Written by Kimberly Bishop | Corporate Responsibility
Giving season is in full swing here at Gen. Beginning with our “Geniversary” on November 7, the day we launched as a new company in 2022, and extending through the end of December, we spend the end of the year supporting the causes and communities that mean the most to us. Through donation campaigns, matching gift programs and more—united under the banner of #WeAreGenerous—Gen team members are fostering the spirit of giving that lies at the center of our culture.
This year, our holiday giving efforts resulted in nearly $574,000 in donations to more than 1,400 nonprofit organizations, with roughly 65% of team members across the company supporting causes relating to education, human services, healthcare and more.
Empowering Team Members to Support Worthy Causes
Our donation campaigns allow Gen team members to maximize their support for the causes they care about. To celebrate our Geniversary, every employee across the company was given a special $50 reward to donate to the nonprofit of their choice. The campaign was run from November 7-17 through the Gen Giving Hub, an internal platform powered by Benevity that allows our teams to find volunteering, giving and educational opportunities in one easy-to-use place.
Additionally, three team members who shared the causes they supported with their colleagues were chosen at random to receive another $200 in donation rewards.
“I read somewhere, ‘We can’t help everyone, but everyone can help someone,’” wrote Shirish Kondawar, a Gen team member in Pune, India, and one of the lottery winners. “Gen is playing a key role in enabling and triggering this broader action… I donated to the Sant Ishwar Foundation near Pune that helps abandoned and vulnerable girls in need of care and protection, women with disabilities and the elderly.”
The results from this campaign, which saw increases in participation rates and number of causes supported since 2023, tie into Gen’s company-wide culture of giving. Since April, the global participation rate in our overall giving and volunteering program is at more than 67%, up from 55% in 2023. Total employee giving in the current fiscal year including matching exceeds $707,000.
Doubling Our Impact on Giving Tuesday
We also continued our annual tradition of matching 2:1 all team member contributions to nonprofits for Giving Tuesday on December 3. In just 24 hours, team members across the globe, as well as every member of Gen’s Leadership Team, gave to a wide variety of organizations, from local parent-teacher organizations to orchestras to the dog shelter collective Naděje pro čtyři packy (“Hope for Four Paws”), which Gen team members in Czechia supported by creating and selling the “GenoWoofers” calendar of employees’ dog photos.
“Though I've always been in a position of relative privilege and comfort, I have needed and gotten a lot of help in my life, both emotional and financial, so I would like to help those who are lacking food, water, safety, justice, whatever,” wrote one Gen team member who supported multiple causes on Giving Tuesday. “I want to close the gap between what I do and how much more I could be doing. We're in this together, and all of us are better off when we help each other.”
Ongoing efforts include donation drives at our offices in the U.S., Czechia, Ireland, India, Germany, Romania and Serbia. Each site has established donation spaces in their offices where team members can donate canned food, toys, holiday gifts and more to local organizations working on the ground in their communities. Multiple sites also offered in-person or virtual volunteer events with their partner organizations.
Serving Our Communities Year-Round
Our team members continue to keep our spirit of giving alive even after the holiday season ends. Through efforts like our Global Volunteering Week, our internal platform that connects team members with service opportunities, paid time off to volunteer and more, we provide employees with meaningful ways to put their time, skills and resources to use. Check out our latest Social Impact Report for more information on how we make a difference.