Volunteering to create more vibrant communities

Today is International Volunteer Day, and we are joining the United Nations in celebrating the tireless work of volunteers across the globe – especially our Otis colleagues who continuously strive to help our communities thrive. As part of this year’s theme of “solidarity in volunteering,” we issued a call to our 68,000 service-minded colleagues to connect within their regions to support the vibrant communities where we live and work.

More specifically, we challenged each colleague to donate at least two volunteer hours of their time to the causes they feel most passionate about through a campaign we are calling “2 in ’22.” The Otis region and world headquarters function with the highest participation rates at the end of the year will have the opportunity to direct grant money to the STEM (science, technology, math and engineering) charities of their choice, building on existing programs like Made to Move Communities that help to develop our next generation workforce.

The response has been overwhelming and reflects the long tradition of volunteering among Otis colleagues. To date, we have recorded 27,000+ hours for the year with well over a thousand colleagues from our four global regions and within our headquarters dedicating their time so more people in their communities can connect and thrive.

Here we spotlight five of our colleagues and teams who are making a positive impact in communities around the world. Their collective efforts help to advance our ESG goal to dedicate 500,000 volunteer hours by 2030.
 

Otis Asia Pacific

As part of Otis’ ongoing commitment to STEM education, our Asia Pacific team recently partnered with The Asia Foundation and Cambodia Academy of Digital Technology to organize a robotics competition under the theme of 'Urban Mobility.' Three teams emerged as top winners with innovative solutions to tackle traffic congestion and healthcare access challenges.

“I am very proud of the students and our six Otis mentors who have worked together over the past four months to put together these creative concepts,” said K. Manivannan, Managing Director of Otis Vietnam and Malaysia. “Through the live demonstrations and working model prototypes, the students showcased how their STEM solutions would operate in real life and bring benefits to the communities they live in.”
 

Otis Americas

Feeding South Florida provides over 90 million pounds of food (75 million meals) to nearly one million individuals each year who are facing food insecurity in Broward, Miami-Dade, Monroe and Palm Beach Counties. The always-staggering costs of housing and transportation, coupled with the recent economic fallout, have made it even more difficult for many families to put food on the table. The Otis team responded to this urgent need by donating their time to sort and pack food and personal items at Feeding Palm Beach County.  
 

Otis China

Otis volunteers provided mentoring support for a scholarship program to encourage and enable greater female participation in STEM careers. So far, about 180 female university STEM students have benefited from the program through financial grants, support from female mentors from Otis, including Research & Development engineers and marketing specialists, as well as opportunities for future internships and employment.
 

Otis Europe, Middle East and Africa

For eight years, Otis Spain has hosted a “solidarity race” around its plant in Leganés. The race benefits the Ana Carolina Díez Mahou Foundation and its Primera Estrella (or First Star) program, which supports children with mitochondrial neuromuscular genetic diseases and their families. Over 900 people of all ages, including more than 700 Otis colleagues, participated in the race, both in-person and – for the first time – online.
 

Otis World Headquarters

The Otis Women in Technology employee resource group was the latest team from the company’s world headquarters in Farmington, Conn., to provide hands-on, project-based STEM learning to members of the Boys & Girls Club of Hartford. Teams from Communications and Human Resources also engaged with club youth earlier in the year. Colleagues taught local students about the engineering design process by experimenting with centripetal force and inclined planes while designing and building a roller coaster made entirely of paper. Students, with their professional mentors, create ingenious inventions while problem-solving and having fun.

To learn more about the work and impact of Otis volunteers worldwide, visit https://www.otis.com/en/us/our-company/social-impact