On a fairly regular basis we like to publish our latest givings on social media. Often we’ll state that we’ve provided books, water, bricks etc to people in need throughout the world.
It occurs to me that this might come across a little like ‘look at us, we give!’
It’s not about us!
The title of this blog isn’t just intended to grab your attention, although I expect that like me it did, it’s an actual sign on a wall at a school in Cambodia advising the young children what to do WHEN they are raped. Not IF, but WHEN. How terrible is that?
We are so privileged to live in a part of the world where we consider uncivilised to be eating with your mouth open or not holding the door open for the next person.
In the wider world there are families who are lucky to eat once every 2 days. There are children who are regularly raped and/or kidnapped and put in brothels. There’s poverty, disease and abuse in so many places.
The UN’s Global Goals are each focused around making the world better for people, animals and the environment as a whole.
The AVN team choose goals that are important to each of us individually and then we identify channels to make an impact. Sadly it’s only a small impact and so the more people and businesses that can get behind these goals the better.
I strive to make AVN a business for good. One of our values is ‘Make Lives Better’. This includes our customer’s lives, local community and the wider community. The way we make our impacts is directly related to internal activities and not always connected to income. For example, every time an accountant completes our free Practice Diagnostic Tool which gives them a free report on how they can improve their practice, our current giving is purchasing bricks. to help house families in India.
My personal targets aren’t around turnover or profits but about giving and the impact we can have in the world. This drives me to ensure that AVN is able to deliver on that much more important and greater cause.
Our preferred channel for making our contributions is B1G1, Buy1, Give1. The intention is that for every time someone purchases anything from you, you can make an impact in the world for just a small proportion of that purchase. We use B1G1 because I know that 100% of donations go directly to the well researched cause.
So next time you see a post go out, please understand, it’s not about the numbers or the books.
When we buy books we’re helping get children educated, we’re contributing to keeping children in schools which in addition to being more protected (children who are attending schools are less susceptible to being kidnapped and raped than children who aren’t at school since they’re likely working the fields and are thus more exposed) – means that their education will help them, get better employment when they’re older, to better support their families and become less reliant on external help.
If you’d like to find out more about how you can make more of an impact in the world through the transactions your business makes, check out www.b1g1.com
One of the causes that we help through B1G1 is FreeToShine who help protect and educate children in Cambodia. Watch the impact videos on their website. https://www.freetoshine.org/impact-videos/
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