By Hugh Welch, senior partner at commercial firm Muckle LLP.
If the ‘Great Resignation’ has taught us anything, it’s that employee benefits are more important than they’ve ever been.
From agile working and flexible hours to health insurance and profit share, providing attractive employee benefits has become crucial for talent acquisition and retention.
But what if we told you there’s one, often overlooked, employee benefit that’s known to boost productivity, improve recruitment and retention and could deliver between £1.50 and £3.60 of benefits to an organisation for every £1 spent? That benefit? Employer-supported volunteering (ESV)*.
Hugh Welch, senior partner at commercial firm Muckle LLP, discusses the firm’s journey with its volunteering programme.
The UK is a generous country. In fact, the Charities Aid Foundation ranks the UK as the world’s third-most giving nation, with Britons donating a record £13.9bn in 2023. They also report that while around 7.1m of us volunteered in the same year, more than half of charitable organisations still say they’re struggling with volunteer recruitment.
Hugh believes local businesses are key to pushing these numbers up: “It is one of the strengths of this region that charities are embedded in our communities; they play an immeasurable role in providing support for the most vulnerable, and I believe it’s up to local businesses, that admittedly have access to greater resources, to play their part too.
“Offering paid time off for your people to volunteer is a great way of doing this. The modern workplace is evolving and as I see it, every step of this seems to reinforce the value of workplace volunteering. People want purpose at work, both in their roles and the opportunities offered by their employers to make a difference outside of their actual jobs.”
It is estimated that between 17m and 23m employees in the UK do not have access to workplace volunteering opportunities. If they did, it could support between 1.5m and 2.8m additional people who would participate in workplace volunteering, providing much-needed resources to the struggling charity sector*.
Muckle offers two days of paid leave annually to volunteer, but Hugh says simply offering is not enough: “It can’t just be a tick box exercise; as a business, you have to commit to doing it well. Volunteering is just one pillar of our community work, but it is one that we’re putting an increased focus on. 33% of our people take one or both days, and we’re determined to increase this over the next 12 months. We also support our people in undertaking external roles such as charity trustees and school governors. There are 28 active appointments across the firm, but we’d love this number to increase.
“In 2022, we partnered with OnHand, an app that offers by-the-hour volunteering as well as more long-term volunteering opportunities such as mentoring. Our team has worked with some fantastic charities over the past year, including the Country Trust, CHUF and Wag & Co. Last year, we introduced purpose champions, a nominated person in each team whose job is to encourage team volunteering as well as promote pro bono work and trustee roles, and so far, it’s working really well.”
Hugh says businesses can also see benefits to their own organisations: “First and foremost, employee-supported volunteering is all about giving back. By lending our skills, expertise, and people, businesses can make a tangible difference in our local communities. But there are also other benefits. Volunteering is the perfect opportunity for people to learn new skills and work on their personal development, and it’s great for attracting new talent – people want to work for socially responsible employers.”
Research conducted by Pro Bono Economics showed the productivity boost generated by volunteering contributes an impressive £4.6 billion to the UK economy annually – this is attributed to wellbeing benefits such as better health and improved skills, as employees learn from the experience, leading to fewer sick days and better staff retention.
At the end of 2023, Muckle became the first law firm in the North East and Cumbria to be given B Corp accreditation, awarded to organisations verified as meeting high social and environmental performance standards, transparency, and accountability.
Hugh says that being part of B Corp has invigorated the firm’s drive to consistently improve: “We’ve always put community and purpose at the heart of everything we do. Our Muckle Fund at the Community Foundation has been running for almost 23 years now, and we’ve once again committed 1% of our annual profits to help local charities. But we’re always looking to improve, and B Corp is a great facilitator of that. It allows us to celebrate the areas where we are performing well, but more importantly, pushes us to be innovative and creative in the areas where we have room to improve – like volunteering.”
Find out more about Muckle’s ESG programme at muckle-llp.com
* Pro Bono Economics