#NiebieskoNam and #PomagamyBardziej

Another year of active initiatives at Krajowa Izba Rozliczeniowa (KIR, Poland's national clearing house) is behind us! In 2024, sporty fun for employees was combined with support for as many as four charitable causes! How did it all begin?

KIR's sports initiatives started in 2017 with Bieg Firmowy, a company run. Then came Poland Business Run, triathlons, triathlon relays, half marathons and even marathons. Even back then they came with a charitable cause. The idea of combining these activities came up in a conversation with Joanna Grochowska from the SYNAPSIS Foundation.

The goal was to create a personalized initiative for employees. That is how the “#NiebieskoNam” contest was born in 2021. Although at first the idea seemed impossible to organize, it soon turned out that everything could happen virtually.

In April 2021 the “#NiebieskoNam” challenge began, covering several important areas: getting employees of Krajowa Izba Rozliczeniowa moving, charitable support for the SYNAPSIS Foundation and educational cooperation with it to spread knowledge about autism. In June came the idea of extending the cooperation as part of preparing for Poland Business Run, and that is how the summer #PomagamyBardziej campaign was created. The program continued in this form in 2022 and 2023.

In 2024 the initiative grew even bigger! The existing April #NiebieskoNam and the summer #PomagamyBardziej series were joined by new charitable causes, and the support extended to more organizations. Participants could also take part in an extra "Pink October" edition for Pink October, the month of women's cancer prevention.

KIR's challenge in 2021 and 2022

April is International Autism Month. That is when we started raising employees' awareness of the topic and drew attention to many of the problems and challenges related to it. To start, we added a bit of fun: employees sent us photos showing something blue. That was in April 2021, as part of the preparations for the first challenge.

In #NiebieskoNam 2021, the prizes were very important, or rather their nature. They were meant not only to reward the winning employee, but above all to carry a deeper meaning.

All the prizes were made by people with autism at the SYNAPSIS Foundation's workshop in Wilcza Góra. It was something truly special!

This gave the prizes a special meaning. Participants received them very well, and they even motivated them to get more involved.

After all, prizes like these cannot be bought in a shop: they are unique and fit the whole challenge. A clock from the campaign hangs on the wall in the KIR office.

In the #NiebieskoNam 2022 edition (April-May), the main aim was above all to reach the charity goal, which meant PLN 8,000 of financial support for the Synapsis Foundation, and to educate employees about the autism spectrum.

In June the format of the challenge changed, and the 3-month “colorful” “#PomagamyBardziej” initiative began. Each month had its own color (orange June, yellow July and pink August) and a dedicated PLN 5,000 of support for people after a mastectomy, which KIR employees raised by earning points in the Activy app. In addition, as they covered kilometers, they discovered fun facts about the Cyberium Foundation and the nature of its cooperation with Poland Business Run.

Sport is part of the organization's culture, here to stay. It appeared in 2017 as my hobby, which I managed to push through. I'm very happy about it. A lot of people, employees, take part in it now; in total, as I summed it up, 20% of employees took part in this challenge. So the percentage speaks to me too; for an organization like this it was a lot, it was 82% of organizational units. You could say it was a bull's-eye - Agnieszka Chodakowska, initiator of the Krajowa Izba Rozliczeniowa challenge

The challenge in 2024

In 2024, KIR's sports initiatives expanded to new charitable causes. Besides #NiebieskoNam (April) and #PomagamyBardziej (June-August), in May employees supported the Auxilium Foundation, and in October, as part of Pink October, the app featured educational content on cancer prevention and a fundraiser for the Alivia oncology foundation.

Weekend missions provided extra motivation, encouraging people to be more active and to support the charitable causes. Participants in the latest round of the challenge could also look forward to a special summer campaign called "Kartki z wakacji" (Postcards from holidays), where employees could earn extra points for creative photos from their holiday trips, and a mission to prepare for Poland Business Run. Once again, the challenge combined sport with helping others and got even more people involved!

Results

The challenge came with a lot of emotion. Mostly along the lines of: “will I move up a spot and overtake my colleague, for example?”. Competing in the rankings, together with the streak, helped motivate people to simply get out and stay active. 

The closing survey showed that 100% of participants who filled in the form are interested in repeating the initiative, and 93% are very satisfied with the promotion, meaning the communication with participants and the promotion of the challenge. More than half of the participants believe that thanks to Activy they move more often in general, so we reached this goal quite nicely.

The challenge was a real motivation to move. Employees really got involved, got moving and enjoyed it, having lots of fun along the way.

As it turned out, participants also got their families involved! This way the challenge grew naturally: it was no longer just about KIR employees, but also husbands, children and wives, who got off the couch together. Hearing about situations like these was a real pleasure.

For some, it was the start of a new chapter. One participant stressed that thanks to taking part in the challenge, she cycled 370 km in the mountains in Croatia. Another woman, who walked the most, covered about 1,100 km, I think! She said she had not been an active person before, and it was the charitable cause and the whole challenge that got her going. It was really lovely feedback from people, confirming that our idea made sense!

One employee told me a story and actually thanked me. I asked: what for? He replied that thanks to this challenge he spent more time with his daughter and had time to talk during their walks. Those were touching moments. There were funny ones too :) A colleague told us that his adopted dog was keen to go for walks at the start of the challenge, but by the end even he had had enough of the hikes and was cutting the routes short.

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