associated with COVID-19. Younger adults, racial/ethnic minorities, essential workers, and unpaid adult caregivers reported having experienced disproportionately worse mental health outcomes, increased substance use, and elevated suicidal ideation.”

Now two years in, we’ve learned terms like “Zoom fatigue” and “decision fatigue.” The stampede away from the office and our subsequent dependency on virtual access subjected many of us to marathon meetings online. The result: a malaise we now call Zoom fatigue. 

And more recently, according to medicalnewstoday.com, “Decision fatigue happens when, after making many decisions at once, a person’s ability to make decisions declines. Complex decisions, such as those posed by the COVID-19 pandemic, deplete one’s capacity for decision making especially quickly….According to a survey by the American Psychological Association published in October 2021, 32% of adults in the United States struggled to make basic decisions, such as what to wear, due to COVID-19-induced stress.”

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    The rates of burnout and mental health issues have been most acute among Millennials who lament the feelings of alienation that their remote work assignments have induced.

    In a 2020 study published by the Blue Cross Blue Shield Association study, “Researchers found that among millennials since 2019, there’s been a 12% increase in major depression, a 7% increase in alcohol use disorder, and a 5% increase in both tobacco use disorder and substance use disorder. This means nearly one in three millennials are now suffering from behavioral health conditions….”

    Fortunately—and ironically—this crisis is exposing and exploding the stigma of mental illness. World class athletes, super models, actors, and healthcare workers have recently revealed their own mental health issues. And this has encouraged the rest of us to unapologetically seek the psychological and emotional therapy we need. 

    Charitable workshops and employee engagement

    Some of us have found that the quickest route out of our own heads is to dive heart-first into someone else’s—relieving the burden of worries and woes that keep them up at night. Charity is good medicine for the giver and the receiver. And a charitable team building workshop can revitalize the health of a whole company.

    Whether on-site or home-based, your team probably needs a break from worrying about their own personal and professional problems, and the answer is just outside the door. In your own hometown, there are people in desperate need of help and when you provide that help, you benefit as well.

    Take local first responders for example. Every day, police officers and EMS personnel respond to house fires, car accidents, and domestic violence attacks. And sadly, many of these cases involve children who may be victims or spectators—in any case, the emotional impact of these experiences can be devastating.

    But, you and your team can literally come to the rescue by creating and donating Rescue Buddies—plush toys designed to comfort frightened children when they need something to cling to.

    Charity builds strong teams

    You’ll divide into small teams and assemble birds, bears, lions, porpoises, turtles, and other furry friends. The assembly process involves “friendly competition” between groups. So you’ll need to come with your A-Game, and use your best team building skills:  coordination, collaboration, and communication. 

    And each step along the way— stuffing, sealing, and tagging the toys—is a step toward stronger employee engagement and a level of team bonding you’ve never imagined. That’s because the employee experience during a charitable team building workshop increases the level of employer loyalty. 

    And when those toys are handed off to first responders for delivery to a crying child, your sense of commitment to your town will increase exponentially. The sense of community among your staff will make your  corporate culture a healthy one where workers sink down healthy roots and thrive. 

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