Building Employee Engagement

Last month in The New York Times, Peter S. Goodman wrote about "the new poor" – a growing segment of the U.S. population slipping out of the middle class due to falling or nonexistent unemployment benefits at the same time that sluggish economic growth is keeping companies from adding jobs for which they could apply.

Goodman warns that this phenomenon may be a factor for years. Yet, the Hitachi Foundation is following the old life-lemons adage and taking this opportunity to provide assistance to young entrepreneurs whose missions align with helping this very population.

Triple Pundit, a site that writes on the triple bottom line of "people, planet, profit," shared the details of Hitachi's Yoshiyama Award. It's for entrepreneurs aged 18-29 – the demographic of the Upstarts that Donna Fenn writes about. Hitachi is offering six winners up to $50,000 over two years to help support their work.

If you know someone in that age range who runs a business aimed at helping America's poor, tell them about it by using the Share button at the bottom of this post. And tell them to hurry if they want to apply for 2010: the deadline is March 22.

Related: All social entrepreneurs should get in the habit of doing a "social audit." There's a story in today's Wall Street Journal on this topic which profiles The Redwoods Group, a specialty insurance provider that Winning Workplaces honored in 2008 for their incredible team building and employee engagement best practices.