business

ib29 These days are not easy – not for charities, not for businesses. Indeed, giving to charities may not be high on your business agenda at this point, but hear me out. You can actually help others out, give a helping hand, and gain benefits for your business as well. I got this idea from an article I read, which is written by Jerrie Dean.

You know how most often, when we talk about helping charities, we think about actually giving money to them? I suppose that this is the norm – people do not have enough time so instead of volunteering, they offer financial help instead. What if I told you that there is a way to help charities without having to volunteer or give money in the traditional sense?

Jerrie Dean presents the idea of sponsoring a charity. There are many ways by which you can sponsor a charity without having to make an initial cash lay out. For example, if you have an online store, why not sponsor a specific charity that will receive proceeds from the sale of a specific product? This will not only encourage your customers to buy that product (because in effect, they will also be contributing to the charity) but it will also show how socially responsible you are.

Another way would be to simply create awareness for your favorite charity. Add a banner and/or a donate button to your favorite charity on your web site. Of course, an informative write up and a link to the charity’s web site will even be more helpful.

The bottom line is that just because you do not have the cash does not mean that you have to stop helping out.

Originally posted on February 10, 2011 @ 8:32 am

If you think that the closure of Lehman Brothers only affects the business world, guess again. Lehman Brothers also does it share of social work and donating to charity is certainly among their long list of past accomplishments. Actually, you may even call it a regular habit that they do and with the bankruptcy filing that they had done, even charitable institutions are bound to be affected by it.

A big question was whether commitments would be honored. “If it’s a commitment out of the Lehman Foundation, a separate charitable entity, it legally needs to be honored,” says Melissa Berman, president of Rockefeller Philanthropy Advisors. “At the same time, if the foundation has made more commitments than assets, it’s not clear what could be done.”

According to tax forms filed by Lehman Brothers Foundation, it had $23.7 million in total assets at the end of its 2007 fiscal year ending in November. At that time, it had $11.3 million in grants payable.

Source

On whether this was a commitment or not is really highly technical at this point. With no organization up to constantly disburse those funds for a worthy cause, that is one less donor to the world of charitable work. It is something that cannot be avoided but the only good thing that can perhaps be seen from all of it is the fact that at least you can see troubled companies doing their fair share for society regardless of the situation they are in.

Originally posted on September 15, 2008 @ 2:20 pm

Of Charities and Businesses

Lehman Closure Affects Charities