Ten years ago last month, the MassMutual Foundation received its 501c3 designation, launching an ambitious and exciting adventure to foster a culture of social impact for our MassMutual colleagues. Our hope was also to become a catalyst for change in response to the mounting challenges facing vulnerable communities in our headquarter-city of Springfield, in Boston where we have since expanded our base of operations, and throughout the United States.
As our foundation is commemorating its 10-year anniversary this year, it is fitting that it falls at the same time MassMutual celebrates 175 years since its founding, for it is in the spirit of the company’s longstanding tradition of community support in Springfield from which the MassMutual Foundation forged its mission. Our company began when 31 Springfield residents came together in support of one another and raised $100,000 to lay the groundwork for what is now an enterprise that has been a steady source of strength and support for generations of Americans.
Our company operates under our uniting purpose: we help people secure their future and protect the ones they love. The MassMutual Foundation exists to extend that purpose into communities facing financial and economic hardship – in order to help families build the financial capability and resilience they need to have a brighter future and ultimately, to thrive.
In 1953, economist Howard Bowen wrote a book entitled Social Responsibilities of the Businessman in which he espoused the inherent value of corporate social engagement on the part of American companies defining it as the obligation of business leaders to encourage policies and execute decisions that align with improvements to the nation’s social fabric. While considered revolutionary at a time when companies operated according to the tried-and-true model of shareholder capitalism, it ushered in the era of stakeholder capitalism, more prevalent today especially through the democratization of information access and social media.
How corporations choose to comport themselves in light of this new reality takes many forms. Perhaps the most recognizable are through financial donations to deserving nonprofit organizations and corporate volunteer programs which have and continue to offer the opportunity for employees to roll up their sleeves and effect tangible, positive change in their local communities. Regardless of how companies choose to operate in this new paradigm, customers, prospective customers, and the public at large are taking notice and often consider how companies show up in the community and society as part of their consideration for doing business with them.
The MassMutual Foundation’s work to support meaningful social impact is not prescribed solely through these traditional means. That’s not to suggest that financial capital through philanthropy alone or corporate volunteerism isn’t sufficient — they are indeed critical components of a company’s presence in the community and very much a part of the impact efforts of MassMutual and the MassMutual Foundation. However, through our experience working closely with communities both locally and in other parts of the country, we’ve come to the realization that we can, in fact, inform and change some of the underlying systems from which impediments to social advancement and financial resilience arise.
While financial assistance given directly to benefit the community remains a mainstay of our work, we have also taken great measures to leverage the intellectual and social capital we possess as the corporate foundation of a leading financial services company in ways that are helping drive more innovative solutions. For example, systemic changes in how health care is organized and delivered for financially vulnerable populations, how municipalities can creatively deliver new housing and homeownership opportunities to once blighted neighborhoods, or how driving innovation through locally based nonprofit lenders (e.g., CDFIs) can and will create more new businesses and set more families on a path to financial stability in traditionally capital-strapped neighborhoods.
In the last 10 years, the MassMutual Foundation has taken the time and expanded our effort to more fully understand the challenges that individuals and communities face daily. Equipped with that knowledge, we have brought the necessary resources to help communities confront those challenges and present innovative solutions to solve them. Sometimes, those resources are financial; other times, they manifest through connections we facilitate between communities and others organizations in our network, but no matter how we show up, our intent is to initiate and nurture long-term change for the better.
In just a decade, much of our work has been recognized and, in many cases, replicated beyond our immediate communities. To be recognized locally, regionally, nationally, and even internationally is an honor, but the true honor is in the work itself and the people on whose behalf we toil. With partners like Boston Medical Center, Opportunity Finance Network, Everfi, Union Capital and so many other organizations from Springfield, Boston, and other parts of the U.S. — as well as with other peer funders — we’ve set a course that at once gives us a sense of gratification for these first 10 years, and tremendous momentum and optimism for what’s to come in our next 10 years.
At 10 years old, the MassMutual Foundation is only getting started, and, inspired by the vision and fortitude that gave rise to MassMutual 175 years ago, the Foundation will continue to do great things on behalf of the company, its employees, and the communities for which we care so deeply.
To learn more about the MassMutual Foundation, please visit MassMutual Foundation: Building Stronger Communities.
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