A little about GiveForward: We’re fun. We’re young. We like burritos. As an up-and-coming Chicago startup (did you see us on ABC or Crains?) we do very serious work, but try not to take ourselves too seriously. We help people raise money for their loved ones battling cancer and other illnesses. We also happen to throw an insanely fun ugly sweater pub crawl every December, and an employee vs. bosses burrito eating contestevery summer. If you join our team, we can guarantee this will definitely be the most fun position you’ve ever had (and hopefully the most rewarding as well).

The three positions we are hiring for are: one Business Development (Biz Dev) intern, one PR/Marketing interns, and one Interactive/Social media intern.

Here is what we look for in a Biz Dev intern:

• A passion for helping others.
• Strong analytical skills and attention to detail.
• Experience with sales (working at a bar/restaurant, any customer facing role works).
• Must love talking to people.  If you can have a conversation with anyone, this is the position for you!
• Can take initiative with projects, while completing assigned tasks; freedom to use your individuality to create your own. projects that improve GiveForward is highly encouraged.
• A great sense of humor.  If you think this is funny you’ll fit right in: http://thebloggess.com/2011/07/would-you-like-to-buy-a-monkey/.

Here are some things that would be awesome to have, but aren’t deal breakers:

• Experience with cold calling.
• Experience with internet research (part of Biz Dev is finding new clients, so you’ll need to be a bit of a detective at times).
• Can bring mad tunes to the GiveForward turntable.fm room.

What will you be working on?  Great question! Among other things you will be working on:

• Researching potential strategic partnerships for GiveForward.
• Reaching out to new contacts via cold emails and phone calls.
• Helping spread the word about GiveForward through viral marketing.
• Helping develop, monitor and track our system for recording success of Biz Dev initiatives.

Here is what we look for in a PR/Marketing intern:

• A passion for helping others.
• Experience with social media including Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, Tumblr, Reddit, Foursquare, LinkedIn, etc.
• Experience with blogging, particularly using the WordPress platform.
• An appreciation for chocolate, gummi candy and vegetables.

Here are some things that would be awesome to have, but aren’t deal breakers:

• Experience with event planning.
• Experience with Public Relations.
• Strong analytical skills and attention to detail.
• Can bring mad tunes to the GiveForward turntable.fm room.
• Can take initiative with projects, while  completing assigned tasks; freedom to use your individuality to create your own projects that improve GiveForward is highly encouraged.

What will you be working on?  Great question! Among other things you will be working on:

• Press outreach.
• Helping organize our Ugly Sweater Pub Crawl.
• Working on our bi-monthly enewsletter.
• Keeping the GiveForward Kids in line.  Don’t let the photos fool you, they’re a handful.
• Updating the GiveForward blog.

Here is what we look for in a Interactive/Social media intern:

• A passion for helping others.
• Experience with social media including Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, Tumblr, Reddit, Foursquare, LinkedIn, etc.
• Experience with various video mediums including YouTube.
• Ability to be creative while multi-tasking.
• A love of storytelling.

Here are some things that would be awesome to have, but aren’t deal breakers:

• Mad burrito eating skills.
• Familiarity with managing online communities.
• Works well under a deadline.
• An uncanny ability to quote movies like Mean Girls and Bridesmaids word for word.
• Can take initiative with projects, while  completing assigned tasks; freedom to use your individuality to create your own projects that improve GiveForward is highly encouraged.

What will you be working on?  Great question! Among other things you will be working on:

• Helping to manage the GiveForward online community including social media.
• Telling the story of GiveForward through video.
• Helping to organize GiveForward’s YouTube channel.

What we do not look for in any of our interns:

• Robots
• Someone who color-coordinates their leisure suits.
• People who are allergic to helping others.
• Evil monkeys
• People who use all CAPS. Seriously, don’t yell at us.

Most importantly we are looking for passionate people. We look at resumes but we really care most about cover letters. To apply, please send us your cover letter, resume and anything else you think would impress us (hint…hint…we really want a pony) to jobs@giveforward.com.  Or if you have a friend who you think would be perfect for this position, please forward it along!  All positions will be unpaid but we are happy to give college credit.

Love,

The GiveForward Team

All you have to do is follow 3 easy steps and the iPad could be yours!

Ready?

1. First, “Like” the GiveForward company page on Facebook. It is important to like this particular page (http://www.facebook.com/pages/GiveForward/157801610956395?ref=ts) because that is the only page we will be monitoring so make sure it is not one of the other pages that GiveForward is affiliated with, such as Give Forward and GiveForward.org.

2. Next, in a status update, let us know what Giving Forward means to you. It could be as small as sharing food with your friends or as big as a generous donation to your favorite fundraiser on our site. We want to hear it all!

3. And finally, tag the GiveForward company page that you just “liked” somewhere in the status. Here is an example: “To me, giving forward means doing a random act of kindness once a day. @GiveForward.” By tagging us, we will know to give you credit for your brilliant answer and enter you in the raffle.

And don’t think that this is a one in a million chance– you can enter as many times as you want! Each time you give us a definition and tag us in the post, you will be entered in the raffle again. It’s as simple as that!

The winner will be notified at the end of the month, and we will be compiling some of our favorite answers to be featured on our site.

So tell your friends, neighbors, and everyone you know– everyone is eligible! Please help us GiveForward a new iPad this August, and of course, thank you so much for all of your support.

Sending endless hugs,

The GiveForward Team

This piece by MSN featuring GiveForward’s CEO Desiree Vargas Wrigley, talks a little about how small business owners do exactly what our users are doing – turning to each other when they need a little extra help.  Oh and in case you were wondering who that beautiful baby is in the video they featured, that is Hannah and here is her fundraiser: Help Hannah Breathe.

Olivia Kealey – Public Relations/Marketing Intern

Olivia hails from Iowa City, Iowa, but does not live on a farm as most people assume. She much prefers Chicago to Iowa, and is heading into her junior year at Northwestern University, studying Communication Studies, Integrated Marketing Communications, and Spanish. She loves the color green, her huge family, labrador retrievers, cookie dough ice cream, and watching sports, especially of the Chicago variety. Although she runs and bikes regularly, she is a bigger fan of the idea of working out. She attempted a food eating contest this past spring and although she failed, she is thrilled to keep practicing. She is also a dancer and has a passion for perfecting her moves in grocery store aisles (beware fellow shoppers). At Northwestern, she is a member of Tri Delta sorority and is especially passionate about their philanthropy: Saint Jude Children’s Hospital! She is incredibly excited to be a part of the GiveForward team and can’t wait to help spread the word about this amazing company! (And is so thankful that GiveForward saved her from another summer of lifeguarding.)

Natalia Khosla – Public Relations/Marketing Intern

Natalia lives right here in Chicago in the awesome South Loop. She grew up in Burr Ridge, IL, and now is a rising sophomore at Yale University, studying Psychology/Neuroscience and pre-medicine. She spends her time at school dancing with YaleDancers and the Yale Bhangra (Indian dance) Team, hanging out with her sisters in the Kappa Alpha Theta sorority, and volunteering at the Yale-New Haven Hospital. Natalia enjoys skiing, speed-boating, speaking French, French Silk pie from Bakers Square, watching the movie John Tucker Must Die, and singing to loud music in the car with the windows down, and she is afraid of moldy bread and spiders. Natalia wants to be a physician when she grows up, and she is loving the chance to work with GiveForward to see medicine from a different perspective: the patients! She wants to get the word out there about GiveForward’s insightful mission to break the stigma of giving that the dynamic duo, Desiree and Ethan, are spear-heading with amazing leadership! She loves sending people lots of virtual hugs through the site, and is thrilled when she gets responses from users saying it made them smile

Sam Mortimer – Video/ Interactive Media Intern

Sam graduated from University of Wisconsin – Madison this May with a degree in Communication Arts – Radio/TV/Film. One day he hopes to work as an editor for television, film, or web. At GiveForward he is producing video and animations to help get the word out about specific fundraisers and the company in general. His projects so far include user testimonial videos and an animated marketing video. Sam has experience using Final Cut Pro, Adobe Flash, and Pinnacle Studio 15. For fun, Sam has worked as an editor on a short film for a Madison based production company and also works as a social media assistant for a concert promoter. Evidently, Sam has a passion for film and music. He is excited to enjoy the vast Chicago music scene this summer. His other favorite things include: Mexican food, playing with his dog Pepper, and watching Big Ten football (Go Badgers!). He is super excited to be a part of the GiveForward team and can’t wait to put his skills to further use to help promote the site!

And, that’s the crew that’s working behind the scenes at GiveForward to make sure all of you, our users, feel the love. Want to know more about us, question our strange interests, or tell us about yours? Email us, we want to know you!

What would you do if someone called you a charity case?  If you’re like most people you’d probably be a little offended.   To many people, accepting help from others represents a personal failure.   Well, today we are declaring that this mindset needs to end!  Because the reality is that EVERYBODY is a charity case. Yep, everybody.

According to a study released recently by the National Bureau of Economic Research, 50% of Americans said they absolutely wouldn’t be able to come up with $2000 in the event of a medical emergency.  And a staggering 75% of those surveyed said they would have to dip into savings, ask friends and family for help, or resort to credit cards or a home equity line of credit. Let me repeat that: 75% of Americans would need help covering a $2000 bill.

Now, imagine that someone close to you is diagnosed with cancer or another illness and instead of just $2,000, that friend needs $10,000 or $20,000 to cover the medication co-pays, travel costs, meals, extra daycare for the kids and all the other out-of-pocket expenses associated with getting sick. Like most people, you’d probably want to help by sending some money, right? Of course you would.  But the reality is that most Americans don’t give money when a loved one is sick. They might bring a meal over to the family or send flowers, but they don’t typically send money.  And that is the problem.

As a society, we are generous in celebratory moments like the birth of a baby, graduation, or a wedding.  But we’re often afraid to give when times are bad. And it’s not because people don’t want to help. If anything over the last three years at GiveForward we have witnessed that people truly do want to help, and the act of giving can be a remarkably empowering experience.  Rather, the reason people are hesitant to give money is because they are afraid of making the beneficiary feel like a charity case.

We feel strongly that this “charity case” stigma needs to end!  And it needs to end today.  According to a recent study by Duke University, the average cancer patient pays over $8500 a year in out of pocket expenses not covered by insurance.   If 75% of Americans can’t come up with $2000 in an emergency, imagine how few can come up with $8,500.  I’d wager that for 99.5% of Americans an expense of this nature would be devastating.

So the reality is that we’re all in the same boat.  I’m a charity case.  You’re a charity case.  Everyone is a charity case — every single one of us, whether we are in the lower class, middle class or upper class.  We can all use an extra helping hand when we get sick. So today we are asking you to do one thing.  The next time you find out that someone you care about has been diagnosed with an illness, stop worrying about offending their sense of pride.  Instead, worry about how you are going to keep them alive so that they get to celebrate another birthday.  Set up a fundraising page for them and spread the word to others. You’ll be amazed at the outpouring of love, generosity and support that will follow.  But it requires courage to take that first step.

A little about GiveForward: We’re fun. We’re young. We like burritos. As an up-and-coming Chicago startup (did you see us on ABC or Crains?) we do very serious work, but try not to take ourselves too seriously. We help people raise money for their loved ones battling cancer and other illnesses. We also happen to throw an insanely fun ugly sweater pub crawl every December, and an employee vs. bosses burrito eating contest every summer. If you join our team, we can guarantee this will definitely be the most fun position you’ve ever had (and hopefully the most rewarding as well).

The three positions we are hiring for are: two PR/Marketing interns and one video/interactive media intern.

Here is what we look for in a PR/Marketing intern:

• A passion for helping others.
• Experience with social media including Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, Tumblr, Reddit, Foursquare, LinkedIn, etc.
• Experience with blogging, particularly using the WordPress platform.
• An appreciation for impromptu dance-offs.

Here are some things that would be awesome to have, but aren’t deal breakers:

• Experience with event planning.
• Strong analytical skills and attention to detail.
• A love of animal-related Tumblr blogs.
• Can take initiative with projects, while  completing assigned tasks; freedom to use your individuality to create your own projects that improve GiveForward is highly encouraged.

What will you be working on?  Great question! Among other things you will be working on:

• Helping organize our super secret party for Tech Week.
• Working on our bi-monthly enewsletter.
• Keeping the GiveForward Kids in line.  Don’t let the photos fool you, they’re a handful.
• Updating the GiveForward blog.

Here is what we look for in a video/interactive media intern:

• A passion for helping others.
• Filming and editing experience.
• Experience with various video mediums including YouTube.
• Ability to be creative while multi-tasking.
• A love of storytelling.

Here are some things that would be awesome to have, but aren’t deal breakers:

• Mad burrito eating skills.
• Familiarity with holding & recording long-distance interviews.
• Works well under a deadline.
• A love of tandem bicycling.
• Can take initiative with projects, while  completing assigned tasks; freedom to use your individuality to create your own projects that improve GiveForward is highly encouraged.

What will you be working on?  Great question! Among other things you will be working on:

• Putting together user testimonial videos.
• Telling the story of GiveForward through video.
• Helping to organize GiveForward’s YouTube channel.

What we do not look for in any of our interns:

• Robots
• Someone who color-coordinates their leisure suits.
• People who are allergic to helping others.
• Evil monkeys
• People who use all CAPS. Seriously, don’t yell at us.

Most importantly we are looking for passionate people. We look at resumes but we really care most about cover letters. To apply, please send us your cover letter, resume and anything else you think would impress us (hint…hint…we really want a pony) to jobs@giveforward.com.  Or if you have a friend who you think would be perfect for this position, please forward it along!  All positions will be unpaid but we are happy to give college credit.

Love,

The GiveForward Team

Every day I  go to work, I realize how blessed I am. I get and do something I am absolutely passionate about, and I get to share this experience with an incredibly wonderful group of co-workers who bring smiles to people’s faces everyday.  I couldn’t think of a better job.  But if you asked me ten or twenty years ago what I’d be doing today, never in a million years would I  have guessed it would be this.

You see, when I was six I wanted to be a real estate developer.  Yep, a real estate developer.  I don’t know how this crazy notion popped into my  head, but for the longest time I thought this would be my calling.  I was going to develop commercial real estate.  Seven years later,  my dad passed away from colon cancer, and  I came to the conclusion that life is too short to develop strip malls and parking garages.  I wanted to do something to help people.

So in high school I started volunteering for a cancer organization called Kids Konnected that helps children cope with the loss of a parent to cancer.  I enjoyed it, but at the time, I didn’t feel like it was my calling.  When I entered college I continued to volunteer at cancer organizations, but like most college kids I was more interested in keg stands and beer pong than I was in helping people with cancer.

Towards the end of my junior year I started to think hard about what I really wanted to do with my life.  Most of my friends were in the undergraduate business program and were going off to New York to become investment bankers.  As a political science major with less-than-stellar math skills, this was not an option for me.   Instead, like every other political science major who doesn’t know what the heck to do with a liberal arts degree, I applied to law school.

Law school was a challenge for me.  After my first year, I remember coming home for the summer and telling my mom that I wanted to quit and become a river raft guide.  I loved being outdoors and when I thought of my happiest times, several of them were river rafting.  Maybe this would be my calling?  Well, my mom wasn’t having any of this river raft nonsense so I begrudgingly went back to law school the next fall. I worked hard and made Law Review, but for the first time in my life I couldn’t just breeze through classes, cram at the end of the semester and then ace the exam.  I actually had to study.  And I found out that no matter how hard I studied, there were always people who would do better than me on the exams.  It was very humbling and it made me realize that I wasn’t going to succeed in a career where you had to always out-smart your competition.  I needed to find a career where you could simply out-care the competition.

Fortunately, while I was in law school, I finally discovered my calling.  During my last year of law school, my buddy Ned convinced me to train for a marathon.  I had never run more than five miles in my life, but I decided to give it a shot.  And since, I would probably never run another marathon I decided I might as well use this opportunity to raise money for a good cause. So I signed up to run for St. Jude, which raises money to fight children’s cancer.

St. Jude had given me a personal fundraising page and I gladly spammed all my friends and family with email updates about my training and asked them to donate to my page.  Within a week I hit my goal of $1000 and it was such an incredible high that I decided to up the goal to $5000.  But then I hit a wall. Once I raised about $2500, I had tapped out all my friends and family and I realized that if I was going to hit my goal, I was going to have to get creative.

I had always been good at making people laugh and I thought to myself, if I can get people to smile, I can get people to donate.  I had a banana costume lying around my apartment from the previous Halloween and decided to dust it off and start doing my training runs up and down the streets of Washington, DC in this costume.  I handed out little cards to people on the street promising that if I hit my goal of $5000, I would run the marathon in the banana costume.  Well, people got a kick out of seeing some goofball jogging around DC dressed as a banana giving out high fives and business cards to people.  Word spread quickly and within a few days of my first banana run,  dozens of $10 and $20 donations starting pouring in from all over the country. I ended up surpassing my goal and raising over $6000 for cancer research. Finally, I had found something in my life that I absolutely loved.  I was having fun, doing good, and helping others.  Now, if I could only make a career out of this, I figured I’d be set.

One of my biggest takeaways from my marathon experience was just how phenomenal a tool these personal fundraising pages were.  I had never seen a personal fundraising page before this and I was absolutely blown away by how effective it was.  The problem with the marathon, however, was that runners could only choose from one of about twenty-five official charity partners if they wanted to raise money.  I ended up raising money for children’s cancer but if I had had the choice to raise money for anything, I would have raised money for colon cancer since that is what my dad had passed away from.  I thought to myself why limit it to just the twenty-five official charity partners of the marathon?  Why not open it up so that every person that cares about a particular cause has access to a fundraising page?

Fast forward a year  — I had graduated law school  but I still couldn’t get this idea out of my head.  So I began doing some research and planned to start a company where people could create a fundraising page for any non-profit cause.  I had told a handful of people of this idea but unfortunately none of my friends were willing to quit their jobs and start this company with me and I didn’t have the guts to do it by myself.

Then in February of 2008  I got a phone call from an ex-girlfriend in Chicago.  She told me she met this woman, Desiree Vargas, at a Super Bowl party who had a similar idea and was starting a company called GiveForward where people could raise money for anything, not just non-profits.  She gave me Desiree’s number, and after a couple of weeks I finally decided to call. Within the first minute of our phone conversation I  could tell Desiree was incredibly passionate about her idea. We instantly clicked, and without so much as giving it a second thought, I packed up everything I owned into two suitcases and moved  half way across the country to help start GiveForward.

That was three years ago.  Today, GiveForward has helped thousands of people raise over $4.5 million for their loved ones’ medical expenses as they battle cancer and other illnesses.  It has been a wild journey so far and I couldn’t be happier with the direction of where the company is going.  But what I am most proud of isn’t the amount of money we’ve helped people raise.  What I’m most proud of is the small things we do each day to bring smiles to people’s faces.

Every day, all GiveForward team members (from the CEO to the interns) are responsible for giving out at least one “virtual hug” to a customer on the site.  Usually this is just a quick email that may include a joke, a quick pick-me-up or some words of encouragement.   But these small gestures can mean a world of difference for someone battling cancer.  And it is this ability to touch people’s lives that makes our jobs so fun.   So, while I am incredibly passionate about fundraising and even more passionate about helping people with cancer, neither of these things are my calling. My calling is simply making people smile and GiveForward is the platform through which I get to do this everyday.

I’ll admit it’s a bit odd to think that my journey started because of a silly banana costume, but that’s my reality.  I am a banana person and there’s no denying it. Since that initial banana man marathon, I’ve run two other marathons, countless half marathons and even took a polar plunge in the banana costume all to raise money for cancer organizations.  I do it because cancer sucks, but mostly I do it because it’s fun and I like giving out high fives.  Now, I sincerely hope that one day I will be remembered for more than just being the weird jogging banana dude.  But to be perfectly honest, as long as I make a few people smile along the way, if I’m simply remembered as the banana guy, well, I’m okay with that too.

Sending a hug is pretty easy, simply go to the GiveForward page and click on the “Hugs” tab (next to the Details and Donors tabs).

There you will be able to view hugs left by others and leave your own words of encouragement and love.  Just click on the “send a hug” button, type in your name, email address and your message and hug away!

At GiveForward we’re firm believers in the power of hugs (we’re still lobbying for an Ikea hug pillow for the office), and clearly our users are too because within just hours of the “hug” feature launching, we’ve already had a number of hugs sent out.

Want your hugs to reach beyond just the GiveForward page?  Try sending a hug via Facebook.  Now get out there and hug away!

What does this mean for users?  It means you get the exact level of personal attention that you want.  Is this your first time fundraising?  Our coaches are

happy to help you figure out the next steps and share their tried and true fundraising tips, just email them at info@giveforward.com or give them a call at 312-957-6113.

Are you an old pro at fundraising and just want someone to call on if you get stuck?  They’re there for that too.

Plus having a personal fundraising coach also means you get a nice glossy photo of your coach with your introductory email.  Always a nice perk.

We hope that you guys enjoy working one-on-one with our coaches as much as they enjoy working with you.

These donations have changed lives and helped people cope with everything from an unexpected cancer diagnosis to rebuilding after a fire.  So we want to take a moment to say a big GiveForward THANK YOU to everyone who takes a little time every day to give.  It is donors like the Quinn Family, who made the $4millon donation to the fundraiser “Help Support Margie Bersterman” that are changing the world one dollar at a time.

Way to go, Giveasauruses; you are all rockstars!!