The Boston Consulting Group seeks to contribute to the resolution of global social issues and the improvement of our communities. Our not-for-profit efforts cover a wide range of topics and locations. BCG actively works with the World Food Programme, the Rockefeller and Gates foundations, and Save the Children.
Activities include community development, education and research, health, social services, urban planning, and economic development. The firm allocates approximately 2 to 3 percent of its revenues to not-for-profit projects.
BCG Moscow also contributes a portion of its time to the not-for-profit sector. Focusing mainly on domestic benefit projects, BCG Moscow played a significant role in the creation of a sponsorship program for the State Tretyakov Gallery.
Local Activity in Focus
Since March 2006, BCG’s Social Impact team has been supporting an orphanage in Kalyazin, a small town 180 kilometers from Moscow. The Kalyazin orphanage is home to more than 70 children between two to eighteen years of age. Although it was started on the initiative of just a few individuals, this project has grown into a full-scale, company supported program.
What makes BCG’s support of this orphanage different from other corporate donors is that it is focused, not on basic monetary donations, but on changing the orphaned children’s future by striving to understand and support their dreams. We have launched an educational program to help recognize each child’s natural talents, to increase the chances of their completing a higher education, and to help develop their professional skills. This varied program has included things like the sponsorship of tutors and private lessons, computer classes, support in getting drivers licenses, and classes in dancing, music, and sport.
We also focus on integrating the children into an everyday environment in the hopes of making them experience life “just like all other kids.” We organize events that give them an opportunity to talk to and interact with others on an individual basis and to have fun together. BCG employees have visited Kalyazin to host barbecue parties, watch movies, and celebrate major holidays. We have also organized trips to Moscow where the kids have had a chance to do all sort of things, like tour the city, play at water parks, go to the movies, and visit the planetarium.
An orphanage is just like any other household—only on a much larger scale—in that it has numerous everyday needs that it must meet to be able to stay in business. In this regard, BCG also provides Kalyazin orphanage material support.
In a recent initiative, four teenagers from the orphanage were given summer internships with BCG. These interns spent three weeks in the Moscow office to get a flavor of what the working world was all about. One of the interns called it “the most memorable event and biggest turning point in my whole life.” We now have plans to offer these internships on an annual basis. As we see it, if our efforts create a positive change in the future of just one child, then we will consider our mission to have been a success.