How it all began
help alliance was founded in 1999 by committed Lufthansa employees in order to bundle the commitment of many individual employees.
David Wolseley flew as a flight attendant for Lufthansa for 33 years and is one of the founding members of help alliance. “The opportunities offered by this job were and are unique,” says the now 66-year-old. “You get to know the world and get in touch with local people.” You experience a lot – including extremes.
“I quickly realized how much poverty there is in the world,” says Wolseley. From the crew bus, he often saw countless people, including children, working in terrible conditions on construction sites or camping on the side of the road. He realized how privileged we are. But he also experienced something else: How committed many of his colleagues were.
With the founding of help alliance e.V. in 1999, this commitment was brought together in a joint initiative with the aim of supporting people in disadvantaged countries through aid projects. Financial resources were made available with the help of fundraising campaigns.
After 18 years of successful work, the association was transformed into a non-profit limited liability company (gGmbH) in 2017 and has been a wholly owned subsidiary of the Lufthansa Group ever since.
A lot has happened since then. help alliance has professionalized its structures, processes and guidelines and increased its commitment and cooperation with Group airlines and business units. Today, its work encompasses a global network of committed LHG employees and local communities at 81 Lufthansa Group locations.
A lot has also happened in recent years with regard to impact measurement and project portfolio management. Precise objectives with clear indicators for impact measurement, local ownership and empowerment of local people, as well as an exit strategy from the start of the project, ensure that the projects are particularly sustainable and a perfect fit for the project beneficiaries, while the annual project funding has increased a hundredfold since 1999: from around 40,000 euros to over 4 million euros per year.
In this way, help alliance has developed from an employee initiative into the central pillar of the Lufthansa Group’s social commitment and is celebrating its 25th anniversary this year.
An anniversary is a time to look back and honor what has been achieved so far. But even more important: what has already been achieved is a foundation. The basis for a successful future.
25 years of help alliance – that’s got a future!
