Local tech leaders take a charitable approach

Workplace culture and employee engagement win as attitudes change

KITCHENER — In a high-pressure business environment where the demands of shareholders and investors are often paramount, the concept of charity can sometimes take a back seat.

“Entrepreneurship does not traditionally go along with giving,” Vidyard co-founder and CEO Michael Litt said during a panel discussion at Lot 42 in Kitchener Thursday night.

But that’s an ill-conceived and outdated attitude that is changing, Litt and other tech leaders said — and the benefits are being felt both outwardly and inwardly, where workplace culture and employee engagement stand to gain as well.

For Litt, the power of social consciousness was driven home personally as Vidyard grew its presence in downtown Kitchener. From time to time, he’d hear complaints from employees about homeless people in the core. One of those homeless individuals was, in fact, Litt’s uncle.

“That didn’t feel right,” Litt said of the complaints. “We were the ones coming in,” he said, gentrifying the area and displacing the less-fortunate.

Fortunately, his uncle received help from the House of Friendship, and is no longer homeless. But that connection helped to inspire Litt and his colleagues in ensuring that Vidyard and its employees are a force for good in the community.

“There’s no reason you can’t go and do good (things) because it’s part of our culture,” he said. “It’s part of what we do.”

John Stix and his Fibernetics co-founders have placed a similar priority on their people, after realizing they’d “started to lose” themselves in the midst of the telecommunication firm’s rapid growth. “We felt like something was missing,” Stix said.

A focus on giving back as an organization and an emphasis on positive workplace culture have wide-ranging benefits, Stix said. “Passion leads to happiness, happiness leads to productivity, and productivity leads to results.”

It’s important for businesses and charities alike to recognize the expectations of a younger generation, Litt said. They’re not content with just putting money into a donation box. “They want to see the impact.”

Guelph-based Givesome has created an app that fulfils that desire. People can donate a few dollars to a charitable project that’s been vetted by Givesome, and they’ll receive a video showing the people whose lives they’ve improved once the project is funded and complete.

Years ago, Givesome founder Jay Whitelaw had the chance to see first-hand the impact that a donation of a mattress and small fridge had on a man in Namibia, where Whitelaw was teaching. “It solidified that I had been missing out on a lot of this whole concept of giving,” he said.