A new site on iTrust has been launched to manage volunteerism at Citizens Energy Group.
The Citizens for Good volunteer portal enables employees to sign up for Citizens-sponsored volunteer opportunities and track their individual community volunteer hours.
The portal, which can be accessed via the Corporate Affairs iTrust site, was developed to help employees understand our overall investment in the community. In addition, results of the annual Corporate Accountability Study, a survey of local community leaders, indicate that our company is rated more favorably when the public is aware of how we give back. 
A group of employees formed a project team to brainstorm ways to increase the visibility of Citizens’ community support. The team was led by Jennifer Mentink, Marketing Communications Coordinator. Other members included Jennifer Bailey, Ryan Basore, Stacy Caldwell, Garrick Hardy, Vicki Hughes (who has retired), Beth Noel, and Lacy Wooden.
The name “Citizens for Good” was developed by the team to encompass all that Citizens does to help our community. Along with being the name of the new volunteer portal, it is used as a hashtag on social media when promoting ways Citizens gives back to the community. It also has been used as a headline in the last several issues of Engauge to highlight grants awarded to local non-profits by the Corporate Sponsorship/Philanthropy Team.
The Citizens for Good volunteer portal includes a calendar of events for which employees can sign up to volunteer; general guidelines for volunteering at Citizens-sponsored events; and information about our annual giving campaign for the United Way of Central Indiana, the Jefferson Awards for Volunteer Service, and our Community Volunteer Support Program, which provides $250 grants to non-profits for which our employees and retirees volunteer.
“We are really excited about the new portal,” said Mentink. “It will allow employees to track their volunteer hours in real time and also calculates the collective volunteer hours of all our employees. We will use the site for volunteer event sign-ups when we are able to host opportunities for our employees again.”
Please contact Jennifer Mentink if you have questions or if you would like a demonstration of the Citizens for Good volunteer portal at an upcoming department staff meeting.
