As we approach the American Thanksgiving Holiday I find myself wondering what can a company do to be more connected and helpful to a community? 

A company, by definition, is a group of people who build products or deliver services to customers. If successful the company makes a profit and delivers a return to its shareholders.  Those that work there profit by earning a living for their time and skills.  Where in there is community? 

Well xMatters isn't just a collection of normal people.  We are, well, abnormal?  Let's go with unique.  Yep, that sounds much better.  Our community includes our clients.  Those that we work with to help be successful.  And our clients are not Company X, they are people with names.  We believe our clients are people with names who need us and we need them.  And that's why we like our work (at least I think it's that way).    

So, back to "community".  Our community is also our local community.  It's the San Francisco Bay Area.  It's greater London.  It's Victoria, BC. It's also Austin, Sydney, Chicago, Atlanta, Irvine and so on.  Our community isn't just where our Global HQ is, it's where our people are and even where our clients are.  And in those communities, this winter and holiday season - times are tight.  In our area the Alameda County Food Bank services 1 in 6 residents.  1 in 6.  That's amazing and it's not right. Our HQ team will be focusing on the Alameda County Food Bank.

The xMatters team will be completing our support of the fight against Prostate Cancer this "Movember" 30th.  What do we do in December?  Well, I'm going to challenge you.   Challenge our partners, our clients, our vendors, our neighbors, our people to work with me for sixty days. 

What if our vendors: Salesforce.com, Oracle, Marketo and Jive Software participated?  What if our partners: BMC Software, CA Technologies, HP Software and IBM Global Services all participated?   What if our clients participated?  What if a company were able to move a community to act?

I would like to launch a drive against hunger at home - from December 15 to February 15.  60 days of collecting donations, canned food and raising awareness for fighting hunger at home.  Donations go to food banks in YOUR community but we do it together.  What if you got everyone you know to do a little something and help?  What if we all did!  When the holidays end and we go back to business as usual will we still be as thankful?  We should be so let's choose to act and see just how powerful a community can be. 

Let's occupy stomach space and put a dent in hunger in your home community.  As we develop this idea further we will formalize the program.  Think about this holiday season as you enjoy all of the trimmings thankfully.  How can you share?  If you can help and want to help, respond to this post with your ideas.  In three weeks we'll launch this idea and see how many pounds of food and dollars of donation we can muster. 

What can a community do?  Let's find out.  Troy McAlpin