Taking National Day of Service 2020 Virtual

Each year, West Monroe takes a Friday in June to shut down our laptops and dedicate the day to community service. Our National Day of Service offers a chance for us to partner with organizations that are working to solve some of our communities’ toughest challenges. It’s also a fun opportunity to get out of the office and build relationships with people we may not work with day-to-day.  

This year, however, we were faced with a conundrum: The pandemic meant that most in-person volunteering options were off the table, certainly in a group setting. The easy solution would have been to postpone the event until we could serve in-person again. But our commitment to our communities is not just a priority in good times, but challenging times as well. We felt it was critical to figure out a way to continue with our National Day of Service as scheduled.   

Our team got very creative, very quickly to pivot to a virtual event, collaborating with more than 40 organizations across nine cities to reimagine our service projects in a way that would maximize impact remotely. Understanding that many of our people are balancing working full-time at home with parenting and schooling their kids, we also sought to create a number of family-friendly options.  

Projects ranged from recording book readings for hospitalized children, to writing cards and letters to populations who have been isolated during social distancing, to QAing audio books for sight-impaired and struggling readers. We created flashcards for students, delivered care packages to seniors and the houseless, and sang karaoke with residents in community-based homes. We conducted mock interviews, held virtual career coaching sessions with teens, and recorded virtual Career Day videos about life as consultants. We also participated in a number of Pro-Bono-In-a-Day projects, lending our consulting expertise to assist nonprofits to help them scale their reach and respond during the pandemic.  

We are grateful for the ability and opportunity to give back to the communities that help us thrive personally and professionally, even though we couldn’t physically be present during this year’s National Day of Service.

Some of our other highlights include: 

• 255 books read on video 

• 1,858 cards, digital cards, and letters written to community members facing isolation or working on the front lines 

• Conducted quality assurance on 2,303 audio book pages 

• 250 masks made 

• 2,608 flashcards made 

• More than 50 mock interviews conducted  

Check out our photos below for more details!