Unit 3: Common metrics for employee engagement

[Alicia_Schmidt]

This article reviews core Corporate Social Impact topics and provides an overview of common metrics, measurement of outcomes, and considerations for measurement. This inventory is by no means exhaustive, but may serve as a starting point for companies to begin or review their impact measurement and reporting activities.

This inventory was developed by cross walking metrics collected and used by ACCP, CECP, Benevity, and a random-sample of corporate social impact reports.

Employee Engagement

• Volunteering 
• Donations Matching

A Note on Metric Types

In the following pages, each metric is tagged with a metric type. These are offered to help facilitate thinking and discussion of metrics, however they are not set in stone. Whether or not a metric is an output or an outcome depends largely on the goals of the program or initiative, and its theory of change. See page 14 for discussion of logic models.

Input	Activity	Output	Outcome	Impact
Company Resources: time, people, money, etc.	What Companies do with their resourcesPrograms offered and services provided	Immediate results of the activities: products, services, time spent	Resulting behavior, condition or state of well-being	Change in behavior, condition or state of wellbeing that resulted from the activities
HOW MUCH WE DO
		HOW WELL WE DO IT
			IS ANYONE BETTER OFF?

Measuring Outcomes

Most of the common metrics for measuring philanthropy impact can be categorized as outputs — they tell us about how much an organization is doing and possibly about how effectively their operations are running. They do not tell us a whole lot about outcomes or the impact that’s generated through philanthropic giving.

This is, in large part, because companies are giving across a wide range of issues, causes and geographies, each representing different sets of goals, purposes and outcomes. Companies will need to identify outcomes metrics that speak to their unique philanthropic mission and goals, and realistically reflect their investments with partners and communities. But this doesn’t mean you are alone, and need to figure it all out yourself. Although each company’s mission may be unique, a great deal of work already exists to standardize the measurement of program effectiveness and investments on specific topics and issue areas. It is recommended to both build your own Theory of Change and understand current thinking in the field.

World Benchmarking Alliance (WBA): Anchored to the UN SDGs, the WBA is creating benchmarks across a wide range of pressing ESG Issues.

Global Reporting Initiative: Provides sustainability reporting standards, including sector and topic standards.

Evaluation.Gov: The US Federal Government creates evidence-based evaluation metrics for its departments and programs. If you are working on a particular social change topic, especially if based in US geographies, this can be an excellent resource.

Measurement Considerations

Leverage what exists for grantee reporting: When it comes to asking grantees to report to you, consider the level of effort relative to your investment and explore whether you can leverage what they are already reporting, rather than asking for something bespoke.

Attribution & Contribution: Contribution is the idea that your influence is only one of many factors that brought about a change, while attribution is the idea that your intervention was the only reason for the change.” (SoPact) More than likely, your institution is but one funding-actor in a wide ecosystem, so the goal is to think about how you are contributing, rather than what impact you can claim as your own. 

Category	Metric	Metric Type
Volunteering	# hours volunteered	Output	How Much
	# causes and organizations supported	Output	How Much
	% employees who volunteer	Output	How Well
	$ value of hours volunteered	Output	How Much
	Experience of nonprofits benefiting from employee volunteerism (Satisfaction/ CSAT Rating)	Outcome	How Well
	Impact of employee volunteerism on employee sentiment	Outcome	Better Off
Employee Donations and Donation Matching	% employees participating in donation matching program	Output	How Well
	$ value donated by employees through gift matching program	Outcome	How Much
	# causes and organizations supported through gift matching program	Output	How Much
	Impact of donation matching program on employee sentiment	Outcome	Better Off

 

Measuring Outcomes

There are two main stakeholder groups when it comes to employee engagement activities:

1. nonprofit organizations receiving volunteering hours and donations and 
2. the employees themselves. Measuring outcomes for both can be done through survey and interview methods.
   

For nonprofit organizations, measuring outcomes hinges on whether or not the volunteering experience was well received and if it provided added value to the organization. While nonprofits want volunteers to provide needed support, they also require investments and resources to on-board, train, and manage. If volunteering is cause or skill specific (i.e. providing pro bono financial advisory services, or delivering meals), outcomes can be associated with the goals of volunteering. Outcomes can be gathered through satisfaction surveys or other experience feedback.

Measuring outcomes for employees focuses on the value add for the employee experience and this can depend on the type of employee volunteering. Skill-based volunteering can support professional development and community-based volunteering can support feelings of belonging. Overall, the question at hand is whether employees who volunteer are happier and show other improvements in their work-life experience. This can be assessed through employee engagement ratings/ metrics or other survey methods, which can allow you to compare satisfaction scores for those who participated or not.

Measurement Considerations

Valuing Volunteering: Many organizations quantify and report a dollar value attributed to their employees volunteering. This is a relatively simple calculation in which an hourly rate is multiplied by the number of hours volunteered. For companies that offer both skill-based (i.e. pro bono accounting or legal services) and general skill volunteering, these may be valued at different rates.

Chief Executives for Corporate Purpose (CECP) offers both a definition and a value for pro bono and skill-based volunteering.

Independent Sector and Points of Light offer hourly dollar value for general volunteering.

Assuring employee engagement data for ESG reporting: In order for employee engagement data to be assured by a 3rd party reviewer, there must be an adequate system in place with data controls to ensure data quality and accuracy. 

What makes it hard	What makes it worth it
Verifying data, particularly when it’s self-reported Getting employees to track their volunteer hours consistently. Systems can be a barrier It is difficult to push past the number of hours, dollars, and organizations supported to measure outcomes	Making the case for budget and resources Demonstrating the value of programs to employees, through their engagement and potential to correlate with retention Engaging stakeholders both internally (employees) and externally (brand and reputation)

What data do our members companies collect:

• # Hours volunteered
• Event participation/attendance
• $ Donated and matched
• # Individuals impacted by skilled-volunteering
• # Organizations supported
• % Employees volunteering
• % Employee participation in giving programs
• % Employees maxing out their matching gift benefit
• Employee sentiment following volunteer activities
• Stats tied to specific campaigns
• Surveys for participants & organizations

Engaging Employees to Get Accurate Counts

At Contentstack, fostering a culture of volunteerism stands as a top priority — our community-driven tribe actively engages in volunteering and shares their experiences through photos on Slack. However, despite this passionate involvement, like many other companies, our team faces challenges in garnering equal enthusiasm for diligently tracking volunteer hours. In the upcoming year, we're considering an innovative approach: initiating each company All-Hands meeting with a dedicated 3-minute segment specifically aimed at logging volunteer time. We aim to infuse this process with enjoyment by offering rewards and celebrations for those who demonstrate exceptional commitment through their Volunteer Time Off (VTO) hours. Through this initiative, we hope to encourage and reward our team for their contributions, enabling us to gather precise and comprehensive data on our collective impact in the community.

- Jessica Shor

General Counsel, Contentstack