This #GivingTuesday, companies went beyond corporate giving

#GT Heart.pngThis week we celebrated the sixth annual #GivingTuesday, a global day of philanthropy following Black Friday and Cyber Monday, when consumers turn from shopping to giving—and for companies, corporate giving. According to #GivingTuesday founding partner Blackbaud, this year was the most successful yet: Online giving was up 28 percent from last year, with more than $60.9 million in online donations.

As always, companies were instrumental in that success, using social media to drive the day's momentum. Corporate citizenship leaders used this moment to shine a spotlight on not only corporate giving, but also corporate community involvement and engaging employees on volunteer work—both on this #GivingTuesday and all year round. 

Among those CSR champions were representatives from the Boston College Center for Corporate Citizenship member community of over 430 companies. Below, you’ll see examples of how our member network firms got involved in the movement across social media platforms. 

To kick off the day, Blackbaud joined NASDAQ in ringing the opening bell at the New York Stock Exchange:

Taking to social media, Regeneron Pharmaceuticals, Illumina, and John Hancock Financial Services encouraged employees and customers to take #UNselfies and share personal stories:

 

#mygivingstory by Jen Carroll: I lost my best friend, Liz Laats, in December 2015 after a six-year battle with ovarian cancer. Liz is the reason I work here at Illumina and why I am so grateful every single day for the opportunity to work with all the amazing people here and contribute to the critical work Illumina is doing. I was recently introduced to Camp Kesem, a sleep-away camp for kids whose families were impacted by cancer. The amazing thing about Camp Kesem isn’t that it’s completely run by student volunteers, or that it’s 100% free of charge, or that it gives the kids an opportunity to meet 90 other kids who really know what it means to a family to go through cancer, but that it’s pure summer camp fun. The people behind Camp Kesem have figured out that if you create a unique community of kids with a shared pain, douse them with unconditional love, and give them the single task of having fun, then the kids will come together and find a healing joy unlike any other. I would TRULY appreciate your consideration of learning about Camp Kesem in the hopes we can increase awareness of Camp Kesem for families who need it. @Campkesem #givingtuesday #mygivingstory #illuminainthecommunity #lifeatillumina

A post shared by Illumina Social (@ilmnsocial) on

 

Other companies, like Shell Canada, UPS, and Bank of America Merrill Lynch, used the day to help promote donations to nonprofit partners:

 

ArcelorMittal, Lam Research, and Tufts Health Plan took the opportunity to communicate their matching gifts programs for employees:

 

 

  

While JetBlue Airways, Exelon, and General Motors celebrated employee volunteers:

 

 

 

View all Community Involvement resources on the topic page:

COMMUNITY INVOLVEMENT