Source: Charities@Work

The real question:

October has become the month of corporate giving in North America. If you’re one of those companies looking to break the giving record you set last year you know exactly what you have to do – increase the number of employees who give and the enthusiasm with which they participate.

Simple, right?

Sure, until you ask yourself the question, “How exactly do I increase employee engagement in my annual giving campaign?”

The answer?

To find the answer to that very question, we traveled to the Microsoft campus in Seattle for a behind the scenes peek at one of the largest workplace giving campaigns in North America. (For more information about how these funds are invested in the community, read this article by Brad Smith, Executive Vice President & General Counsel, Microsoft).

Microsoft uses a strategy that we’ve seen successfully employed by other companies looking to create widespread participation in workplace giving campaigns. The strategy is to issue the role of “Executive Sponsor” to a senior executive who is willing to step up as a champion for the giving campaign.

We sat down with S. Somasegar (who goes by Soma), the corporate vice president of the Developer Division at Microsoft, to talk about his insights as the Giving Campaign Executive Lead in this year’s campaign. Soma has been with Microsoft since 1989 and is an avid supporter of the Campaign.

We asked Soma how he champions the campaign at all levels of the organization. Without hesitation, he outlined six action points that blew me away. I think these action points are brilliant and may prove helpful in your campaign.

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