Beyond the paycheck: engaging employees in humanitarian impact with UNICEF USA

Your employees don’t just clock in and clock out – they bring their hearts, values, and concerns about global events into the workplace. When hurricanes devastate communities, conflicts displace families, or climate disasters threaten children’s futures, your workforce feels that impact. The question isn’t whether your employees care about these crises: it’s whether your company is equipped to take action.

As social impact professionals, you understand that employee engagement goes far beyond just giving. Today’s workforce expects their employers to provide opportunities for meaningful impact during a crisis. Luckily, you can demonstrate your company’s commitment to global humanitarian needs through a strategic partnership with a leading charity.

UNICEF USA: Your Go-To Partner

UNICEF USA offers a direct line to the world’s largest humanitarian response network that is specifically focused on children. With operations in over 190 countries and territories, UNICEF USA doesn’t just respond to emergencies – they’re leading the way, working to prevent, prepare for, and recover from disasters.

Take a look at some of the ways UNICEF can engage your workforce with the offerings below.

Employee engagement offering

1. Emergency Virtual Donor Experience: Bringing the Field to Your Office

Jump into an immersive journey that connects your employees directly with UNICEF’s life-saving work. These virtual briefings aren’t PowerPoint presentations – they’re carefully crafted experiences that allow your team to witness UNICEF’s programming firsthand.

Your employees will hear directly from program staff working in crisis zones, donors who’ve seen the impact of their contributions, and most powerfully, families whose lives have been transformed by UNICEF’s interventions. Whether it’s a mother in Yemen describing how UNICEF’s water purification tablets saved her children, or a program officer explaining how rapid response protocols get aid to children within 72 hours of a disaster, these experiences create lasting emotional connections that drive sustained engagement.

The Corporate Benefit: These sessions don’t just educate – they inspire. Employees leave with a deeper understanding of global challenges and their role in solutions, fostering a sense of purpose that research consistently links to higher job satisfaction and retention.

2. UNICEF Lunch N’ Learn: Expert-Led Insights That Matter

Move beyond generic presentations with interactive sessions led by actual UNICEF program experts and staff members. These aren’t theoretical discussions; they’re insights from professionals who coordinate million-dollar relief operations, negotiate access in conflict zones, and innovate solutions for children in the world’s most challenging environments.

The interactive format keeps employees engaged through quizzes that test their knowledge of global humanitarian challenges, videos that showcase real UNICEF operations, and Q&A sessions that allow your team to ask the questions that matter to them. Whether your employees are curious about how UNICEF maintains operations during conflicts, how climate change is reshaping humanitarian response, or what it takes to deliver vaccines to remote communities, they’ll get answers from the people doing the work.

The Corporate Benefit: These sessions position your company as a thought leader that provides employees with access to world-class expertise and global perspectives.

3. Emergency Simulation: Hands-On Problem Solving That Builds Teams

Perhaps the most innovative offering is UNICEF’s Emergency Simulation experience, where your employees step into the roles of UNICEF staff members facing real-world crisis scenarios. Working in teams, they must navigate the complex challenges of humanitarian response: How do you ensure safe water access when infrastructure is destroyed? What do you do when political instability blocks supply routes? How do you support children’s education when schools become refugee shelters?

These simulations, facilitated by UNICEF experts, mirror the complexity of actual emergency response while building critical thinking, collaboration, and leadership skills. Teams must consider budget constraints, cultural sensitivities, security protocols, and competing priorities—all while keeping children’s welfare at the center of their decision-making.

The Corporate Benefit: Beyond the obvious team-building advantages, these simulations develop the same problem-solving and crisis management skills that drive business success. Employees return to their roles with enhanced analytical thinking, improved collaboration abilities, and experience managing high-pressure situations.

The Impact

Want to see what support for UNICEF can do when you team up with UNICEF USA?

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