Mills & Reeve – Finalist 2021, Best for Innovation

Creative thinking from the firm’s trainees and senior partner on how to maintain office charity fundraising efforts while boosting employee morale, physical activity, wellbeing and engagement led to Mills & Reeve’s Winter Charity Challenge. For 12 weeks, employees were invited to take part in challenges via the law firm’s Innovation Hub.

Activities included running, walking, baking, and reading to name a few. The variety of both physical and non-physical activities meant that everyone could get involved. The campaign was supported by various staff networks and religious festivals such as Diwali were celebrated and topical events like Black History Month were incorporated.

Each office was awarded points for individual contributions, and these turned into donations to their chosen charity. People were encouraged to donate themselves as well, but this was not obligatory, as the team recognised the financial impact of the pandemic.

Engagement in the challenges was high, with almost 400 people logging more than 1,180 minutes of movement. There were 5,702 points awarded to individual activity contributions, with almost £9,000 being raised for charity.

A new version of the challenge called ‘Chat for Charity’ has seen colleagues being encouraged to reach out to another team member who they haven’t spoken to for a while to see how they are. The higher the number of ‘chat’ points an office gets, the more money their chosen charity receives from Mills & Reeve.

Award sponsored by Adactus Ltd