CluneTech’s award winning employee wellbeing programme offers a range of supports and initiatives including corporate health insurance, a Global Employee Assistance Programme, Life Work Days and much more, ensuring that health and wellbeing of our people is always a priority. In recent years, we expanded our offering to include fertility support and paid leaves for both IVF / pregnancy support and miscarriage / pregnancy loss, helping our people and / or their partners through all stages of their fertility journey.
With this in mind, we are honoured to announce that this summer, CluneTech has made its first donation towards the I Want a Baby Foundation in Bulgaria. This donation will directly assist the facilitation of psychological support groups for those experiencing infertility in Bulgaria’s sea capital Varna, where the large majority of our Bulgarian workforce is based.
The I Want a Baby Foundation launched its psychological programme in 2007. The programme is the first of its kind as it has been thoughtfully crafted to run in tandem with the medical procedures a couple is going through.
Following the donation, Katya Simeonova, who is the psychologist conducting the support groups in Varna, shared:
“When families start their infertility path, we always notice a feeling of social isolation. Their families and friends usually have children, and this is something that upsets them very much. They start distancing themselves emotionally. They usually don’t have someone to share the things they are going through and at some point, they start feeling isolated. The work in such groups is very precious to them as it gives women with infertility a chance to meet people with similar problems, to talk things through, each one of them to share the challenges they have been through. They get great feedback and in addition, they start getting closer to each other. They keep nurturing the friendships they create throughout our support groups even after the end of the program. I’m confident to say that group therapy is working really well.”
At the beginning of 2023, in addition to the many amazing initiatives we already support, we opened our global CSR request form, where our employees from all over the world have the opportunity to submit requests highlighting which charities and causes they would like to see us support. This year saw the highest number of requests to date, with our employees eager to see us support the charities and causes closest to their hearts.
Following an open vote on our internal communications platform Workvivo, the I Want a Baby Foundation which was put forward by Iglika Raeva, was chosen as the next CluneTech Cares beneficiary.
Following her nomination, Iglika Raeva from our Veliko Tarnovo office shared:
“The reason I want to support 'I Want a Baby' is because it is a cause very close to my heart. The volunteers there give their time and endless effort to support the families that are listed in the program. They support them not only financially, but also mentally, and emotionally and become their second family. All the parents of the babies born with the help of the foundation are also volunteers and they give back time and effort invested by others previously for them. I see great value in their cause as it brings happiness to people that have wanted this for years.”
The I Want a Baby Foundation coordinates reproduction, fertility treatment and psychological support programmes for childless couples.
The foundation’s efforts led to the creation of Bulgaria’s National IVF Fund and there are now IVF Funds in over 45 municipalities in the country. These funds sponsor up to four IVF procedures per couple. In addition to the foundation’s psychological support programme, the I Want a Baby Foundation also operates a genetic material donor programme for all couples who, after multiple unsuccessful procedures, are unable to conceive and require a donor.
In 2023 the organization celebrates its 16th birthday. In those sixteen years they have welcomed 3,500 babies in Varna and 20,000 babies in other locations, which would easily fill a whole town!
CluneTech’s CSR programme was established in September 2007 in response to a tragic flooding disaster in Tsar Kaloyan, Bulgaria. Deeply saddened by the news, our Bulgarian employees decided to help and within 48 hours, they had rallied together and organised 3.5 tonnes of food and 12,000 litres of water for the village. After this event, we formalised our CSR activity to give it a global reach, ensuring to support each of the communities in which we operate and giving back to our local communities.
The amazing thing about our CSR Programme is that it’s created by our people, for our people. Each year employees are given the opportunity to request which charities we support and the programme’s global reach results in us having appositive impact in each of the communities we operate in.
As part of CluneTech Cares, in 2020 we introduced our Volunteer Day which empowers our people to give back within their local communities during working time, ensuring that even our smaller teams can get behind the charities and causes closest to their hearts.
In 2022, we donated over €75,000 and supported over 55 charities, causes and fundraisers.
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