Creating an EVP as strong as Buckner’s mission

Buckner International is a faith-based nonprofit serving vulnerable children, families, and seniors around the world. For more than 150 years they've been transforming lives and strengthening communities.

Buckner has a powerful mission, a strong reputation, and has been named a Great Place To Work multiple years in a row. Alongside these strengths, Buckner leadership recognized that their organization’s laser-focus on serving others had traditionally meant less emphasis on their own people. They wanted to define and communicate the value they created for their 3,000 associates as effectively as for those they serve.

Turning good intentions into measurable impact‍

Buckner's leaders genuinely care about their people. They offer competitive benefits, invest in training and development, and have many recognition initiatives in place. Beyond these offerings, there were opportunities to improve the employee experience. Stress is an ongoing challenge for people who give of themselves every day in their jobs, while those who don’t work directly with clients could feel less connected to the organization’s mission. Employees needed to know they were as valued by Buckner as its clients.

So what was missing? Buckner lacked a clear Employee Value Pledge (EVP)‍

While most organizations see employee value propositions as a branding challenge, we knew it went deeper. We think about an organization's EVP as three interconnected elements: 

• The "deal" offered: What I get, how I grow, how it feels and how I work; 
• How leaders demonstrate that deal through daily behaviours; and 
• How it's communicated confidently and consistently – in every interaction. 

The research revealed consistent themes. Buckner's mission-driven work was attractive, and employees felt a strong sense of purpose, but there was room to improve. Compensation was a priority, benefits were comprehensive but poorly understood, career progression felt unclear, and employees wanted leadership to consistently "walk the talk". While Buckner had clear standards for serving clients, they lacked the same clarity around serving employees.

‍The breakthrough came with our unique EVP Index‍

Rather than simply identifying problems, we created a measurable framework for improvement mapped directly to their values (Faith, Integrity, Respect, Service, Teamwork) and the four core components of the EVP "deal".

This gave Buckner something they'd never had before: objective, granular data on exactly where their employee experience was strong and where it needed improvement.

We focused our recommendations on three strategic areas:

1. Strengthening the deal itself—developing a clear compensation philosophy, expanding bonus eligibility, creating centralised career pathways, and better communicating their reward package.
2. Improving how leaders demonstrated the Employee Value Pledge through daily behaviours – leadership development programs, clearer accountability measures, and regular coaching.
3. Giving their internal communication the same attention as external. That meant new channels to reach all employees, more regular internal messaging and greater transparency

We equipped the organization with valuable tools for success

The EVP Index provided Buckner with a baseline and clear priorities for investment. Leadership gained alignment on the "big rocks" while identifying low-cost, high-impact initiatives to improve daily employee experiences.

Buckner now has a clear, measurable Employee Value Pledge that reflects the same diligence they bring to serving clients. They have mechanisms in place to move beyond good intentions to deliver measurable impact—applying the same level of care and focus to employee experience as they do to fulfilling their mission.

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