Letter to Executive Leadership

Dear __________, I’m an employee here in the _____________ department. I want you to know I’ve discovered a gem of a Christmas volunteer idea, and would like to give other employees the option to volunteer for it, too. I want to put together a group of like-minded employees, and I beleive others here would also like to join. Those who volunteer will give 2 to 10 hours of their own time during the first two weeks of December, depending on which tasks they sign up for. Employees who do not have time to participate could at their option simply donate to our employee fund. Details about what we’d volunteer for in a moment. I am writing you to ask for your support in getting a message to other employees, perhaps even company-wide. To give you an idea of the email I want to send out, I will be working with a template written for all companies; it’s at the bottom of this page: beanelf.org/company-christmas-charity. Look for this headline: Draft of a message to all employees. If you approve the idea of my sending a message similar to that, I will get right to work on it. Let me know. We need to decide this before Thanksgiving. The home page of BeAnElf.org offers a short presentation of the program I want us to volunteer for as a company. They also offer a detailed plan for companies wanting to send volunteers at beanelf.org/company-christmas-charity.) Here’s a short description: Every year since 1906, the US Postal Service’s ® Operation Santa program has distributed letters to Santa written by kids in need. Their letters often ask Santa only for a toy, Christmas dinner, clothes or basic necessities. For the first two to three weeks of December, anyone from the public may read and adopt children’s letters to Santa at participating postal branches, mostly in large cities. Christmas volunteers adopt the letters that move them most, take them home, and later mail their gifts directly to the needy child or family. There’s no middle man or charity when people participate in this way; it’s micro-philanthropy, direct from each volunteer to a child. Volunteers catch the true spirit of the holidays, and put smiles on the faces of underprivileged kids on Christmas morning. In most cities companies can adopt up to 100 letters, sometimes more with permission. We will be contributing our own time and money, but I’m asking the company to match whatever funds we manage to raise. That way we could double the number of presents we send to needy kids. We will provide receipts for all our purchases. Those who volunteer from our company will surprise some children in real need on Christmas morning with the gifts we send in the mail. Working together, our employees can make a difference. When we know who is interested in volunteering, we’ll hold our first meeting; it’s best if it’s right after Thanksgiving. At the meeting, we will divide up the tasks; employees can sign up for whatever they like. One of these will be reading and selecting letters for “adoption” by our company. The closest branch to us is [name a branch listed at www.BeAnElf.org/Locations]. Note that the list of “Operation Santa” post offices is updated every year by the USPS®  around December 1, but the ones on the 2018 list are all likely to participate again. I need to get an email out to our employees in November, and one repeat email before Thanksgiving, and a reminder right after Thanksgiving, on the day before our first meeting. After that o nly those who sign up will get emails. If we stick to that timeline, we will be on track to get the kids our gifts in time for Christmas. We are doing this ourselves, with support from the website and charity, BeAnElf.org. Below is some brief info about them. I will be following their  online plan for companies. If you wish, Be An Elf’s Executive Director Patrick Reynolds also offers consulting and support to companies. At most of the participating USPS® branches, companies may send a delegation of employees to read, select and adopt up to 100 letters. Be An Elf recommends budgeting about $100 per letter, so to adopt that many letters, we employees would need to raise about $10,000. The deadline for contributing to our employee fund will be by our first meeting. I need to know how much our employees have raised by then, so that we will only adopt the number of letters we have funds for. Some of our employees may feel alone and sad over the holidays, and find comfort and inspiration being part of this program. Others have families and can bring their kids, to teach them the meaning of Christmas. Children will be told that of course Santa’s volunteer helper elves always forward every letter on to Santa! We will mark all our gifts, “From Santa.” Be An Elf is not affiliated with the US Postal Service® or its Operation Santa program, but supports the program by recruiting new volunteers and making it easy for the public to learn where and how to volunteer. The group also adopts its own letters with most of the donations that come in; contributions to Be An Elf are tax-deductible. Google Grants awarded the group a $10,000 per month in-kind grant for free advertising in 2004, and it remains in place. Be An Elf also sends out a news release every year to create additional public awareness of the venerable USPS® program, and would be pleased to consult with the company Communications office about publicizing this locally. See their last news release in the Press room at the website; they feel the emphasis should be on covering the USPS® program and creating public awareness of it, perhaps with a mention of Be An Elf as a good guide to volunteering for it. BeAnElf.org does offer excellent tips for volunteering. The contributions by our employees to the little fund I am starting are not tax-deductible, but I dont think anyone will mind. Be An Elf is a tax-exempt 501c3 non-profit group, and it may be possible to work this out with them. You may contact Executive Director Patrick Reynolds by sending him a message at https://beanelf.org/contact-us/. Please share this message internally, and let me know if you will send a message I’ll draft to others at our company. Most employees might not have time to volunteer, but may wish to contribute to our fund. Some will do both. I will organize it, and would welcome your support. Until two Co-Treasurers are named, I will collect the funds, unless someone in your office has time to do that. Those who contributed time or funds will be invited for Christmas cheer and a gift wrapping party around the second or third week of December. We’ll enjoy a little holiday cheer, too. It’s your call, but my vote is to keep this separate from the larger company Christmas party. I feel this would be a fun and inspiring project for employees who volunteer, and I hope the company will support this. Not least, please forward this email up the ladder internally, and maybe we’ll get support from the highest levels. It never hurts to ask! Please send it on to our Directors of HR, Communications and to our CEO. Please let me know if you will join me. [Your name and contact info.]