Good Health and Well-Being

Our Sustainability Commitments

Good Health and Well-Being is one of the 17 Sustainable Development Goals established by the United Nations in 2015 to end poverty, protect the planet, and ensure that all people enjoy peace and prosperity. SDG 3 aims to ensure healthy lives and promote well-being for all at all ages.

At Make-A-Wish International, our mission is deeply rooted in the principles of Positive Psychology, which focuses on enhancing well-being and enabling individuals and societies to flourish. We are committed to promoting good health and well-being for our beneficiaries, stakeholders, and staff through our actions and initiatives.

Global Access to Wishes

Make-A-Wish International grants wishes in nearly 50 countries and territories across 6 continents. We currently have over 40 Affiliates around the world, split equally between developing and developed nations. However, more than two-thirds of our wishes granted each year are granted in developing nations. (Data from 2023)

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 in Ecuador and Indonesia to extend our wish-granting programs there, and we continue to foster relationships with established relevant organizations to keep increasing 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. 

The survey showed that across all phases of the Wish Journey, Joy and Happiness, which are key elements of well-being, consistently scored the highest among all types of impact, while the wish realization phase was the moment that both wish children and parents expressed having the most positive experience during the Wish Journey. Throughout the Wish Journey the positive experience across all types of impact increases, with the peak happening at the wish realization phase.  

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.

Good Health & 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. Since October 2023, we’ve participated in The Great Place to Work survey, and in October 2024, we were proud to earn accreditation as a Great Place to Work for the second year in a row.

We are committed to continuous learning and development, taking ongoing measures to enhance workplace satisfaction and employee well-being. Recent initiatives include:

• Enhancing Inclusion: Strengthening international social connectivity for remote employees through a dedicated Social Committee.
• Improving Internal Communications: Introducing an international Outlook calendar to share organizational events and professional plans.
• Fostering Diversity: Rolling out Unconscious Bias training for all staff and advancing our Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion strategy.
• Benefits: Refreshing policies and communication on available employee benefits.
• Empowering Employees: Establishing a People and Culture Committee with representatives from each department, facilitated by HR leadership. This advisory group addresses staff recommendations from the survey, informs decision-making, and fosters staff engagement.

These efforts reflect our ongoing dedication to creating a workplace where employees thrive, feel valued, and stay engaged.