Top Corporate Social Responsibility Trends Every CSR Leader Should Know

CSR is changing across the UK.

• Employees want impact opportunities that reflect their values.
• Leaders are looking for new ways to engage their teams and communities.
• Businesses are rethinking how to embed purpose into their culture.

With so many shifts shaping the social impact space, the question is: how can you ensure your CSR strategy keeps up?

Backed by data from 130+ companies with UK employees, our second annual industry spotlight offers an inside look into how today’s leading organisations are engaging their people in giving, volunteering, and grantmaking. And now, we’re sharing key highlights from the report that every CSR and employee engagement leader should know.

This infographic offers a snapshot of our 2nd annual YourCause UK CSR Industry Spotlight with key metrics and some notable trends across giving, volunteering, enterprise size data, and more.

1. Engagement Is Holding Steady, But the Donor Gap May Be Widening

While overall participation in giving and volunteering programmes remained stable in 2024, our latest industry report reveals a growing disparity between large and small donors. While major donors are maintaining their contributions, smaller donors seem to be pulling back. This trend highlights the importance of designing programmes that both support and engage everyday donors.

2. Combined Programmes Drive Higher Engagement

Companies offering both giving and volunteering programs saw significantly higher engagement (16.8%) than those offering only one (5.1% for giving-only, 7.3% for volunteering-only). This reinforces the value of integrated CSR strategies that give employees multiple ways to participate and connect with causes they care about.

3. Small Companies Continue to Make a Big Impact

Organisations with 1,001-5,000 employees led the way in volunteer engagement, boasting a 63.05% participation rate. Companies of this size also had the highest average giving engagement (16.91%). The data suggests that smaller firms may have more agile cultures that allow for deeper community involvement—and that larger enterprises can learn from their example.

4. Employee Priorities are Shifting

This year, Environmental and Social Causes rise in popularity among employees, joining our list of top charity causes employees want to support. As employee values shift, this data not only reflects the importance of staying abreast of changes in employee behaviours and preferences year to year, it also reveals a clear opportunity for UK companies to align their CSR initiatives with sustainability and environmental action today.

5. New Metrics: Median Data Adds Clarity for Benchmarking

For the first time, our industry report includes both average and median values for key metrics. This shift helps CSR leaders better understand typical employee behaviour and avoid being misled by outliers. For example, while the average annual donation per donor was £355, the median was just £51, highlighting the importance of looking beyond averages when evaluating programme performance.

Whether you’re building a new programme, benchmarking an existing one, or making a business case for impact, insights like these can be a valuable resource to help you make informed decisions and drive more meaningful, measurable change.

Looking For Even More Insights?

Download the full 2025 UK CSR Industry Spotlight to explore these trends in-depth and see how your strategy measures up to your peers.