The Added Edge is one of the inspiring companies featured in Susan Hyatt’s book, Strategy for Good.

The Added Edge is engaged in human resources, marketing, and sales consulting, as well as catalytic coaching, an innovative twist on performance evaluation. The firm’s unique win-win consulting services are derived from more than 25 years of combined experience in communications, human resources, marketing, sales, and coaching.

Working to make a difference for businesses in various stages of growth, the firm has successfully delivered solutions and services to a variety of industries nationwide. The company’s experience includes consulting at numerous large companies as well as many mid-sized and small organizations.

The founder’s “Investment in Community” program is based on the philosophy that “we all have to take responsibility for giving back to our communities,” explains Leslie Sheridan. The program was set up to support local nonprofits selected based on local needs and their continued commitment to their stated missions. As part of each new client contract, The Added Edge asks the client to select an approved nonprofit to receive 5 percent of the company’s fee. For instance, if an organization hires The Added Edge for $20,000, the selected nonprofit gets $1,000. The donation is given on behalf of the organization that hired The Added Edge in their name, on letterhead from The Added Edge. To be considered for participation in this innovative give-back program, a nonprofit must agree to recognize each client donor with a thank-you note. Nonprofits that fail to meet this condition are removed from future consideration for support from The Added Edge’s client pool.

Nonprofits are also encouraged to support The Added Edge by spreading the word to their constituents/supporters, knowing that if they use The Added Edge, the non-profit they support will benefit. The biggest benefits of community involvement for The Added Edge have been the intrinsic reward which comes from giving, the satisfaction in making a difference in one’s community, and building the firm’s reputation in the community.

DaVita Charity Partners Program

“Run for charity with our highly successful DaVita Charity Partners Program for 2011! It’s simple: non-profit organizations from across Colorado agree to register runners/walkers (and/or provide volunteers) for the marathon, half marathon or relay and then build a fund-raising campaign around those highly visible participants. With 73 charities participating, we’re the 4th largest program in the country!

The nonprofit keeps 100% of the pledges raised. In 2010, 41 charity partners raised close to $250,000.

When you register through Active.com, there is an option to select the Charity Partner you wish to join.  That Charity Partner will email you directly with instructions on how to start your fundraising.  Already registered? No problem. Email info@runcolfax.org and we’ll get you all set up.”

Great way to support local nonprofits by giving them the opportunity to offer a fun fundraiser as a way to involve supporters and strengthen their sustainability while giving DaVita great visibility for their strategic business giving.

About DaVita:

DaVita Inc., a FORTUNE 500® company, is a leading provider of kidney care in the United States, delivering dialysis services and education to patients with chronic kidney failure and end stage renal disease.

” Calling all Kaiser Permanente Colfax Marathon volunteers! To thank you for your efforts, Bellco Credit Union will randomly select 5 volunteers to receive a $100 gift certificate to Runner’s Roost. Simply take a picture of yourself race weeked at the Expo, along the race routes, or at City Park in your volunteer t-shirt and then share it with Bellco on their Facebook page.  http://www.facebook.com/BellcoCreditUnion

Celebrating 75 years in Colorado, Bellco Credit Union is proud to support the 2011 Kaiser Permanente Colfax Marathon and all the volunteers who make race day possible. Life is a marathon, not a sprint – Bellco helps its more than 
193,000 members to face this challenge with the right set of services to meet their financial needs. Stop by one of its 15 branch locations or check out  www.Bellco.org.”

What a great idea!  Fabulous way for Bellco to get great visibility with the over 2,000 volunteers helping make the event happen and stand out from all the other non-title sponsors of the event.  Having volunteers compete for $100 by posting photos on Facebook means many new people will go to their Facebook page and as they are looking at the posted photos, they will also learn a bit about Bellco and what they do.  Also, all the friends of those that post will also be able to see Bellco is involved in their newsfeeds.  Existing Bellco customers and employees will also see that Bellco is supporting local volunteers – I am sure that will build even greater loyalty among those folks, as well.

For a small investment, this will definitely get Bellco a lot of exposure at the same time they are honoring the volunteers that are giving of their time to make the marathon happen.  It is strategic and a great way to demonstrate their commitment to business giving and the community.   I like it!

From the press release:

“About the Colfax Marathon

The sixth annual 2011 Kaiser Permanente Colfax Marathon takes place May 14-15, 2011 and includes the full marathon, half-marathon and marathon relay, as well as the new Colfax 5K and kid’s race.  Established by the cities of Aurora, Denver and Lakewood to encourage Coloradans to be healthier, the marathon has established itself as an iconic race for the mile-high city. We support local charities and nonprofits by providing one of the country’s biggest fund-raising platforms through the DaVitaCharity Partner Program. We are proud to partner with corporate sponsors who make our race a success, including: Kaiser Permanente, DaVita, 9News, The Denver Post, Comcast, 104.3 The Fan, The DenverAthletic Club, Primrose Schools, Jim ‘n Nick’s BBQ, and more. To learn more, visit www.runcolfax.org or follow us on twitter @runcolfax or facebook.com/runcolfax.

About Kaiser Permanente Colorado

Kaiser Permanente Colorado is the state’s largest nonprofit health plan, proudly working to improve the lives and health of Denver, Boulder, and southern Colorado area residents for 40 years. Kaiser Permanente Colorado provides comprehensive health care services to more than 535,000 members through 21 medical offices and a network of affiliated hospitals and physicians. The health plan was named “Highest in Member Satisfaction” among Commercial Health Plans by J.D. Power and Associates for the third straight year. Kaiser Permanente was also recognized by the National Committee for QualityAssurance (NCQA) as the top-ranked private health plan in Colorado, No. 9 in the nation and one of the top 5 Medicare plans in the U.S. for the second year in a row. In 2009, Kaiser Permanente proudly directed more than $82 million to community benefit programs to improve the health of all Coloradans. For more Kaiser Permanente news, visit kp.org/newscenter or follow us on twitter @kpcolorado orfacebook.com/kpcolorado.”

STRATEGY – Instead of just throwing money here and there, we now have a deliberate strategy that directs our efforts for maximum impact.

VALUES – Our company’s philanthropy is a way for us to demonstrate our values are heartfelt and go beyond just making a profit.

INTEGRATION – Our giving is now integrated across our departments and locations to leverage more impact in the community and strengthen our internal cohesion.

VISIBILITY – Our strategic giving program sets our company apart from our competition.  We have gone from being “just like everyone else” to doing something remarkable that makes a difference.

SALES – Consumers like to know the products and companies like ours that they invest in are doing good with their money.  Our customers do business with us because they see that we care about the community.

MEDIA – Our community involvement and giving have helped us get invaluable attention from the media – we couldn’t have afforded the great positive buzz this generated for our company.

IMPACT – We were able to create a sound business case for this program.  It’s not just feel good fluff, but work that creates a win/win – for our company’s bottom line and the community.

PRODUCTIVITY – Our employees feel good about being part of something larger than themselves.  Because they feel pride in our company and themselves, they are more productive in their jobs. “We work for a company that cares.”

MAXIMIZE – We are now clear where and how to focus our scarce resources to do the most good in the community.

RESULTS – We actually know how we are going to measure the results of our giving programs.

What can your business do to give back?  How can your give back program be in alignment with your core products or services and company values?  If you can use assistance in being more strategic with your giving program, contact me at shyatt@BNConnections or 303-512-0808…I can definitely help!

At Lucy, “our passion is to inspire women to achieve their personal athletic goals, despite obstacles both large and small. We support charitable organizations that advocate these same values. With every lucy store grand opening, we donate 10% of the event’s sales to a designated non-profit organization from that store’s community. We also donate clothing to organizations in need and participate in charity race events throughout the year.”

In early September, the emailer about Hatha Yoga pants had the following:

Lucy is clearly dedicated to partnering with their employees and customers to take action in their communities – through donating a percentage of purchases and other activities and events in which they participate.

How can you let your customers see what you stand for?  How can you invite them to join forces with you for positive change and to show caring in the community? Doing something to give back and be supportive, no matter how small it may seem, is great — AND so much more can be accomplished by connecting with people inside and outside your company walls to work together in pursuit of a common goal.  What can you do? How can your company be an agent of change?

The beginning of a new fiscal/calendar year is a perfect time to revisit your company’s community involvement mission and strategy and to make specific plans for the coming year.  If you don’t have a written plan, it is way too easy to dilute your impact by being all over the map with your contributions, become overextended with your scarce resources, and cause confusion among employees and other stakeholders about the focus and true commitment of your company’s philanthropic actions.  Also, without a written plan as your map, it is hard to know when you have achieved what you set out to do.  While the feel good part of community involvement is great, there is the potential for much more significant impact for all concerned with just a bit of planning and strategy

The following are the two minimum steps we suggest all businesses take at this time of year.  In the first step you need to revisit last year’s contributions – even if only briefly.  In the second step, you need to set some goals and targets for the upcoming year. Hopefully, you already have instituted in-depth systems for both these processes.  If not, this should help get you started.  If you need help, send us an email at info@bnconnections.com.

The following series of questions are meant as food for thought as you or a committee of employees and/or other stakeholders make your 2008 plans.

Reviewing 2007:

• What organizations or causes did our company support over the past year?
• What process did we use to select them?  How did that work?
• How did we support them (dollars, in-kind, people, commerce)?
• What was the total dollar value of all of our contributions (not just the tax deductable amount)?
• What percentage of either our gross revenue or net profit was our total contribution?
• What significant benefit did our support leverage for the community?  For our company?
• Were our community involvement efforts consciously tied to our business goals?
• What lessons did we learn this last year?  What do we want to be sure to do again?  What do we want to change?

Planning for 2008:

• What resources (cash, in-kind, people) do we anticipate sharing in 2008? How much of each?
• Do we have options for engaging in commerce-based activities with nonprofits?
• What is the target percentage for our overall contribution? (1%, 2%, 3%, 5%, 10%, 100%,??)  Of sales?  Profit?
• What is the targeted total dollar value?
• Are there financial trends for our company that we need to pay attention to when thinking about our community involvement?
• Given this projected level of resources, what strategy will we use to allocate our resources this year?
• What causes or organizations will we focus on working with or supporting this year?  Why?
• How will we select them?  Is there a process or is it first come, first served?
• Do any of these link with our other business goals for 2008?  If so, how?
• Are there times of year that are not good for heavy involvement due to existing commitments and work flow?
• How will we time our various types of involvement for this year?  One big project?  Something each quarter?  Ongoing?  Or…?
• What are our specific goals?
• What action steps do we need to achieve our goals?
• Who (person, department, team or??) will have responsibility for which pieces?
• What are our tracking and reporting expectations?
• How and with whom will we share information about our effort?

BNC WEBINAR: Community Involvement 101

February 13, 2008  Time: 4:00 – 5:00 pm (ET)   Where: Online at your desktop

Community involvement (CI) is an essential consideration for companies of any size committed to sustainability and corporate social responsibility (CSR). CI requires strategic planning and action to be effective — just like the” other” components of CSR (ethics and governance, human rights, and marketplace, workplace, and environmental policies and practices). Don’t default to using to a shotgun approach for your company’s community contributions. Instead, invest scarce resources in ways that provide mutual benefits – maximizing impact on the causes you care most while also positively addressing your business goals. This webinar will debunk the five myths of community involvement, give you an overview of the menu of options for contributions and commerce with nonprofits/NGOs, and present four types of business benefits beyond the obvious “feel good factor” and tax deductions.

BNC WEBINAR: How to Conduct a Community Involvement Audit

Thursday, February 21st, 12:00 – 1:00 pm (ET)  Where: Online at your desktop

Do you know value AND the impact of your company’s contributions to nonprofits last year? How did your efforts really benefit the nonprofit(s)? Your company and its bottom line? This webinar will show you a three-step process for (1) summarizing and valuing the total contributions made by your company last year to nonprofit organizations, (2) assessing the effectiveness of your internal organizational systems and decision-making for community involvement and (3) assessing the true impact of your community involvement strategy (or lack thereof) and actions on the nonprofits you supported. After doing a community involvement audit, you can tweak your efforts in the spirit of continuous improvement to make sure there is more ROI this year!

BNC WEBINAR: Moving Beyond Checkbook Philanthropy

Tuesday, February 26, 2008   Time: 2:00 – 3:00 pm (ET)   Where: Online at your desktop

Is money tight? Do you think that you can’t support community nonprofits because you don’t have a giving budget? Think again! There are many other very effective ways to provide needed support that do not involve cash and may be even more effective in building a win/win relationship and helping you meet specific business goals. Learn about your menu of options for contributions and commerce with nonprofits/NGOs.

The news announcement I saw mentioned that Papa John’s would donate $2.00 to JA for each customer who placed an online order at www.papajohns.com and uses the online coupon with the JA logo.  I thought sounded like a nice cause marketing effort.  When I read the press release, I discovered this is actually a much broader and more integrated partnership – which I really like to see.  When a business mobilizes multiple resources to support one nonprofit organization, there can be much greater impact for both organizations.  The release said, “Papa John’s International, Inc. (NASDAQ: PZZA) and Junior Achievement (JA) today announced a national partnership that will help local JA Offices deliver work readiness, entrepreneurship, and financial literacy lessons to U.S. students. Papa John’s will donate two dollars to JA for each customer who places their pizza order at www.papajohns.com and uses the online coupon displaying the Junior Achievement logo.

In addition, Papa John’s franchises and corporate-owned restaurants will conduct “job shadow” events at which JA students can experience first-hand what it is like to own and run a Papa John’s restaurant, and Papa John’s employees will be encouraged to volunteer to teach JA classes at schools in their communities. JA Offices can also expand the partnership to include recruiting Papa John’s franchisees and local market team leadership to serve on their boards of directors. “

I am hungry and in the mood for pizza (even if it doesn’t fit my New Year’s Resolution…), so where do I look for the online coupon so my $2 can go to JA if I am going to order pizza anyway?  Don’t see it on the JA site…  On the Papa John’s site, after clicking a link for online specials and coupons and entering my delivery address, I found the specials listed.

Next time you order pizza for lunch at the office, remember Papa John’s!

My take is as follows and is what I commented to Tracy.  In my work, I sometimes hear an ambivalence from companies about whether it is OK to expect some “return” from their community involvement or to tell others about what they are doing.  If your community support/engagement comes from a place of authentic values and is not an attempt to whitewash other offenses, I think doing double duty – providing a benefit to both the business and nonprofit – is great and the only way to go.  Having a “return” to your business is not sacreligious.  I recently interviewed leaders from 50 companies of various sizes for a book I am writing for businesses on how to do more effective community involvement.  They all felt their community involvement had a positive impact for the company – everything from “feeling good” to strengthening their business reputation, customer loyalty, increasing sales, employee skills and retention, and access to capital. 

While I believe that doing something in the local community is usually better than doing nothing – just offering up your scarce resources for any social issue (whether cash or time or whatever else) on a first come first served basis can be a missed opportunity to synergize a greater impact in the community and to strengthen your company.  My mantra is “one pack of hotdog buns to every nonprofit that asks has no real impact - for the community or the company.”  Having a strategy about how to best use your company’s resources, skill sets and overall comparative advantage in service to the causes you choose to support with a link to business goals only makes sense to me and is the basis of my company, Business Nonprofit Connections, Inc.’s work with businesses of all sizes. 

My message is similar with nonprofit clients.  With nonprofits, I always emphasize the need to think about themselves as assets in the community and to think about engaging with businesses from a sense of win/win “partnerships” — not just the old school paradigm of checkbook philanthropy. The business also needs to get something out of the engagement or it is likely to be an unsustainable relationship.  The nonprofit will find themselves beating the bushes for new donors next year for their silent auction or other resource development activities which is really time consuming. With some tweaks, both sides can and I think should benefit.

• Community involvement
• Business philanthropy
• Corporate philanthropy
• Strategic philanthropy
• Strategic partnerships with nonprofits
• Strategic alliances with nonprofits
• Community relations
• Community investment
• Giving Back
• Charitable giving/contributions
• Charity
• Paying it forward
• Philanthropreneurism
• Venture philanthropy
• Social (civic) entrepreneurism
• Social enterprise
• Corporate citizenship

And the list goes on.  It is mindboggling!  To me, while many sound similar, they have subtle differences under the surface.  So which to use?  I have struggled with this terminology issue for years!!  What is the best term to represent my philosophy and vision concerning the interaction between organizations labeled as businesses and those labeled as nonprofits in the eyes of the IRS?   Do I use one in common usage and define it for my purposes or do I create something new and have the uphill battle to get it recognized and understood like the LOHAS folks?  Generally, I have opted for the terms “community involvement”, “strategic partnerships”, or “business nonprofit connections.” 

Some people strongly prefer “community investment” because it indicates more clearly the notion of two-way benefit and the need for some ROI for the business, as well as the community.  Though growing in popularity, it is still not a term used by the bulk of businesses – especially smaller ones.  I am all about mutual benefits and all-win approaches but I am still lukewarm to using that term in my work.

For years, I also shied away from using the term “philanthropy” because I felt it can imply a sense of noblesse oblige – where the “rich” company (or business person) is providing a handout to those less fortunate from a feeling of burden or guilt.  That certainly doesn’t feel like a strategic partnership or “teach a man to fish” approach to me.  It can seem more like a one way grand gesture from the powerful to the weak that does not fully acknowledge the assets and experience in the trenches of the nonprofit colleague.  Also, it seemed easy to confuse individual and business forms of philanthropy.  However, when I looked it up in Merriam-Webster’s dictionary the definition seems fine:“goodwill to fellowmen; especially : active effort to promote human welfare.”  That’s not so bad, right? “Philanthropic,” however, is defined as “dispensing or receiving aid from funds set aside for humanitarian purposes.” Coming out of the international development field where there was a lot of talk about “trade not aid”, I tend to associate some forms of aid to continued dependency – not breaking cycles poverty and other social issues.  Instead, I sought a term that implies a greater sense of partnership and potential synergy for positive social change that can result from different types of organizations with their varied skill sets, networks, and other assets working together.  So which term IS best for that? Frankly, I have been stumped.  I also have not wanted whatever word choice to seem ”old hippy”, “granola”, or political because I feel that business engagement in communities is for everyone.

The truth is that as much as I originally avoided the term because of the undertones I perceived it had, business people do use “philanthropy” all the time to talk about their efforts as evidenced, for example, in their online search terms to find more information about how to strengthen what they are doing; business people that have good intentions and want to grow their companies and actively show their values through their engagement and support of communities.  Those are the people with whom I want to work.  So why shy away from it anymore?  Why not get off my idealistic high horse and go with a commonly used term?  Wouldn’t that be the easiest path in to a substantive dialogue – later sharing my specific philosophy and principles to help businesses rethink and tweak what they are doing to be more strategic and “all win”?  I now think so – hence the name of this blog!

What terms do you prefer? What do you see as their shades of meaning? What do you see as trends in how people are talking about such activities and initiatives?