Šiaulių Bankas works in different manner today: more than 320 employees will be engaged in volunteering

Today, more than 320 employees of Šiaulių Bankas have switched from ordinary banker's work to social activities. Various volunteering projects are ongoing in as many as 106 locations in Lithuania, ranging from food donations to the needy to environmental initiatives in cities.

Most of Šiaulių Bankas’ representatives from all over Lithuania's customer service points and the majority of the administrative staff will volunteer. While most volunteers will not be performing their direct work today, all normal banking services will still be provided.

“I dare to say that this is a unique initiative that stands out in its scale and ambition: most of the bank's employees are not working in the bank to work for Lithuania on that day. We started this initiative deliberately: we are a Lithuanian bank and we feel obliged to contribute to the well-being of Lithuania through meaningful work. In addition, our bank's branch network covers many cities and towns in the country, therefore we know the communities and feel obligated to help them”, said Vytautas Sinius, CEO of Šiaulių Bankas.

The majority of the bank's volunteers today will become Food Bank aides and will invite shoppers to donate non-perishable foods for the poorest in the supermarkets. According to Simonas Gurevičius, the director of Food Bank, an average of 57 thousand of low-income people receive support twice a year with the food collected during the autumn and spring campaigns.

“More than 8,000 volunteers invite the supermarket shoppers to donate to poorer during Food Bank campaigns. Gathering such an amount of people who want to help for free is really a difficult job. So socially responsible business initiatives are always sincerely welcome. Šiaulių Bankas team volunteering in the Food Bank campaign is a great help to all non-governmental organizations participating in the event and the people who receive support, I am very grateful for this initiative”, said Simonas Gurevičius.

In cooperation with city municipalities, Šiaulių Bankas’ volunteer forces will improve the environment of Lithuanian cities today: in Vilnius volunteers will manage greenery in the capital's Bernardine Garden, Kaunas volunteer team will help to clean the Šančiai cemetery, Klaipeda staff will clean the embankment of the Dane River, and in Šiauliai volunteers are determined to arrange the surroundings of the Dainai Park and the Hill of Crosses.

The preparation took several months

According to the project coordinator Rūta Pitkauskienė, the employees of Šiaulių Bankas did not have to be encouraged to join the campaign: the majority of employees became infected with the volunteering virus and joined just after the registration of the campaign.

The bigger challenge was to plan the work of the campaign in such a way that usual banking activities remained intact when most of the employees would go out to volunteer. “The bank is a large organization that works exactly like clockwork. That is why we have been preparing for the volunteering day carefully for several months: we had to coordinate the schedules of all departments and work, plan the time and details to ensure that every banking function functions smoothly”, said the project coordinator.

The bank will work on a flexible schedule

Today Šiaulių Bankas will work on a flexible schedule. Normally all basic banking services will ve operating: e-banking will be available as well as payment cards and ATMs. All branches of the Bank will be fully operational until 2 pm, with only a few employees remaining for the end of the day, while the opening hours of the supermarket branches will not change.