Have you seen the videos on this link: https://www.firstbanknigeria.com/home/impact/crs-week/? Piece of advice: Please hold your handkerchief or make sure there is a good supply of tissue paper while you view.
The initiative that inspired the efforts and results seen in the videos is not a strange one but it has a way of surprisingly leaving people teary-eyed. Viewers tear up as they get to see the positive difference it has made in the lives of ordinary people in communities across Nigeria.
Many people across the
country are familiar with SPARK – Start Performing Acts of Random Kindness – an
initiative by First Bank of Nigeria Limited, West Africa’s premier banking
institution with its impact woven into the fabric of society. SPARK was
initiated to spread the message of kindness and inspire people to adopt
kindness as a way of life. What many may not know is how much of a kindness
revolution the initiative has birthed within FirstBank itself.
What started out in 2017
as a simple effort to reignite acts of kindness in the society through events
that could help to reorient people towards the right values, has turned
FirstBank itself into a massive kindness enterprise. The management and staff
have become part of a giant machinery that constantly generates kindness. Staff
of FirstBank are involved in several initiatives informed by their kind heart
and disposition. A number of staff run private charities on the side, that help
the underprivileged. A number are deeply involved in private charities run by
other people. And every staff, by department or directorate, is involved in
collective endeavours to make a positive difference with their touch of
kindness in poor and challenged communities around them.
Tagged “SPARK
Amplification”, the collective endeavours involve each department or
directorate within the bank and its staff using an assigned month in the year
to collectively identify and fund an impactful project in a challenged
community. Executed as an internal initiative under the banner of SPARK, itself
a part of the bank’s impactful Employee Volunteering and Giving programme,
SPARK Amplification seeks to expand and deepen FirstBank’s involvement in its
stakeholders’ communities through integration and institutionalisation of acts
of random kindness.
In 2021, at least seven
groups, comprising departments and directorates, took turns (in their assigned
months) to fund and execute projects of their choice. The bank did not
determine or contribute to support any of the projects. Each project was fully
funded by the staff of the executing group, and each involved engagement
through departmental champions. The projects ranged from visits and donations
to the underprivileged, to business support, educational support and
construction. In terms of impact or the difference made by the departmental
projects, the reactions of the direct beneficiaries speak volumes.
They are only children.
So, one must forgive the occupants of Treasure Care Home, Port-Harcourt
Children Home and Atunda-Olu School for Physically Challenged in Abuja, Port
Harcourt and Lagos respectively, if their best attempt at defining the word
“corporate” is no more than a mere description of the men and women of the
Corporate Banking Group of FirstBank. Even adults may struggle to do any better
when totally overwhelmed by the visits and donations of teams of august
visitors from the directorate who came calling in August 2021.
The staff of FirstBank’s
Corporate Banking directorate, rather than allowing for unnecessary
individualistic efforts and brilliance, aggregated all efforts and thus
demonstrated that they understood the multiplied power and impact of corporate
efforts. The result was the overflow of food items and other provisions
delivered in Abuja and Port Harcourt, and in Lagos, water closets, empowerment
training tools, food items and toiletries donated to the physically challenged
children.
Even the 356 children in
16 orphanages and a hospice located in 11 cities across the country visited by
the E-Business and Retail Products directorate could make a similar mistake if
asked to define the concept of e-business. So, there should be a readiness to
extend the same forgiveness to them. They were completely overwhelmed by the
donation of back-to-school supplies and food items by the directorate. To
create a deeper connection, men of the directorate cooked for the children in
October 2021.
Demonstrating their full
awareness of risks, especially security risks, the staff of the Risk Management
directorate elected to construct a perimeter fence and security gate at St.
Peters African Church Schools (I and II) in Oke-Aro, Ifo, Ogun State. November
2021 was the month that witnessed this intervention to mitigate against a
serious security risk.
December 2021 was the
month of the learned minds manning the bank’s Legal Services department. And as
expected, they did not disappoint. Knowing the power of education to elevate
the mind, to inform and correct, our learned friends channelled their efforts
towards visiting the Ikoyi Custodial Centre of the Nigerian Correctional
Service, in Lagos, to donate educational materials, tables, chairs and fans to
support education of the inmates.
Earlier in 2021, May
precisely, staff of the Marketing and Corporate Communications department had
donated SPARK-branded umbrellas, tables, chairs and cash in support of small
businesses. These small businesses were being run by petty traders around
FirstBank head office (Samuel Asabia House) and
an annex (Elephant House) in Lagos Island.
Staff of the Compliance
department of the bank had chosen educational support as their project. The
beneficiaries were students of Gbara Community Secondary School, Jakande, Lagos
State. The students received mathematics and English language textbooks – the
two compulsory subjects. This intervention was in June 2021. And in September
2021, staff of the Human Capital and Management Development department (HCMD)
stormed the Makoko community in Lagos. Widows and aged women were the target.
They received a large donation of food items and toiletries from the HCMD team.
The multi-million-naira
projects by members of staff of the seven executing directorates and
departments saw the staff committing about 10,000 volunteering hours, which
value cannot be quantified in monetary terms. The projects directly impacted
about 4,500 people across Nigeria’s 6 geopolitical regions. Many more thousands
were indirectly impacted by the projects.
While the bank maintains
its stance of not contributing to support any of the departmental efforts, it
understands the need to spur staff to continue to champion and pursue worthy
causes. So, the CEO’s Office matches the value from the directorate with the
highest contributions. The November 2021 efforts of the staff of the Risk
Management directorate put them in pole position to receive the matching grant,
which the directorate will expend in execution of another project in this new
year.
Demonstrating a true
heart of service to humanity, the executive leadership of all the implementing
directorates joined their team members to volunteer in the schools and homes
visited.
And as the euphoria of
the new year wanes and people begin serious efforts to make a success of 2022,
staff of FirstBank are already raring to go. They kick off new rounds of
implementing, by department, self-determined and -funded initiatives in
underprivileged communities around them.
The Finance directorate
will seek to set the tone for other directorates or departments as its staff
embark on their own project this February. Technology and Services department
will follow in March and give way to Corporate Transformation in April. May will
see Customer Experience and Value Management (CEVM) in action.
Staff of Retail and
Commercial Banking (Lagos and West) will take their turn in June ahead of
Retail and Commercial Banking (North) in July. Then in August, the Corporate
Responsibility and Sustainability (CR&S) Week will hold. This is a full
week of community-impacting activities funded by the Bank.
Departmental
interventions will resume in September with Retail and Commercial Banking
(South), followed closely by Internal Audit in October. Staff of Public Sector
Group will take over in November while staff of Treasury and Financial
Institutions will seek to close the year on a high when they execute their
project in December.
The line-up of FirstBank
directorates/departments set to take turns in 2022 to execute their own
initiated and funded projects looks really promising. Benefitting communities
in 2022 are likely to see more robust engagement by FirstBank departmental
staff and more impactful projects. For anyone wondering what this could mean,
they should endeavour to multiply by any figure above 1 (one) the visible
impact of the projects they see in the videos on this link https://www.firstbanknigeria.com/home/impact/crs-week/. They will not see any
project in 2022, when the kindness revolution is set to go notches higher, that
is less impactful than its 2021 version.
Written by Aniekan
Ezekiel
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