By David Bloom. This piece was originally published on the Lurniture blog.
Your last name does not need to be Gates, Buffett or Zuckerberg for you to be a philanthropist. Philanthropy is simply donating your time, knowledge or money, and there are no minimums to participate in this giving game.
In May, at the Salesforce World Tour in Toronto, we pledged 1% of our equity to the Upside Foundation, a platform to help Canadian startups and high-growth companies “Share The Upside” and positively impact our community.
In business, we’ve all heard the late Peter Drucker’s quote that “culture eats strategy for breakfast”. The essence of a culture is not captured in the material things like free lunches, dry cleaning or ping pong tables; it must go much deeper for culture to be a true competitive advantage.
I remember during my first week as an employee at salesforce.com, I was flown to California for onboarding. On the 2nd day, we spent the better part of it packing lunches for those that couldn’t afford it. It was at Salesforce that I was introduced to a bottom-up approach to philanthropy where employees were given 4 work days (1%) to give their time back to charity.
To this day, much of these philanthropic events at Salesforce keep employees talking, engaged and giving back. This stems back to a pledge to philanthropy made by the founders in the early days of Salesforce when 1% of the company was put aside and a commitment made to donate 1% of the company’s equity, time and product to charities.
At that time, Salesforce was worth very little, struggling to find venture money and amidst the dotcom crash. Now, 17 years later, the company enjoys a $50B plus market cap and that 1% pledge has contributed millions of service hours, grants and donated product along with inspiring hundreds of companies to make that same commitment.
For those companies adopting this model of philanthropy and supporting the 1:1:1 model, my hat is off to you. You are trailblazers for building a new competitive advantage by having a culture that is not only committed to the bottom line and growth but also to the importance of giving back and showing corporate social responsibility.
For those of you starting or working on startups, 1% of something small is still something small. However, philanthropy is not defined by your logo on the wall of a major hospital or educational institution. You can make a small investment in philanthropy today that will bring near-term returns in culture and long-term financial upside for your entire community.
The time is now to plant your seed of giving and let your team water it every day by building a successful company that creates wealth, jobs and gives back to your community.
Everyone is rooting for you. Make the pledge. Make it happen.
We are doing it today.
To learn more about how you can make the 1% pledge, visit www.pledge1percent.org. If you’re a Canadian company, contact the partner of Pledge 1%, upsidefoundation.ca.
Originally posted: November 29, 2016
RevolarⓇ, makers of a discreet, wearable safety device, announced in October a partnership with the National Domestic Violence Hotline (The Hotline) to educate consumers about intimate partner violence and sexual assault. The partnership aims to disrupt the culture around abuse and assault.
Revolar safety devices empower men and women to live the life they want, knowing that help is near with the push of a button. Revolar keeps users such as college students, runners, solo travelers and anyone concerned with safety, better connected with those they trust most. With the press of a button, the wearable device sends out different alerts via text message and email and includes an active tracking GPS location while the alert is active; a rapid double-press sends a Yellow Alert and a rapid triple-press sends a Red Alert.
Born from the notion that organizations are stronger together than individually, Revolar and The Hotline will work alongside each other to improve education efforts nationwide about the issue of domestic violence. Ultimately, both organizations aim to increase awareness of the issue of domestic violence and the resources available to help prevent and end it.
“The mission of The Hotline is so closely aligned with the mission of Revolar, the partnership is a natural fit,” said Jacqueline Ros, founder and CEO of Revolar. “Because of this alignment, both Revolar and The Hotline realized that while our brands can do great things on our own, we can influence even greater change if we work together.”
Through online activation, on-campus events, student newspapers and resource distribution, Revolar and The Hotline will work to spread awareness about domestic violence. According to the CDC, more than one in three women and more than one in four men in the United States have experienced rape, physical violence and/or stalking by an intimate partner in their lifetime. With this distressing statistic in mind, and as a Pledge 1% member, Revolar also committed to contribute 1% of its equity. Revolar understands the scale of the problem The Hotline works to confront each day and supports their dedication to domestic violence issues.
“Revolar is passionate about leveraging technology to empower people to be safe,” said Katie Ray-Jones, CEO of the National Domestic Violence Hotline. “We are thrilled to partner with a team of people who share our vision of helping to create a world where all relationships are positive, healthy and free from abuse.”
The partnership has several facets, including:
- Providing consumers with the tools and resources they need to feel safe and stay safe
- Empowering students on college campuses to stay aware and educated about abuse
- Creating brand ambassadors on college campuses through Loveisrespect.org
Originally posted: November 29, 2016
By Michael McNeil, Partner and General Manager, Oasis Digital
When we started our high school summer internship program in 2011, we had two simple goals. We felt we could simultaneously provide great personal value to budding software developers, while building future leaders in our industry. What we have found over the years is the impact is far larger. We have been amazed at the footprint of our program in technology education, the software industry (as past interns spread out to companies like Intel, Facebook, Garmin, and other giants), and the St. Louis Area non-profit community.
The program involves a competitive application process. We often get many times the number of qualified applicants that we can hire. We are looking for candidates with a real love for writing software. From varied socio-economic, race, and gender backgrounds, we do not only look at who is the best, but who is passionate. A key criteria is whether they build websites and write applications avocationally as well as in their studies.
Hiring passionate interns has another important outcome: these individuals are very interested in helping others. For the last two years our interns have worked under the supervision of our professional development team to build complex applications for two local non-profits, Oasis International and the Saint Louis Science Center.
Oasis International is an organization that helps refugees from all over the world get established in the St. Louis area. They provide food, furniture, English classes, training, and mentoring to immigrant families. Interns have built and are supporting an application being used to record items from donors, track stock to match items with needs, and schedule deliveries to refugee families. The software creates reporting needed by Oasis International to account to government and private grant sources.
Working on projects such as these, we teach the interns skills that will be of value for the rest of their careers. Understanding needs and translating those into action for a team is high on the list. They learn to motivate each other, meet deadlines, and deliver value. Our interns regularly head to college and immediately take on leadership roles at their schools.
We have been very excited to find Pledge 1%. The philosophy of giving back to the community and adding value aligns very well with ours. We are very pleased to formally join the program and look forward to encouraging others to do so as well. Being a part of this organization helps keep priorities in focus and adds a level of accountability.
At the end of each summer we have a presentation night for the interns. They get to invite family, teachers, and other important people in their lives. Our entire staff attends, with a great deal of pride in the investment they have placed in these young people. The students discuss lessons learned and challenges overcome while demonstrating the results of their software development efforts. I was very pleased this year that a major component of the presentation was the comradery and teamwork they had learned. These high school interns readily admitted they had previously worked alone on projects, but now understood the power of a team. That kind of growth is priceless and worth celebrating.
To learn more and to see this program in action, click here to watch the video.
Originally posted: November 29, 2016
By Erin Reilly, Executive Director of Twilio.org
A lot of people think about social impact initiatives as purely philanthropic, a side project a company takes on to give back, something that is separate from the financials and commercially driven initiatives of a business. In Twilio.org, Twilio’s social impact program, we don’t take this approach.
In the past three years since launching Twilio.org, we’ve learned that social responsibility must be as critical to our success as a company as any other initiative. We actively build ties so that when we build a better company, we also increase our ability to generate social impact. And when our social impact program grows, so too does our business.
Creating a virtuous cycle between the two and actively making them inextricably tied is important for the sustainability of both efforts.
Pledge 1% influenced Twilio’s ability to create this virtuous cycle so that Twilio was no longer “a business with a social impact program” but instead a corporation that does good while creating value. Prior to taking the pledge, we knew we wanted to prioritize social impact, but we hadn’t committed a number to the cause. We had already donated and discounted our product, as well as engaged our employees, but we wanted to step it up by committing our equity. Pledge 1% provided a clear precedent that we could follow of some other great companies that committed 1% equity to social impact.
We’ve seen the impact of our commitment in a few ways already. It reinforced the virtuous cycle between social impact and our business because as Twilio.org generates more impact with nonprofits using our platform, the company does better and our equity is more highly valued, so we have more resources for social impact. Our commitment to Twilio.org has also reassured some of our for-profit clients. When a business sees that we are willing to stake our reliability on a suicide helpline, they know that we can handle other big challenges, too. For our employees, the Twilio.org commitment has a similar effect. Employees are going to do the extra work to test the platform because they know that every message matters. The platform you’re building may be the one that connects someone in crisis with a counselor on Crisis Text Line, brings a doctor to the aid of a child on the verge of drowning through Trek Medics, or connects a victim of a natural disaster with help via the American Red Cross.
At the end of the day, social impact will not be successful if it’s a “nice to have.” Put the full weight of the company behind your program, and you will be amazed by the impact it has on the strength of your business, your customer’s trust in you as a company, and your employee culture.
Originally posted: November 29, 2016
By Seth Levine, Managing Director, Foundry Group
At Foundry Group, an investment firm in early-stage technology firms, we believe we all benefit when everyone succeeds. That’s why every time we succeed, we give back to the community.
If you are a local entrepreneur with a startup, we invite you to join us in this movement. Together, we can continue to make a real impact in our community!
Latest case in point:
The Community Foundation Serving Boulder County announced this week it will grant an additional $300,000 to local Boulder County nonprofits this summer in response to a 62 percent cut in funding from Foothills United Way. The grants will be funded by Foundry through our membership in Pledge 1% Colorado.
When Foundry Group was started in 2007, we made the community an investor through our participation in Pledge 1%. We saw the important role the community played in supporting our company, our investments (many of which are local) and our employees.
The timing of this most recent distribution aligned with the opportunity to help fill the gap affecting our local nonprofit organizations addressing basic needs, health care, and education for Boulder County’s most vulnerable residents.
We hope this money will impact the thousands of local families and individuals who struggle to make ends meet in what is viewed by many as a wealthy, prosperous community. In fact, Boulder County has higher poverty rates than Colorado as a whole, and more than 9,000 children in our community live below the poverty level (defined as just over $24,000 per year for a family of four.)
Pledge 1% Colorado – a program of The Community Foundation Serving Boulder County – flips traditional philanthropy on its head. Historically, an individual or company waits until he or she has become successful to donate money. With
Pledge 1%, companies and founders can be philanthropists, even before they have ample cash to give. It gives an actionable step to the value many of us in the local startup community support around #givefirst – the idea that we give before we get that pervades the Boulder and Front Range startup ecosystem.
Pledge 1% members set aside a small percentage of their early equity (usually in the form of stock options) for the community. Although the equity isn’t worth much at the time of the commitment, the payout can be tremendous if the company becomes successful.
Local startups such as Rally, Gnip, Revolv, Mocavo, DocPopcorn, Techstars, and Filtrbox have joined Foundry Group in distributing more than $6.2 million to Colorado community nonprofits at the point of exit – when companies are either acquired or go public. There are 120 companies throughout Colorado who have similarly tied their own success to their communities – and hundreds more throughout the world who have joined this movement through the international program, Pledge 1%. When Pledge 1% companies win, the community wins.
Entrepreneurs choose this community as their home — and their business’ home-base — because they enjoy the quality of life here. That quality of life doesn’t come without many people and organizations working everyday to make Boulder County a better place for all.
We hope that these companies’ leadership in philanthropy inspires others to do the same. Giving back isn’t limited to the economically elite: It can be an equitable value shared by the young, old, green, seasoned, rich and poor.
We’re honored to support the many people and organizations stepping up to address Boulder County’s greatest needs. We hope others will consider joining us. Learn more at http://www.pledge1colorado.org and www.pledge1percent.org.
Originally posted: November 29, 2016
Paul English, CEO and Co-Founder of Lola Travel and former CTO and Co-Founder of Kayak, has announced his commitment of at least 10% of his stake in Lola being set aside for giving back to communities locally and globally. Lola is a new kind of travel service that provides real human travel expertise on-demand through a smartphone app. Accel Partners and General Catalyst Partners recently led Lola’s $19.7M Series A round. Kayak was acquired by Priceline.com for $1.8B in 2012; a sale that served as a catalyst for English’s notable local and global philanthropic efforts.
“Joining Pledge 1% Boston was an easy choice for me personally. I have seen the impact giving back can have on communities around the world, and I hope to encourage other entrepreneurs and leaders in technology and related industries to make this pledge. Marc Benioff has done a stellar job sharing the Salesforce.com model with other companies and executives, and I am proud to be a voice for Pledge 1% here in the Greater Boston region and beyond,” English shares.
While Lola is an emerging company, English is not new to giving back. Paul co-founded and chairs Summits Education, a network of schools in Haiti that now reaches over 10,000 students in the central plateau region. English also serves on the boards of Partners in Health and Village Health Works. He is an active funder and mentor to emerging and established nonprofits as well.
“Paul English is one of the most notable and savvy entrepreneurs in our region. Having Paul make such a significant commitment to giving back is an example for how we can bridge our innovation economy with communities in need both here and around the world. We look forward to working with Paul and his team on these efforts. We are thrilled and proud to have Paul English as a member of Pledge 1% Boston” noted Paul Grogan, the Boston Foundation’s President & CEO.
English’s life and philanthropy are covered in Tracy Kidder’s A Truck Full of Money.
Originally posted: November 29, 2016
Addteq was proud to take the pledge a year ago. Since then, Addteq has founded the Iris Foundation. The Iris Foundation was created in an attempt to build philanthropy awareness within the IT industry.
Pledge 1%, allowed us to pledge 1% of our time and software products to companies in need. Within the short year after we took the pledge, the Iris Foundation was able to become the official sponsors of the New Jersey Chapter of Room To Read.
Some of our other recent initiatives include:
- Volunteering at various local venues to contribute our time for efforts they may need
- Hosted a charity picnic to raise funds for Room to Read
- Created a four year scholarship program to tech students in India. We are currently sponsoring our first student’s full four-year tuition.
- Sponsorship of a local World of Music concert with Room to Read on September 11th.
It turns out, those first few team activities inspired Addteq founder Sukhbir Dhillon to do more. Because of his upbringing in India, he’s very aware of the lack of opportunity for the under privileged. And he knows what opportunities can do. That’s how the Iris Foundation was born.
Its first initiative was to form a scholarship program at RAIT (Ramrao Adik Institute of Technology), where Sukhbir also happens to be an alumni. Its mission is to bring out the genius in everyone, no matter his or her circumstances. In other words, it seeks out the Einsteins from anywhere to give them an opportunity to change the world. The Iris Foundation’s mission is to find the Einstein in everybody and provide him or her the opportunity to change the world. Check out the video from the scholarship ceremony.
“Our participation has had a real snowball effect. Now alumni at the university are offering to get involved and help contribute to The Iris Foundation, too.” – Jaclyn DePinho, Marketing Specialist at Addteq
Addteq encourages other tech industry experts to take the pledge and join a great network of people willing to spread their philanthropy across the world. Read more about how Addteq and other Atlassian partners were able to take our pledges to the next level.
Interested in what we do or have an idea and want to get involved with us? Contact us today!
Originally posted: November 29, 2016
By Allison Riggs, Global Marketing Manager at e-Core. Originally published on the Atlassian blog as part of their #TeamUp4Good series.
“Be the change you want to see in the world.” – Ghandi
When the call to action came to join the Pledge 1% Initiative, the e-Core leadership team realized that this was more than just a chance to do good in our communities, but also an opportunity to inspire our teams to do good together.
Getting started as a team
Our first project started with a small community center, Casinha, or “little house”, for children in the impoverished area outside of Porto Alegre, Brazil. Since e-Core’s largest office and main service delivery center is located in downtown Porto Alegre, it made sense for us to start there. During our first visit to the center we noticed they had a lot of great computer equipment that hadn’t been set up or used yet.
Our tech teams knew this was the best way they could begin helping by building computer stations and putting desktop computers together. After setting up their computer room, our teams starting providing computer classes for kids after school.
This one small idea then turned into a dedication to bettering the home in multiple areas, including offering music classes, organizing soccer games, and eventually funding and painting the entire house. Our employees turned one small project into an ongoing partnership including monthly events with Casinha.
As the teams in Brazil became more involved, the inspiration spread to our other offices in the U.S. Choosing to combat the issue of local hunger, our New York and Tampa, Florida offices started working with food banks and shelters to package and deliver healthy meals to families in need. In just the past five months, our teams across our four global offices have completed over 190 hours of volunteer hours with four different organizations.
My Pledge 1% story
My personal journey with the Pledge 1% program started when I joined our e-Core Committee for giving back. The first project I worked on was with a few co-workers at the distribution center of Feeding Tampa Bay, where we stocked shelves of food for local food pantries. After this first small effort, I knew I could give more to people in need.
My husband and I started talking about what we could do for a village that he visited earlier this year in Las Salinas, Nicaragua. Like most under-developed countries, only 20% of Nicaragua’s population has consistent and affordable access to clean water. Contaminated water mainly affects children, often leading to months of missed school and/or serious medical conditions.
This is where we knew we could make an impact. Through my husband’s work in Central America over the last nine years, we had purchased three simple, small, and highly-effective water systems. One of these water systems can provide clean water for up to 70 homes, or an entire school, in a community indefinitely.
With our expedition bags, the water systems, and our determination to make a difference, we left for Las Salinas for one full week. Working as a team with friends in Las Salinas, we were introduced to Erno, the director of seven schools, and Martita, the director of the local medical clinic. In less than an hour, we had trained them both on how to use the systems in each of their locations.
Martita explained to us that every month she travels to even more remote villages to provide check-ups and health education to families. She was excited to bring the water system with her to provide a solution for children and pregnant women in desperate need of clean water. Their hope for their communities was visible, as laughter, hugs and tears were shared over the next few days. We realized that together we each had a small piece of the puzzle to bringing these water systems to where they needed to be and providing clean water to thousands of people.
Giving back is part of teamwork
My story is just one of many at e-Core where people are coming together as teams or individuals to make an impact around the world. The Pledge 1% program has provided the opportunities for our team to interact in a new way as people from different departments come together to drive efforts forward. Support engineers, HR Analysts, IT Teams and executives stand side-by-side giving back to those in need.
Here are some ways your team can get started:
- Just start! Once we made the Pledge, we created a committee of only four people to implement the program company-wide. Our first project consisted of a few team members who showed the kids at Casinha how to use Google to help with their homework. It doesn’t have to be a big idea to make a big impact in the lives of others.
- Create easy ways for your employees to get involved. Provide a few examples of places to volunteer and make signing up easy. We use JIRA to request, approve and track our volunteer hours.
- Create a culture of sharing your experiences. We ask our teams to share their stories on Confluence. Teams are motivated to encourage each other and talk about how they are giving back.
We are thankful for the opportunity to be a part of the Pledge 1% community and we hope you will join us and take the pledge!
Originally posted: November 29, 2016
Pledge 1% Boston, spearheaded by the Boston Foundation and a network of community leaders, is pleased to announce a new partnership with Life Science Cares. Since launching two months ago, Pledge 1% Boston has recruited almost 20 companies to pledge 1% for their communities. We are excited to parlay this initial success into an alliance with the life sciences community, one of Greater Boston’s most influential sectors. This kind of industry-specific partnership is a new approach for Pledge 1%, and we are excited to be blazing the trail in this region.
The life sciences sector in here is far-reaching and substantial. According to the Massachusetts Life Sciences Center, all of the world’s top 10 biopharmaceutical firms maintain facilities in the state. More than 500 other biopharma companies and 400 medical device makers also call Massachusetts home. With this burgeoning and growing economy in our region, we have an opportunity and obligation to connect leaders with the practice of giving back from an early stage.
Life Science Cares is an emerging nonprofit that engages leaders and companies in the space with giving back. The mission of Life Science Cares , is to “put the true good that life sciences companies represent into action—not just for human health, but for human potential.” In just the last year, Life Science Cares has recruited more than 70 leaders and companies to unite their human and financial resources to end poverty in greater Boston. The organization has attracted leaders from across the industry to its Board of Advisors, including Alnylam Pharmaceuticals CEO John Maraganore, Vertex Pharmaceuticals CEO Jeffrey Leiden, Mass Bio CEO Bob Coughlin, Ovascience founder and chairwoman Michelle Dipp, and Mass Life Sciences CEO Travis McReady. Other notable Greater Boston community leaders on Life Science Care’s Board of Advisors include Deval Patrick and Greg Shell from Bain Capital,, former Millennium and Forum Pharmaceuticals CEO Deborah Dunsire and former Cubist Pharmaceuticals CEO Mike Bonney. Initial nonprofit grant partners include Citizen Schools, Bottom Line, and Big Brothers Big Sisters of Massachusetts Bay.
“Pledge 1% Boston is an important initiative for this community, and the broader Greater Boston region”, said Rob Perez, Founder and Chairman of Life Science Cares. “Engaging founders and companies to set aside 1% of equity or other resources for giving back to communities from an early stage is a terrific way to provide meaningful resources for the future of Greater Boston. We are excited to partner with Pledge 1% Boston and the Boston Foundation to embed giving back into the DNA of life sciences companies.”
We will be formally announcing this partnership in early December at a reception for the life sciences community hosted by the Boston Foundation.
Originally posted: November 29, 2016