Volunteering Could be the Secret to Happiness: How You Can Get Involved, Go Riverwalk Magazine, June 2014

What if there was a study dedicated to unearthing the secrets to a happy life?  Researchers analyzed data from 40 published papers and found evidence that volunteering, in fact, boosts happiness.  Volunteers had lower levels of depression, increased life satisfaction and enhanced well-being.  More importantly, volunteers had a 20 percent lower risk of death than…

Volunteerism in South Florida

I recently wrote a blog on how volunteering can be the secret to happiness.  In that blog, I shared that altogether, 64.5 million Americans volunteered nearly 7.9 billion hours last year and of those, a third volunteered for more than a hundred hours each year (which requires just two hours each week).  The estimated value of…

Companies Reflect on Doing Good and Doing Well, Go Riverwalk Magazine, March 2014

With the recent release of Giving USA’s philanthropy report, which indicates that companies gave over$18 billion to charities in 2012, companies and nonprofits can reflect on all of the good work done by corporate philanthropy.  Instilling a culture of corporate philanthropy often takes time, however these three philanthropy initiatives show how companies have turned “doing…

Looking Ahead: Nonprofits Need to Get to Know Their Future Donor Base, Go Riverwalk Magazine, January 2014

  There is a debate in the nonprofit arena on how much effort there should be towards recruiting the next generation of donors – the Millennials. While Millennials may not individually donate large sums of money, their collective power can help raise thousands for nonprofits.  Nonprofit groups should be aggressively working to involve people in…

New Generation of Service, Go Riverwalk Magazine, May 2013

The New Generation of Service Baby boomers, millennials, corporate employees, executives and students are responding to the national call for a new generation of service: Skilled-Based Volunteering (SBV). SBV is when company employees and/or individuals offer nonprofits their personal talents or professional competences to help organizations meet their demands. From the COO offering free strategic…