Northern Trust's Commitment to Shared Value

Community engagement opportunities, paid time off for volunteerism and matching gift programs provide a competitive advantage in partner recruiting and satisfaction. Partner volunteerism is consistently a priority for college graduates considering future employers. Non-profit and civic board involvement is integral to talent management as it provides partners with leadership, skills development and networking opportunities beyond the scope of their responsibilities.

Northern Trust Community Partners is a global program that helps partners identify, engage and develop relationships with local charities. These relationships include both financial and volunteer support. We offer two full days of paid time off for partners to spend volunteering with an approved non-profit organization. In addition to these hours, partners generously gave over 154,000 hours of their personal time to charitable organizations.

Community involvement is deeply rooted in the Northern Trust culture and affects the way we do business globally. Since our founding in 1889, Northern Trust has actively advanced a culture of caring and a commitment to invest responsibly in the communities we serve worldwide. This philosophy continues today through progressive community investments; contributions to service and community organizations; partner volunteerism; gifts in-kind such as donations of meeting space, catering, supplies and other knowledge services; and directorship guidance to charitable and civic boards.

Our approach to supporting the community takes into account the way we affect our clients, shareholders, partners and the communities we serve. We execute each activity with these priorities in mind. Our scope of community involvement provides sustainable company benefits:

Brand awareness – Our brand strength relies on community sponsorships and alignment with highly respected non-profit institutions. Our charitable grants, event sponsorships, charitable and civic board representation and partner volunteerism are integral to our marketing strategy and serve to help raise brand awareness and brand equity in our target markets around the world.

Business development – We work directly with each of our business units to identify community investment opportunities related to key marketing and client relationship efforts. Given the philanthropic interests of our client base, community involvement has proven to be an effective business development tool through which we can access key clients, prospects and influencers.

Download the full report and learn more about CSR at Northern Trust