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Common Impact Connections: Supporting Our Communities During COVID-19

How to leverage virtual service and disaster resiliency to safely continue your skills-based volunteering

Common Impact Connections: Supporting Our Communities During COVID-19

How to leverage virtual service and disaster resiliency to safely continue your skills-based volunteering

Published 04-09-20

Submitted by Common Impact

Last month, Common Impact CEO Danielle Holly shared a clear call to action: “Now is the time to plan and adapt, not pull back." Since then, our team has been working with Danielle to accelerate and expand our virtual skills-based volunteer models for companies and design resiliency-focused needs assessment and project scoping tools for nonprofits. We've created some first-look resources your team can use to help navigate skills-based volunteerism during the COVID-19 pandemic:

  • Virtual volunteering: View our new catalog of virtual volunteer models to learn about the virtual day of service, virtual team consulting, virtual education and our new hotline for nonprofits to access corporate expertise at critical moments.

  • Nonprofit crisis management support: Capacity Commons now features a new COVID-19 guide to leveraging skilled volunteers in times of crisis. Included are a 10-minute resiliency assessment to identify core organizational needs, an easy-to-use tool for scoping projects and a roster of sources to find qualified skills-based volunteers.

  • Disaster relief and resiliency projects: Last year, we released Disaster Response - From Relief to Resiliency, an approach to cross-sector partnerships for disaster and crisis management. Access the report and pro bono project portfolio to understand how you can reshape your programs towards scenario planning and facility resiliency assessments.

For additional resources and more on how we're helping nonprofits and volunteers navigate this unprecedented situation, check out our blog post Volunteering Differently – Not Less – During a Crisis. It's a difficult time we're living in right now, and the only way to get through it is together. Thank you for being part of our community.

Questions about crisis management, virtual volunteering or service during COVID-19? Reach out to our team!

New Pro Bono Perspectives Podcast Episodes

Looking for some social impact inspiration? We've got you covered! Tune in to hear Harvard Pilgrim Health Care Foundation's Janelle Woods-McNish discuss the impact of skills-based volunteering and the power of saying "no." Listen as Salesforce.org's Cheryl Timoney shares her organization's response to the COVID-19 pandemic, including leveraging its technology and talent to provide pro bono support to nonprofit and education partners.

Stay tuned for these upcoming episodes:

  • April 14 - Special Episode! COVID-19 & Volunteerism ft. Amy Sample Ward, CEO, NTEN; Michelle Jackson, Acting Executive Director, Human Services Council; Lucy Darragh, Director of Citizenship, Blue Cross Blue Shield of Massachusetts

  • April 21 - Margaret McDonnell, Executive Director, UN Foundation's Nothing But Nets campaign

  • May 5 - Nick Savarese, Executive Director, Flutie Foundation

We're Hiring!

  • The Chief Program Officer will manage and grow our programs, including our consulting work with companies and social change organizations, as well as our field building work that identifies where the talents and expertise of individuals can play a stronger role and incubates new ideas, models and initiatives. This position offers an exceptional opportunity for a mid-career or seasoned leader with a background in corporate social responsibility and social sector leadership to join Common Impact’s Leadership Team. See the full position description for details and instructions on how to apply. Please submit applications by April 24th to be considered.

  • The Director of Technology will apply a strategic technology and operational lens to facilitating cross-sector partnerships and bringing Common Impact’s operations to scale. S/he will support and manage projects across multiple dimensions – strategy, operations, finance, talent and technology – in order to improve the efficiency and effectiveness of work procedures and the systems that support them. This position offers an exceptional opportunity for a mid-career professional with a mix of technical and operational skills to join Common Impact’s talented team and expand a proven model of social impact. See the full position description for details and instructions on how to apply. Please submit applications by April 24th to be considered.

Upcoming Events

Webinar - Attaining Corporate and Philanthropic Support During COVID-19 (April 29 - Online)
Join Candid, Common Impact and Good360 for a webinar on how to leverage the full suite of corporate and philanthropic assets – people, product and philanthropy – to bolster your community resiliency efforts. Participants will receive a set of actionable tools that will help them build strategic partnerships and learn from case studies that demonstrate how cross-sector partners can bridge their expertise in areas such as risk management, continuity planning and crisis communications to prepare front-line organizations and their communities to respond resiliently to crises like COVID-19.

Common Impact in the News

  • Nonprofit Quarterly - Direct Service Volunteers Stay Home in Droves—Now What?: In mid-March, as the COVID-19 outbreak was first requiring workers and volunteers in the U.S. to stay home, Common Impact CEO Danielle Holly addressed nonprofits that suddenly found themselves without in-person support and offered solutions like virtual skills-based volunteerism.

  • sgENGAGE Podcast - Episode 142: Tips for Virtual Volunteer Programs: Host and Common Impact board member Rachel Hutchisson discusses with Danielle Holly the different models of virtual volunteering, how companies can encourage employees to give back in this way and what nonprofits can do to translate their needs into virtual volunteer opportunities

Check out our full newsletter to stay up to date with the latest and greatest at Common Impact!

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Common Impact

Common Impact

Common Impact is a nationally-recognized nonprofit that works to build a society in which individuals and businesses invest their unique talents toward a shared purpose: strengthening the local communities in which we live and work.

Common Impact breaks down barriers that exist between sectors and industries to create meaningful partnerships between companies, social sector organizations and the people that drive them.  The common purpose of these connections:  to deliver business value to each partner through innovations in community engagement, and to address deeply rooted and complex social challenges.

With a deep understanding of both mission-focused and business goals, Common Impact enables growing nonprofits to achieve even greater results in our communities; while simultaneously engaging corporate employees in dynamic and challenging opportunities that develop their skills and unlock successful, purpose-driven careers.

Since 2000, Common Impact has partnered with Fortune 500 companies and hundreds of the country’s leading nonprofit organizations to create this transformational change. Learn more about Common Impact

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