Guardian News & Media community projects
Living our values – the Advertising Sales Department embraced the sustainability agenda through community projects.
Adam Freeman runs Guardian News & Media’s (GNM) 300-strong Advertising Sales Department. He wanted 2009’s internal Ad Sales conference to be different; in the past the department had traditionally focused on teambuilding and communication, but community engagement was added in 2009 as a way to demonstrate and develop the department’s ‘ethical leader’ ambitions and to promote GNM’s deep-seated values. What better way to set the scene than to enable every member of the department to take part in a meaningful community project in the immediate run-up to the conference?
Three Hands was tasked with researching and designing a series of projects that would provide opportunities for employees to share their skills with community organisations and that could lead to sustainable relationships between GNM and the community partners. The result was 16 dynamic and compelling projects with partners as varied as EGA Secondary School, Times Amateur Boxing Club, environmental social enterprise Green-Works, Single Homeless Project and Manchester Young Lives. Teams applied their sales, marketing, communications and organisational skills to fantastic effect, raising money and awareness, running showcase events and sharing skills with charity staff.
In the context of a tough economic background, the projects brought increased confidence, motivation and self-belief to the department; the buzz at the conference defied the economic times. Adam commented: “This was a powerful manifestation of our ambitions to be an ethical leader business... Thank you to Three Hands – we could not have had such a meaningful and successful experience without your guidance and support!”
Photos by Will Venning