Giving Tuesday

A short paragraph on the About Us page on our website runs as follows:

“Intopia is a social enterprise, committed to supporting those that help others. We give five per cent of our revenue to community and non-profit organisations that support access, inclusion, and women in technology.”

Since today, 27 November, is Giving Tuesday – “a global day of giving fuelled by the power of social media and collaboration”- it’s a perfect opportunity to explain just what we mean by that, and how we put it into action.

From its inception, Intopia has been a member of Pledge 1%, a global movement that encourages and empowers companies of all sizes and stages to donate 1% of their staff time, product, profit, and/or equity to any charity of their choosing. In this way, Pledge 1% hopes to make giving back to the community part of a company’s DNA.

Thousands of companies around the world like Intopia have joined Pledge 1%, and to both acknowledge what’s been achieved so far and to make more companies aware, Pledge 1% representatives have been invited to ring the bell to open trading at NASDAQ on 27 November. This is a big deal and is bound to get the attention of tech companies and startups around the world.

Now, at Intopia we’re nothing if not ambitious, so from the start Sarah, Adem and Stewart set a higher bar for their new company: we’ve chosen to donate five per cent of our revenue to worthy causes.

What do we call a “worthy cause”?

Well, in the last 12 months, we’ve provided financial support to:

We’re particularly proud to support the producers of NVDA, an Australian screen reader that is rapidly becoming popular around the world. The only entities that have provided more financial support than ourselves are Microsoft, Google and Mozilla. That’s company we’re happy to keep.

These are organisations, companies and projects that share our aim of making the world a better place for people with disabilities, and do so through innovative approaches, solid commitment and unwavering dedication.

On top of that, we decided to go even a little bit further, in that we choose to donate a further one per cent of total Intopia staff time to volunteering on community projects.

One form our volunteering time takes is in helping to organise local community events that bring together people committed to digital accessibility, including in 2018:

Another form our volunteering takes is in giving talks and presentations at relevant meetups and conferences around Australia, for which we don’t seek payment.

Finally, we found one more way that we help create a more level playing field for people with disabilities in Australia – we offer non-profit organisations a 25% discount on our consulting services.

Giving, and giving back, is a central plank of how Intopia does business, and something we will continue to do for as long as we are in business.

To actively support people in our community who need it is something we are proud to do, and we encourage our peers and colleagues to consider making similar commitments.

Find out more about Pledge 1% and Giving Tuesday.

 

Pledge 1%