Volunteering

We give back to our local communities both through monetary donations from our people's fundraising activities and by contributing time and skills to a wide range of community initiatives. Often, our efforts encompass both. Around the world we have in place a range of volunteering programs that draw on our charitable partnerships and internal committees. Our offices regularly hold fundraising initiatives, from dress-down days to annual events, and we focus on helping organizations which share our own focus on supporting disadvantaged people and bringing about social justice. Some of our activities draw the participation of colleagues from our offices across the world, including our annual fundraising for the global Movember campaign to support men’s health problems. In other cases, our people raise funds and volunteer their time in order to help meet specific local needs.

Some of our volunteering highlights include:

The United States

House of Goods

In 2018, a team of volunteers from our St Louis office joined forces on a Saturday morning to volunteer at House of Goods to help refugees in the St Louis community. House of Goods is run by the Islamic Foundation of Greater St. Louis, a mosque. In Arabic it is called 'Bait ul Maal', which means 'House of wealth/good'. People drop off items that are clean and can be reused and the volunteers there organize them so that anyone (Muslims and non-Muslims alike) can stop by and take what they need.

This is especially helpful as St Louis is home to many refugees – from Iraq and, more recently, from Syria. These people are the House of Goods’ primary clientele.

Canada

United Way

In 2020, across Canada, we donated over C$609,000 to the United Way/Centraide, an organization dedicated to breaking the cycle of poverty and social exclusion by investing donations in agencies and projects that bring people together. For more than three decades, we have raised money for United Way in order to help towards improving lives locally by moving people from poverty to possibility, helping children be all they can be and building strong and healthy communities. 

Europe, Middle East and Asia

Smart Works

Our London and Newcastle offices support Smart Works, a charity which helps vulnerable women to secure jobs by providing them with high-quality interview clothes, styling advice and interview training. The aim is to give women the confidence and practical tools they require to succeed. In 2018, Smart Works supported 1,800 women in London, and 3,000 women across the UK. A total of 60% of its clients go on to get a job within a month of their first meeting with Smart Works. We help through regular clothing drives and other fundraisers, interview coaching and lending a hand at clothes sales.

Australia

OzHarvest

In Australia, we continue to work with OzHarvest to raise awareness about the importance of reducing food waste and improving food security for those most in need. As part of our Global Charitable Initiative, volunteers from our Australian offices, together with our global colleagues volunteered to work alongside and fundraise for OzHarvest by preparing, cooking and delivering meals for local Sydney charities, community centres and shelters. We also continue to donate surplus food directly from our Australian offices to OzHarvest for local charities and shelters.

For more information about our volunteering work, please read our Corporate Responsibility brochure