The Children's Society
Employees: 1,000
Workforce profile: A mixture of retail, community and office based employees.
Highlights: Offering employees a valuable benefit during tough financial times
The Children’s Society, like most charities was facing a challenging period. The economic downturn was having a knock on effect on the charity sector and The Children’s Society faced cutbacks and cost pressures. In this climate how could it continue to recognise and reward its employees? Asperity had the answer.
The Children’s Society works tirelessly to improve the lives of children and each and every employee, whether they be retail, community or office based, plays an important role in making this happen. But for an organisation where so many of its employees work remotely and at a time when everyone was feeling the economic squeeze, creating a sense of affinity with the corporate identity was proving challenging. The Children’s Society wanted to connect with its employees and boost morale but it needed to do this in a cost effective manor.
They looked at the options available and decided upon Asperity’s Reward Gateway - not only because it enabled the charity to offer its employees a valuable discount benefit, but also because of the flexibility Reward Gateway offered. The branding flexibility as well as the opportunity to include additional benefit information would all prove to be valuable features for The Children’s Society.
The Children’s Society was undertaking a rebranding exercise at its retail stores - producing something modern and fresh. Reward Gateway was given the same branding treatment and its launch helped to support internally the rebranding campaign. Additional pages were also built into Reward Gateway showcasing additional benefit information. This new and vibrant benefit hub made it very easy for employees to see just what benefits they enjoyed as a consequence of working for The Children’s Society and the Reward Gateway discounts themselves helped employees make their money go that little bit further.
The communication programme also helped to support the rebrand campaign. Working closely with the branding team, all guidelines were adhered to and a schedule of communications was planned around calendar themes such as Back to School, Summer Holidays and Christmas.
Newsletters and posters were key tools when it came to reaching the offline workforce while the development of an intranet Forum, providing employees with the opportunity to share their saving tips and recommendations, proved equally valuable in reaching the online community.
And with extensive use of the Helpdesk, it was clear that the 7 day a week facility was an invaluable asset when it came to helping employees extract the most from the scheme.
It doesn’t stop here though. Together Asperity and The Children’s Society are taking the time to understand what the Management Information is revealing about usage and are using this analysis to help design the communication strategy going forward. The aim is to identify those areas of the business where engagement still needs a boost and deploy the best communication tools available to make this happen.
