For years, the Lopez Group companies and foundations have continuously reached out to communities within and outside their areas of business operation to conduct volunteer projects and activities. These activities are aimed at utilizing the skills and harnessing the interest of some from approximately 10,000 Lopez’s employees as well as tapping into their compassionate nature while providing them with the venue to exercise social responsibility and Christian duties by helping the needy and less fortunate of their fellowmen. These volunteerism programs and activities have largely been done at the company or foundation level. Very seldom have a Group-wide volunteerism program been done outside the existing Walk-the-Talk Lopez Wellness program.
This is what made the activity last June 4 both exiting and different for the Group. While Brigada Eskwela has been an annual activity for some of the companies and their employees, this year the Lopez Group Foundation Inc (LGFI) identified a school where efforts of the various Lopez companies and foundation can be harnessed into one cohesive act of volunteerism. Thus, in coordination with the Lopez Wellness Walk-the-Talk program, LGFI facilitated a need assessment of the Kapitolyo High School aimed at identifying the need of the school’s teaching and non-teaching personnel and their students as well.
What came out of that exercise was a long wish list of needs and wants that LGFI synthesized into areas covering: 1) Human Resources Development (HRD) such as wellness- physical, spiritual, health and nutrition; 2) Disaster Risk Reduction and Management to include drills, rescue, security and environment protection; 3) Office Administration and Finance such as procurement, IT and data management, record keeping and budgeting; 4) Personality Development; and 5) Other Special topics such as current issues and developments, communications, project management and development, partnerships, CSR, philanthropy and Volunteerism.
The Foundation and the HR Council Heads then sat down to discuss the capacity of the companies and employees to address some of the needs identified in the June 4 Brigada Eskwela activity. An agreement that came out of that conversation is a need to appeal to employees of the Lopez Group to step forward and volunteer their time, skills and talents in addressing the “wish list”.
In the interest of mobilizing volunteers, LGFI is posting the result of the needs assessment here. Any employee willing and able to address a need may contact their HR officers and/or contact LGFI directly through Caloy Campos at (02) 632-7916.
