One of the main purposes of this blog is to share ideas relating to running your business as a platform for Christian ministry. I have shared many examples of things we do in our business in an effort to minister to our employees, their families, our customers, and the community. Today, I want to tell you about a ministry action called the Impact Fund program that we currently run within our business to help with employee hardship.
Employee Hardship Assistance
The Impact Fund is designed to help employees going through a hardship. All employees have the opportunity to contribute to this fund directly from their paycheck. Anytime we become aware of an employee going through a tough time financially, we use money from this fund to help them out.
The contributions are voluntary and range from $2 to $40 per donor each month. All assistance given is confidential and the decisions to assist are made by the Leadership Team. We make sure the needs are legitimate and not reflective of a trend. Rarely is assistance given to the same employee twice.
I have been amazed at the response from the employees giving. I have also been amazed at the opportunities we have had to help those in need! This really is a great program. I urge you to consider something similar for your own company.
Below is one of my recent articles promoting the Impact Fund program in our company newsletter.
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Working Together
- Not long after the I.Q. (Intelligence Quotient) test was developed, several studies were conducted to find out how different groups of people scored on the test as groups. The test was administered to men and women, young and old, rich and poor, and many ethnic groups as well. It was in this context that the I.Q. test was given to a group of Hopi Indians.
When the Hopi received the test, they immediately started to ask each other questions and to compare their answers. The instructor saw this happening, and quickly intervened, telling them that they each had to take the test alone. “You are not permitted to help each other or to share your answers among yourselves,” he told them.
When the Hopi heard this, they were outraged and refused to take the test, saying, “It is not important that I am smarter than my brother, or that my brother is smarter than me. It is only important what we can do together!”
Folks, I am NOT recommending group work on factory certification tests! At the same time, I am telling you that we need to look around and lend a hand to those in need of help. If we are truly going to act like a family and reap the benefits of being part of a family, then we all need to make sure we are acting like Hopi Indians!
One perfect opportunity to do this is what we call the Impact Fund. Each month, you have the opportunity to contribute some amount (of your choice) from your check into this fund. The money in this fund is used for responding to employee hardship. This money is not used for anything else. While I cannot go into detail on any of the specific employee situations that this fund has helped with, I can tell you with confidence that it is working!
Here are two ways you can help your fellow employees…
1. Contribute some amount from your check to go into the fund.
(anything from $1 or $2 up to $20 or more per check – anything helps!)
2. Make us aware of employee hardships that you see or hear about.
(see Brian, Chris, Allen, Tim, or Mike)
I appreciate all who are currently contributing! I know the recipients of the help appreciate it! I encourage everyone to consider participating as you can.
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Do you have anything like this at your business?
Do you have any success stories to share?
What would it take to do something similar?
Our business has three separate buildings with three separate service departments (one for each franchise group – Honda, Ford, Chrysler). In each of these buildings is a customer lounge that includes leather club chairs and sofas, laptop workstations with free WiFi, flat screen TV’s, and complementary refreshments. These lounges are very comfortable and are frequently full of customers getting maintenance completed on their cars.
