As part of our discussion “The Case for Corporate Citizenship,” NCoC is highlighting some ways corporations are engaging employees, giving back to communities, and integrating civically responsible business practices into their operations. The second feature in this series is Pro Bono Volunteer Programs.

Corporate pro bono engagement programs allow employees the opportunity to not just volunteer, but to apply their professional skills to help perform business functions for nonprofits and solve community problems. Also known as skills–based volunteering, this model seeks to make the providing of pro bono services an expectation for every profession the way they are in the legal industry.

In 2008, President George W. Bush challenged the private sector “to deliver $1 billion in pro bono volunteering support for nonprofits”. Out of this challenge, the A Billion + Change campaign was created and called for the collaboration of businesses and nonprofits to work together in order to effectively help those in need. In 2008, 23 businesses had affiliated with the A Billion + Change campaign, which has contributed over $400 million in services to nonprofits. Companies such as IBM, Accenture, Intel, Deloitte, Pfizer, and Xerox have joined to provide their pro bono services to help address social issues.

According to the Taproot Foundation, a corporate pro bono counseling center, there are more than 6.7 million professionals in corporate America with the skills necessary to help address the nonprofit sector's most critical needs. Accenture, for example, has applied its expertise in supply chain management to help organizations such as Oxfam provide more food to people by applying its expertise in supply chain management.

Taproot says about 77 percent of nonprofit leaders say their organizations could benefit significantly from corporate volunteers focusing on business practice improvements such as marketing, accounting, graphic design, and website creation and maintenance. By utilizing skills–based volunteers to perform business functions, nonprofits are sometimes able to focus more on providing and increasing charitable services to their communities. Pro bono services also help nonprofits use business approaches to target problems and innovate solutions that will help their community. Further, this cross–sector collaboration helps build a trusting relationship between businesses, nonprofits, and communities.

Next in our Corporate Citizenship Highlight series: Corporate Philanthropy.