ESG 2

The global mission and work of Make-A-Wish is rooted in the principles of Positive Psychology, which explores the conditions that enable individuals and societies to flourish. Rather than trying to alleviate suffering, positive psychology strives to enhance well-being. That is why at Make-A-Wish International our actions are defined by these principles of enhancing good health and well-being, both towards our beneficiaries and other stakeholders, as well as our staff.

Global Access to Wishes

Make-A-Wish International grants wishes in 50 countries and territories across 6 continents. We currently have 40 Affiliates around the world, split between 21 developing nations and 19 developed nations. Overall, more than two-thirds of our wishes granted each year are granted in developing nations.

Our recently completed Prevalence & Incidence research shows that approximately 1.25 million children are diagnosed with a critical illness each year and are eligible for a wish within our Affiliate territories. For this research project, we collaborated with the Singapore-based research company, Research For Impact and the Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation (IHME), a research institute working in global health statistics and impact evaluation located at the University of Washington. The Global Burden of Disease database (GBD) was utilized to create country-specific pediatric disease profiles for qualifying conditions.

This locally relevant, globally consistent data serves as the backbone for the definition and deployment of Make-A-Wish International’s strategic plan in terms of identifying potentially underserved populations and conditions, guiding medical outreach and anticipating wish demand per country.

Additionally, we see that the majority of children diagnosed yearly in the Make-A-Wish International Affiliate territories live in developing countries.

Overall, we aim to continue expanding and growing our reach to achieve our vision of granting the wish of every eligible child and enabling them to experience the life-changing power and long-term impact of a wish-come-true. To this end, in 2024 we launched new Make-A-Wish Affiliates and territories in Ecuador, Indonesia and Tanzania, and we continue to foster relationships with established relevant organizations to increase reach through new partnerships.

Global Wish Impact on Well-Being & The Wish Journey Theory of Change

A wish is a carefully planned journey, designed to complement a child’s medical treatment, and give them the hope, strength and joy they need to face their illness.

The stages of the Wish Journey work together to support physical and emotional healing by building strong positive experiences through the application of the principles of positive psychology. This way, the Wish Journey builds resilience and helps children to better cope with their critical illness.

To better understand our beneficiaries’ experiences, particularly for wish children and parents/guardians, across Affiliate countries and to create a more consistent and substantiated understanding of the outcomes and impacts that wish granting has on them, Make-A-Wish International embarked on a journey to develop a Global Theory of Change model. The aim of this project was to understand and analyze the actual impacts at different stages of the Wish Journey through a survey to wish children and their parents/guardians, show how these stages affect each other and define what needs to be true at each stage to create meaningful change and maximize the impact for beneficiaries.

Following a thorough literature review, as the first phase of our Global Theory of Change study and survey design, the positive changes related to wish interventions that emerged were collated and classified into seven key outcomes, as shown below, that collectively describe the impact of a wish.

Key outcomes of the wish experience for both wish children and parents

Some highlights of findings were:

• 92% of wish children said the wish experience improved their well-being with 90% saying it helped them look forward and broaden their horizons.
• 97% of both parents and children said it brought them joy and happiness.
• 93% of wish parents said the wish experience provided family bonding.
• 90% of parents said the wish provided respite and distraction for their child.

Wish families were also asked about impact on overall family well-being:

• 88% of wish children said the wish experience helped to create a sense of normalcy and provide relief from their medical treatments.
• 96% of parents/guardians said the wish experience created a happy lasting memory for the family and 89% said it created a sense of normalcy.
• 96% of parents/guardians said that thanks to the wish experience they felt empowered to address their child’s social and emotional needs, as well as the child’s medical needs (92%).

Globally we found that there is a strong convergence around common outcomes and the Wish Journey:

• The benefits of a wish for a wish child included improved physical, emotional, and social well-being and inspiration of hope and optimism.
• A wish experience has a positive impact on the physical, mental and emotional well-being of parents/guardians.
• The wish experience has positive impacts on families by creating happy lasting memories, benefitting other family members (e.g. siblings) and giving themselves/their child relief from medical treatments and creating a sense of normalcy.

Read more about our Theory of Change research.

Good Health and Well-Being at Make-A-Wish International

At Make-A-Wish International the well-being and good health of our employees are of paramount importance. That is why in October 2023 we participated for the first time in the survey of The Great Place to Work and in October 2024 we were proud to be accredited as a Great Place to Work for the second year in a row, with the overall score of 87%. As we champion and advocate for continuous learning and development as individuals and as an organization, following the survey and the accreditation we took some measures to keep improving the workplace satisfaction and overall well-being of our employees. To go deeper into the main areas of improvement identified from the survey results, an additional questionnaire was shared with all employees to receive recommendations of improvement actions in these areas.

To address these staff improvement recommendations an action plan was put in place to:

• strengthen international social connectivity for higher sense of inclusion of remote employees through a Social Committee
• increase open communication of key organizational events by creating an international Outlook calendar
• foster diversity and inclusion by asking all staff to take an Unconscious Bias training and progressing our Diversity, Equity and Inclusion strategy and agenda
• refresh policies and communication on available employee benefits
• set up a People and Culture Committee. The People and Culture Committee, consisting of one representative from each department, is facilitated by the Make-A-Wish International Human Resources and People Engagement Director and aims to further explore and address the staff recommendations shared on the improvement areas identified by the survey. The Committee has an advisory role on decisions made by the management of the organization and strives to keep the staff informed on developments and engaged with participation in decisions.