At RISE, we are incredibly proud to have the support of a wide range of incredible corporate partners, from big businesses to small, throughout our community.
Corporate partnerships not only provide either financial or non-financial support (cash or donations of time or items), but they also demonstrate to the people working in and with those businesses that they stand against abuse and violence.
Recently, we spoke to a staff member from Accurate Background about why they chose to support RISE, the kind of help they offer, and what the partnership means inside their workplace.
For those who don’t know Accurate Background, who are you and what do you do?
“We're a background checks company. We help companies that need to do screenings for recruitment – so we’re basically a partner to HR teams, making sure their new hires have the qualifications they need and are who they say they are. Background checks reduce business risks such as fraud and keep employees safe. We’ve been around for well over 20 years and became a part of the Accurate family about two years ago, so now we’re part of a global company.”
What support does Accurate Background give to RISE?
“It’s mainly been volunteering the team's time if RISE need any help with bag packing, present wrapping, goody bag packing, that kind of thing. We did Christmas present wrapping last year, and anything they need, we will happily help with. The wider business supports that with Accurate Gives Back, giving our team the option to use their time to give back to our communities.”
How did Accurate decide to support RISE?
“We have an employee forum within Accurate and get together once every couple of weeks so that the team can work with HR on making Accurate a great place to work. One of my colleagues brought it up – it’s quite close to her heart. We tend to focus on different charities each year, so we reached out, and we've been able to help as much as we can and build relationships, so it’s been really good.”
What is it about RISE that stands out to you?
“It’s fantastic to work with them. Fundraising Manager, Emma Millar, who we work closely with, she’s brilliant. And we work with a lovely lady called Julie as well – but everyone’s lovely, whoever we meet. There’s lots I love about it. The fact that they help women and children and offer a fantastic service all round in getting them to where they need to be and coming out of the situations they’ve been in. It’s absolutely fantastic, the work that they do. That’s why, for me, it’s so important.
We asked if working with RISE has had an impact inside the workplace.
“I do think so, yeah. We’re very much into wellbeing here anyway, so as a company offering to give our employees time to give back is important to us. But I think in the past year it has definitely made a difference, as we’ve talked about RISE a lot, and they’ve been very prevalent when we talk about charity and what it does. So, yes, it’s definitely started a lot of conversations off, for a good reason. Not only that, but it's brought people from different teams together and forged new relationships between them while they've spent time together volunteering."
How do you share information about RISE with staff?
“We've made the information readily available to everyone here. We display posters, and we put up flyers with contact numbers on them. We have a shared space that lots of our colleagues use, and I put any information Emma sends me on the coffee tables, so people can read them when they’re sitting down. If there are events coming up, we share those as well.”
What would you say to another business thinking about becoming a corporate partner with RISE?
“It’s a fantastic cause, and it can help so many people. The more people that collaborate and help with that, and use their platform to support it, I just think it’s brilliant.”
Looking ahead, do you expect the support to continue?
“Yes! We're already discussing helping Emma out in the first quarter of the year. And if they need additional ad-hoc help near the time and just can’t factor in enough people, then we’ll jump in and do that.”
The practical, consistent support from Accurate Background makes a real difference for us at RISE. Partnerships like these are a vital way of spreading the message that domestic abuse is not acceptable and will not be accepted by our community.
Want to join Accurate Background, Donna May London, Brighton & Hove Libraries, Britton and Time and more local businesses in supporting RISE and standing against abuse? Contact the fundraising team today!
