A couple weeks ago the team at VA Partners – Mark, Steve, Stephanie, Shelly and myself along with Sommer Maynard from Ramp Communications – volunteered an afternoon at the Daily Bread Food Bank. Their main mission of the food bank is to eliminate hunger in the communities in Toronto. The Daily Bread Food bank has a number of different volunteering opportunities available including corporate volunteering, individual volunteering, or hosting your own food drive event.

The team at VA Partners are each allocated a certain amount of hours per quarter that is to be used for volunteering efforts. The afternoon at the food bank consisted of sorting food into different categories and packing away full boxes. By the end of the shift we had sorted and packed 2247 pounds of food.

It may be difficult to set aside an entire afternoon for non-work related activity, but there are a number of benefits that come from helping the community.

Team Work

Often times members in a team may not be able to physically work together. The team at VA Partners all prefer to work at different times and locations. This results in the team often working independently. It was great to have the team together and working for a collective cause.

Communication

Working together for an important cause reduces barriers in communication because all members of the team are there one sole purpose.

The bottom line however isn’t about what volunteering can do for your company but what your company can do to help others. VA Partners recommends taking the time to choose a charity your team members care about and seeking out opportunities to help that cause. If you think the Daily Bread Food Bank is a good fit for your next volunteering efforts connect with them here.