This piece is shared as part of Pledge 1%’s #GivingTuesdayNow campaign, which highlights how Pledge 1% members and the business community are coming together as a force for good to combat COVID-19.

The activation of the national defense law in the beginning of the crisis put a stop to services provided by gym studios and training services across the country. In the beginning, all registration and bookings made through the Connect to Fit application stopped completely. 

Given that we already have a strong and operational online cashless payment system, we immediately launched online live fitness training sessions and encouraged our community of service providers to do the same. 

Staying active at home during lockdown is not only important to maintaining our physical status, but is indeed important to maintaining a healthy and balanced mental status.

The lockdown pushed gyms and trainers to pivot and we started to deliver virtual workout sessions (both group, and one-on-one). This allowed gyms and trainers to maintain their source of income, and for those at home to maintain their sanity! 

To that extent, we continued to encourage our trainers and gym owners to pivot and deliver classes virtually. We launched a campaign through which we directed proceeds generated towards the national COVID-19 fund. 

This piece is shared as part of Pledge 1%’s #GivingTuesdayNow campaign, which highlights how Pledge 1% members and the business community are coming together as a force for good to combat COVID-19.

The spread of COVID-19 has put healthcare workers from all around the world on the front line of a rough battle, so has it in Taiwan. With the hard work and bravery of every healthcare worker, Taiwan is able to successfully keep the confirmed cases under 450, despite being only 1,300 miles from China.

Since the end of January, for almost three months, healthcare workers in Taiwan have been working non-stop, testing and treating patients. Long working hours plus frequent hand sanitization made them suffer from dry, cracked hands. Not only are these dry cracks painful, but they can also be dangerous as potential entry points for bacteria and viruses into the bodies.

We saw how we can contribute to beating the virus by protecting the healing hands of healthcare workers. In response to combating COVID-19, Inna Organic has donated 1000 dual-certified organic hand creams to hospitals in Taiwan including Keelung Hospital, Taoyuan Hospital,  Changhua Hospital, National Cheng Kung University Hospital. By offering hand creams that are designed for sensitive or delicate skin, we helped relieve the pain and concern of cracked skin from healthcare workers so that they can put 100% energy into saving more lives. 

We are proud to be a #ForceforGood with Pledge 1% and #GivingTuesdayNow, because we believe that any action of kindness can be the drop that starts the ripple. The small streams of individual kindness can eventually converge into a great, powerful river. This is the true power of 1%. When we start caring for our skin, ourselves, our community and the whole humanity, we begin to realize our capacity to care for others is infinite.

This piece is shared as part of Pledge 1%’s #GivingTuesdayNow campaign, which highlights how Pledge 1% members and the business community are coming together as a force for good to combat COVID-19.

“This means so much to me, from the bottom of my heart, thank you!” – Aussie Broadband customer

At Aussie Broadband one of our strongly held values is, “Don’t be ordinary, be awesome.” Despite all the challenges during these difficult times, we’ve never been prouder of how our Aussie family continues to display these values. 

Our Customer Experience Manager, Emma Pezzimenti, is one of our team members who has risen to the challenge. She’s been leading a project to help our elderly customers who are currently isolated.

The project involves contacting our customers who are over 70 and letting them know that we’re thinking of them. 

“We have such a large portion of our customers that fall into that category, so we thought it would be good to reach out to them,” Emma said. 

“Essentially, it’s a well-being check to see if they need help in finding resources. We’ve been linking them to various services including TeleHealth, The Australian Post, pharmacy & grocery home delivery, Life Line and Beyond Blue,” she said. 

“We’ve already called around 150 customers who don’t have email, typically customers who are on a voice only service. During the call, we offer them advice on how to stay connected with loved ones and their communities. Ultimately, it’s about health and well-being and checking to see if they need further support,” Emma said. 

Over the next few days, an email will be sent to more than 1,200 elderly customers offering support across a range of services. 

“So far, the response has been overwhelming and we really feel like we’re making a difference to people’s lives,” she said.

As a growth marketing firm for values-driven organizations, Copilot Crew‘s response to COVID-19 has focused on helping as many small businesses as possible to navigate the crisis, and keep their companies going and growing. 

“How we’re helping small businesses survive this environment is unique to each organization, but the common thread is using business as a force for good, finding ways to give back, and adapting quickly and efficiently,” co-founder Hunter Boyle says. 

For instance, they’ve helped a woman-owned skin care client launch a campaign to support Beyond Blue, Australia’s leading nonprofit for mental health and wellbeing services. They’ve helped another client, a (carbon-neutral) corporate consultancy, shift their services to prioritize career transition assistance and leadership development in tough times. The crew has been helping a female-founded fashion client that’s had to close its retail outlets maximize online sales to help offset losses. And they’ve been helping a carbon-neutral shipping client reach and assist more Australian small businesses with the recent shift to delivery-only models.   

Beyond the clients, Copilot Crew have been offering complimentary (virtual) 1-to-1 growth workshops to values-driven organizations and local small businesses. 

These workshops help small businesses identify opportunities to make impactful shifts, from rapidly adjusting their business and marketing strategies, to repositioning their products and services on the fly to fit the radically altered needs of our new environment. Beyond immediate planning and pivots, these pro-bono workshops also help these organizations to look further ahead, envision the transition plans for what comes next, and be as ready as possible for the near-term future, post-lockdown.

“Small businesses are the lifeblood of our economy,” says co-founder Candice DeVille. “When they’re thriving, it lifts our other social ecosystems, especially when they team up with and support charities and put people first. We want to facilitate more of that now and keep it going strong into the future.”  

This piece is shared as part of Pledge 1%’s #GivingTuesdayNow campaign, which highlights how Pledge 1% members and the business community are coming together as a force for good to combat COVID-19.

“We make a living by what we get, we make a life by what we give.” – Winston Churchill

These uncertain times reveal the sure power of giving to uplift any situation. 

Clever Play is a social enterprise committed serving the future by creating lasting positive learning experiences beginning in early childhood. Beyond our portals, we give our time, talent and resources to individuals, communities and organizations that enable and support access to quality and inclusive STEAM Education for all.

The current global crisis has turned our attention to the growing lack of resources in a variety of sectors. Everyone is being impacted by the downturn in one way or another. This opens up a wealth of opportunities for giving.

In response to the challenges posed by the COVID-19 pandemic, we began our charity at home. We allowed our staff to seek shelter in their own homes while being assured of continued income without salary cuts. Working with greater flexibility allows them to wade through these uncertain waters supported. 

In order to maintain our service and helping capacity, we adopted creative ways to shift our diversified services online and crafted learning kits that are delivered right to a child’s doorstep. These actions allowed us to continue to serve while also allocating a portion of our proceeds to families in need. In addition, we have been giving away free kits to our long-time believers and advocates. 

Our giving also includes sponsoring 10 underprivileged students from Al Mabarrah Al Khalifa Foundation for virtual programs. 

To reach our ecosystem partners, we are offering free webinars that tackle relevant strategies to cushion the blow of the crisis and explore opportunities for transformation in these challenge-ridden times. We are particularly proud to support organizations, fellow start-up companies and projects that share our goal to make learning a lifelong habit through innovative means, unwavering commitment and collective dedication.

On top of that, our staff is volunteering in a variety of fundraising projects that provide a lifeline to displaced expatriate workers. 

Finally, we find that one of the most profound ways to help is by partnering with parents in raising their children to be givers. Children who will one day become change-makers, trailblazers and beaconing bright rays of humanity amidst grey skies. To achieve this we recently partnered with Global Youth Service Day to offer Do-Good-From-Home challenges. These are a great reminder to serve from the heart; and despite physical distancing, to never lose touch of the connectedness that makes us all human.

Australia is experiencing one of the worst fire seasons ever recorded. The rapid pace of the burn along with heavy smoke has made it extremely difficult for emergency services to evacuate certain communities. Over a billion animals and dozens of human lives have been lost. More than 2,000 homes to date have been destroyed, and the long-term impact on the environment and people’s lives has yet to be calculated.  

As a global community, Pledge 1% has many valued members in Australia. Today, we are calling our global network to come together to help support the efforts in Australia. With help from Atlassian and some of our other Australian members, we’ve collected the following list of charities and organizations you can give to to support the fire relief efforts. 

NSW Rural Fire Service

The main firefighting organization in NSW directly fighting the fires. Many of these volunteers have been battling against these fires for months now and are risking their lives in the process. NSW has pledged that it’s donations will go not only to the Fire Service but to victims of the fires as well. 

Red Cross 

The Red Cross Disaster Relief and Recovery teams are assisting communities that have been affected by the fires. They help provide evacuees of over 69 different areas with water, food and comforts. In addition, they are arranging emergency accommodations, helping connect missing loved ones and beginning a cash grant program that is intended to help support local businesses and help people meet their immediate needs. 

WIRES Wildlife Rescue

WIRES is dedicated to helping rescue and rehabilitate the animals impacted by the fires. Survivors need all the help they can get in the wake of such intense habitat destruction. Donations to WIRES helps support their immediate recovery, along with longer goals such as habitat restoration and food shortages. 

St. Vincent de Paul Society

St. Vincent de Paul Society is helping the thousands of dislocated people who need emergency housing, along with providing other essentials such as food, water and clothing. They’ve launched the Vinnies Bushfire Appeal to directly help families who have been evacuated. 

Salvation Army

Much like the Red Cross and St. Vincent de Paul Society, the Salvation Army is supporting members of communities that have been affected by the fires. They are providing clothes, food, water and shelter along with emergency service teams in response to loss of life and property. 

This story was submitted as part of the #Pledge1Gives GivingTuesday campaign, which celebrates the many ways our member companies are having an impact around the world.

Horizon champions socially responsible change internally and externally, encouraging other companies to follow suit by speaking to the potential for companies, regardless of size, to give by leveraging collaborative partnerships and employee engagement.

One of Horizon’s most profound partnerships is with the Perspectives/IIT Math and Science Academy (MSA), a school in the Bronzeville neighborhood of Chicago which embraces the idea of educating the whole child. Since launching the partnership in 2016, Horizon has provided it’s profit and time in infrastructure and programming support, as well as over 1,000 hours of employee volunteering.

To date, infrastructure projects have included the installation of water filtration stations to eliminate exposure to lead-contaminated drinking water, constructing a central front office to increase student safety, and creating a peace and meditation room for students to decompress from environmental stressors and practice healthy coping skills.

Horizon’s financial support has also enabled a number of new programs and curriculum to be available for students, exposing them to new ideas and potential career paths. With these programs, Horizon employees generously contribute their time. Employees mentor students through programming with the Network for Teaching Entrepreneurship, Illinois Science and Technology Coalition STEM Challenge, as well as Horizon’s own STEM career speaker series. Students not only hear about various STEM career trajectories from employees, but also have the opportunity to interview the employees participating in the speaker series, developing their public speaking and leadership skills. As MSA reflects Horizon’s core business values, Horizon recognizes the potential to draw from the next generation of STEAM oriented innovators it is currently investing in.

Horizon’s various business units (BUs) also integrate volunteer events at MSA. The BUs have set up equipment, organized hygiene and college kits for students in temporary living situations (STLS), presented interactive chemistry workshops to classrooms and conducted mock interviews.

Because our employees show up for our community partners, such as MSA, Horizon was able to became one of the first biopharma companies to take the 1% Pledge, joining over 6,000+ companies in over 100 countries. Horizon views the components of the pledge as a means to realizing its CSR mission of going to incredible lengths to positively impact the communities in which we live and work.

This story was submitted as part of the #Pledge1Gives GivingTuesday campaign, which celebrates the many ways our member companies are having an impact around the world.

By Twilio.

Empower Others. Those words are not just a catchphrase at Twilio. Instead, they have been the foundation of our core values and products since the very beginning.

Twilions know that unleashing human potential — both within our company and throughout our communities — is key not just to our success, but to the greater good we wish to see in the world.

As we’ve grown as a company and our culture evolved, so has our desire to do our part in creating a better, more just world. We saw this with Twilio’s commitment as a company to Pledge 1% of our time, equity and funds to doing good.

And we see it in the personal passions of Twilions. Like Kathryn Shirley in Atlanta, who donates her time to the Make-a-Wish Foundation of Georgia, providing Wishes for children with life-threatening, critical illnesses to enrich their human experience. Or Alex Alleyne in London, who gives money to organizations like the Hackney Learning Trust, educating and empowering students from low-income neighborhoods. Both wanting to scale their impact beyond their individual contributions.

But let’s face it, there are real barriers in people’s lives that can get in the way of making the positive impact they’d like. Some of us have more time, some less. Some can give more money, some less. On top of that, our lives, hearts, families, and communities are all touched by an array of issues. With all this in mind, determining how to make a positive impact isn’t always easy, and the scale of the issues we want to take on can feel daunting.

Introducing Twilio’s WePledge Program

That’s why we created WePledge. WePledge is our new employee impact program empowering Twilions to take action as individuals, leading to a meaningful global impact as a whole. Like Pledge 1%, WePledge provides a framework for giving in ways that fit the lives and schedules of individuals and enables people to create impact in meaningful ways important to them.

Through WePledge, Twilions make a commitment to contribute 1% of their individual time, money, or both to the causes they personally care about. In turn, Twilio provides an employee engagement platform, matching funds, coordinated volunteer opportunities, and the ongoing support of being a part of something bigger than ourselves.

Making an impact with WePledge is easy:

Volunteer time. Twilions are encouraged to donate 1%, or 20 hours, of our work time throughout the year to causes individuals care about at organizations that could benefit from our energy and expertise. Everyone has 20 hours of paid volunteer time off (VTO) to make this possible.

Donate equity or income. Twilions are encouraged to donate 1% of their equity or income to charity(s) that are meaningful to them. Donating equity often means charitable organizations receive more financial support than they would through a standard donation, and our internal equity systems are set up to help Twilions do this with the click of a button.

Get matched. Twilio amplifies the employee contributions through matching gifts for personal volunteer time, equity, and monetary donations up to a $500 annually per employee.

Global Weeks of Service. Twilio coordinates a week of global volunteering events twice per year which give employees diversity in volunteer opportunities to increase our social impact and connect more deeply with organizations in our communities — and other Twilions in the process. This makes finding ways to use VTO is easier than ever.

Twilions are already out in the world doing good however they can, and with the support of WePledge, Twilio will help magnify the impact of Twilions like Kathryn and Alex.

WePledge is one more way for Twilions to Empower Others. It’s how we empower the organizations working on social issues we care about, it’s how we empower the communities we serve, and it’s how we empower each other to realize the full potential of what we can achieve together.

When we pledge our time and money as individuals, our collective efforts have the potential to make a meaningful impact on a global scale. And this is just the beginning.