As a bank that is committed to being highly involved in the community and environment, Nedbank Group is committed to encouraging and enabling its staff to share their skills and talents in service of others – thereby contributing to the transformation of the country as well as the business. The group’s Staff Volunteerism Programme is designed to cater for staffmembers who wish to give of their time to worthy causes. Many opportunities are available within the group for staff to involve themselves in volunteer work or charity support. These include:
Through the Team Challenge, staffmembers are given the opportunity and financial support to volunteer at charity organisations that are close to their hearts. The Nedbank Foundation makes R2 000 seed funding available to every team to help them get their projects off the ground. Teams can elect to undertake the 10-month challenge or do one or more seven- day challenges.
A total of 207 Nedbank Group staffmembers, together with family and friends, participated in the 2009 Team Challenge (2008: 701). Prizemoney totalling R200 000 was split among the winning teams across the two categories (10-month and seven-day challenges). This money does not go to the teams, but is passed on to the charities or projects with which they were involved.
PAYROLL GIVING PROGRAMME
The Payroll Giving Programme, which was started in 2006, continued to grow during 2009. Around 200 new contributors were added to the scheme during the course of the year. The donated funds are passed on to the SA Children’s Charity Trust (SACCT), which then uses the money to support a variety of organisations, including CHOC, Cotlands, the South African Red Cross Society, Reach for a Dream, the Ithemba charities and the QuadPara Association of SA.
According to Advocate Dawie Crous, of the SACCT, Nedbank staffmembers are the largest contributors to the Payroll Giving Programme. After starting out with total contributions of R965 per month in January 2006, support of the programme by Nedbank staffmembers had grown to R113 000 per month by the end of December 2009. Nedbank staffmembers contributed a total of R1,37 million in 2009.