Building Impact Blog

As part of our COVID-19 response we created Virtual Volunteer opportunities and launched our Gift Cards for Groceries program in partnership with FamilyAid Boston, a nonprofit working to end child and family homelessness. Since the beginning of the pandemic, the staff at FamilyAid have been working around the clock to distribute emergency supplies of basic necessities and food to ~300 local families living in shelters. To help ease the burden on FamilyAid staff and empower these families to have the opportunity to make their own choices on what they need we asked our network to help us purchase gift cards. Our network responded in a HUGE way and has been very generous in already providing $10,000+ in donations for gift cards.

During these unprecedented days of Social Distancing, our need for social connection is great. As individuals and families, we look for opportunities to maintain a connection to our community - but amidst all of the challenges that we feel, our hearts and thoughts are with our neighbors who are struggling right now just to get enough food on the table, or enough diapers or detergent for their families, or even just enough soap to keep hands clean. So what can we do? How can we help?

Team-building with a purpose! A huge thank you to the People Ops HR team at HubSpot for taking time out of your summit to create 14 fleece blankets and 30 bark bags last Tuesday! These donations will go to Greater Dog Rescue New England, a rescue-group that supports homeless or abandoned dogs by placing them with loving foster families until they find their forever home.

The Impact Fellows Program was designed to bring together a diverse cohort of Boston professionals to dig deeper into what it means to strengthen the community through volunteering. The Impact Fellows explored complexities and nuances of volunteer projects as well as the power imbalance between nonprofits and their corporate partners. The program is based on Building Impact's model of listening first to nonprofit needs, co-designing a project, and then serving and measuring the impact. 

With the MIT Sloan mission in mind, the “Leading with Impact” course was established four years ago by Professor Nelson Repenning, Johanna Hising DiFabio, and Diana Ganz (EMBA’14) to provide EMBA students with the challenge of applying business principles to make an impact in the nonprofit sector.  In the final week of the twenty-month Executive MBA Program at MIT Sloan, the executives who have been students of business and management as a part of the EMBA class take on a business challenge faced by a local nonprofit organization.  The goal is simple – making an impact.  But, the complexity of the projects becomes evident from Day 1.

As part of the business development team at Building Impact, I am often the first person on the phone with a working professional planning a day of service. They are passionate and ready to jump in and get their hands dirty. Passionate and ready to get their hands dirty is a great mindset to start in, but impact volunteering requires a step backward first. Before we start ordering supplies and coordinating transportation, we want to think first about the mission of the day. Project leaders need to think about the issue area they are concerned with, training volunteers to work with client populations, and the outcomes for the nonprofit. Then we can focus on acquiring budget, recruiting volunteers, and executing the project. Overall, the process of planning a day of impact volunteering requires a wide range of professional and interpersonal skills.

On this Giving Tuesday, we want to thank all of the volunteers who partner with us in Giving Time and their resources to help our neighbors in need all year round!

We are filled with Gratitude this month for those who have helped us with building Trail Mix Packets for homeless elderly who are served by a nonprofit organization known as Hearth!  Collectively, our volunteers across 30 companies have prepared trail mix that will provide healthy snacks for several hundred elderly people who find housing and social services through Hearth’s outreach. As we worked with our volunteers in preparing and delivering meals at Thanksgiving for families, elderly and teens in shelters, our nonprofit partners in Boston, Waltham, Cambridge and Watertown reminded us that as the weather gets colder, the needs of those struggling for shelter and healthy meals only grow after the holiday season.