Showing Up for Healthcare: Tackling Engagement and Community Investment with CSR Technology

After more than two decades helping organizations evaluate fundraising and data management solutions, I joined Blackbaud’s Corporate Impact team to focus on how our employee engagement and community investment technology can power give-back programs in the healthcare sector – where the stakes are high, the missions are meaningful, and the challenges are complex.

The Challenge: Engagement and Impact in a High-Stress Industry

Healthcare organizations are under immense pressure. From staffing shortages and burnout to public trust issues and budget constraints, the environment is demanding. Yet, these organizations remain deeply committed to their communities, and increasingly, they’re looking for ways to engage employees in giving and volunteering, while managing community investment programs more strategically.

Here’s what I’ve been hearing:

• Employee Engagement Is Critical—but Complex

Healthcare organizations want to reduce burnout and improve retention, and they know that purpose-driven work can help. But engagement is often measured through HR data and analytics, not through participation in giving or volunteering. Some healthcare systems do include giving and volunteering in employment agreements, offering incentives like extra PTO, but implementing these programs can be technically and operationally challenging.

• Community Benefit Programs Are Essential—but Fragmented

Federally funded health systems must complete community needs assessments every three years, focusing on social determinants of health. These assessments inform community benefit programs, which often include grants and skills-based volunteering. But these efforts are frequently siloed and managed by the community benefit office, the foundation, or both, with limited visibility and coordination.

• Technology Can Help—but Adoption Is Slow

Many healthcare organizations aren’t yet on a CSR platform, or they’re using tools that don’t fully meet their needs. Budget constraints make matching gifts difficult, and while fundraising tools like JustGiving are often in place, it can be difficult to get leadership buy-in on more comprehensive CSR software.

The Opportunity: A Unified Approach to Giving Back

YourCause offers healthcare organizations a way to bring it all together. From flexible giving and volunteering tools to grants management and powerful reporting tools, our solutions help health systems:

• Engage employees in meaningful ways, even those in the field who aren’t at a desk with mobile-responsive technology.
• Coordinate across departments, uniting HR, marketing, community benefit, and foundation teams, with a flexible platform that empowers your teams to drive engagement and awareness on your unique programs.
• Track impact and reduce risk, especially around executive giving and grant disbursement, with trusted donation disbursement capabilities.
• Tell a compelling story about how the organization shows up for its community, with centralized reporting tools including dashboards, generative-AI, and predictive impact analytics.