Taking education back to its roots
Grass Roots case study published within the Volunteering Behaviour feature entitled Community Action in Edge, July/August 2010
It's time to put something back into communities, but what's the best way to ensure your staff really make a lasting contribution to local projects? Sue Weekes looks at how companies turn a time commitment into valuable experience.
Case study - Grass Roots, Taking education back to its roots
As Learning Services Director at performance improvement company, Grass Roots Group, Ian Luxford, is no stranger to staging learning events. But even he admits that swapping a room full of adults for a class of 12 year olds, as part of the company's community work, offers plenty of challenge.
"It's hugely developmental; for me because it's testing my skills as an educator," he says. "It's stretching me and I've found an awful lot I can bring back to the world of work."
Grass Roots has implemented a 3Es - energy, esteem and enquiry - initiative with schools in the Tring area, where the company is based and is the biggest employer. The 3Es programme is designed to build children's personal capacity and ultimately better prepare them for the world of work and life after school.
Although a major component of the programme, the 3Es initiative is just one strand of the company's wider charity and community work. Luxford believes that as well as being developmental for staff, these activities increase employee engagement with the brand.
In the annual survey conducted for the Sunday Times Top 100 Companies to work for, Grass Roots' employees have consistently identified their employer's capacity for giving something back as its strongest attribute.
"We've always taken the view that what we give back to the world is an important part of our activity," he says. "One of the things that's striking when we do the [school] skills day is that we often meet children whose parents work for Grass Roots. So it's a very nice circular connection, as they can see the organisation is giving something back to their children.