When we introduced Team Rewards in May 2017 we knew we wanted to give teams a bigger way to reward each other. Rewarding individuals is essential for cultivating a healthy culture. But rewarding a whole team can be much more impactful.
When we discovered how Authentic, a Digital Marketing and Technology agency in Richmond Virginia is using Team Rewards we were touched. Authentic is using Team Rewards to crowdfund support for the victims of Hurricanes Harvey and Irma.
We reached out to Marisa Roe who’s an HR Manager at Authentic to learn about their heartfelt reward.
What inspired you to create such an awesome team reward?
The idea of contributing to the hurricane victims came in through an employee. We had completed a group reward for a Taco Party, so she was hoping we could all contribute to the victims of Hurricanes Harvey and Irma. We encourage ideas of all kinds, so this seemed like a no-brainer.
How has your team responded?
The team has responded to this in a few different ways. In general, the feeling of giving back has been a positive one. This has caused conversation around sustained charitable drives and we are sketching out what that looks like. One of the things that have come up is the intensely personal feelings towards charity. So bringing the contributions to a public place has had a positive reaction. A large swath of the team has spearheaded the taco giving and turning in, so the tacos given and received have spiked during this drive.
What are you doing with all the redeemed tacos?
We were going to donate the money from the drive to the Hurricane Harvey Relief Fund. With the introduction of Irma and possibly more to come, we are shifting our focus to a more global relief fund. We are leaning towards oneamericaappeal.org, which will help all the affected areas. We were going with $0.50/taco to the relief fund, but management is going to match that so we are going to be donating $1.00/taco.
The drive ended with 2,832 tacos donated in about 2 weeks time, which is $2,832 to hurricane relief.
