Planners pump up CSR
team-building activities by
helping those with acute needs
Critical Care
By Katie Morell
Philanthropic team-building activities are seeing a spike in popularity at a time when corporate meetings are under public scrutiny from investors (and the press) and ROI metrics are more important than ever. Gone are multiday junkets to far-flung locations with limited accountability for dollars spent. These days, planners are feeling the pressure to make each dollar count and, at the same time, incorporate charitable causes into meeting agendas.
Enter extreme—as in “extremely critical”—CSR team-building programs. While a variety of excellent programs exist that help disadvantaged communities, Meetings Focus has identified three standout programs that help people in the most dire of situations.
Stopping Hunger
On a sunny day in December 2012, about 60 Google employees gathered on a patch of grass in the middle of the company’s campus in Mountain View, Calif. Half of the group wore blue hairnets, the other half wore white hairnets. Each team stood at long rectangular tables. In front of them was food to be assembled into meal packages for the hungry.
“We were working with Stop Hunger Now, an organization that sends food to Third World countries,” says Charlotte Johnson, people programs specialist at Google. “The teams got competitive and we ended up packaging thousands of meals for those in need. It was great fun.”
Stop Hunger Now is an international hunger relief organization that works with planners to do just what Google did—assemble thousands of meals for the hungry.
“More than 25,000 people die every day from hunger; our mission is to end hunger in this lifetime,” says Karen Sanders Noe, regional development director for Stop Hunger Now. “Our programs are incredibly effective; a group of 100 people can package up to 20,000 meals in just two hours.”
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Make an Impact:
Resources for Acute-Care CSR
Ready to incorporate a philanthropic team-building activity into your next event?
Here are a few places to start.
Clean the World
407.574.8353
www.cleantheworld.org
Stop Hunger Now
919.839.0689
www.stophungernow.org
Odyssey Teams (Helping Hands program)
800.342.1650
www.odysseyteams.com
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