From chopping onions to hiring and mentoring teens in underserved communities and more, Trustifi has been finding ways to give back to the community since its founding. “”It is a part of our DNA,”” says CEO Idan Udi Edry, whose company develops SaaS-based email encryption.
And while chopping 100 pounds of onions is not a typical workday task for C-level executives, that’s just what Edry, CRO Jason Green, and other team members did during last month’s RSA conference in San Francisco. The team spent the better part of a day with sleeves rolled up donating their time to slice and dice vegetables and pack food preparation containers at Project Open Hand, a nonprofit organization that counts on volunteers to prepare 2,500 nutritious meals and 200 bags of healthy groceries every day for seriously ill, isolated, or elderly people in San Francisco and Oakland.
Established during the AIDS crisis, Project Open Hand is also a founding partner of the Food Is Medicine Coalition, which has a mission to advance public policy that supports access to food and nutrition services for people with severe and/or chronic illnesses.
Edry says Trustifi wanted to take the theme of the RSA conference, “”The Human Element,”” and make it meaningful for the community, so Marketing Director Alex Marz explored local nonprofits and determined that Project Open Hand’s mission was a good fit for Trustifi’s core values.
“”It was very inspiring,”” says Edry, adding that he and his team learned a lot about what types of food and nutrition can be beneficial for different illnesses and conditions.
“”We were very happy to do something for the community,”” he said. “”I think, at every company in the world, no matter whether it’s a retail company, software company, or a factory that manufactures parts … we can take a little bit of our time and support the community, whether it’s donation, whether it’s physical efforts.””
The company puts its money where its mouth is too. Edry says Trustifi has established a charitable fund to support efforts to introduce teens to technology and designates a portion of every customer sign-up to that fund.
That effort is hands on as well. At last year’s Black Hat event, the company brought on two teenage interns to participate in the event and learn all about marketing, driven by Marz. “”We showed them how we run a conference from a marketing perspective as a high-tech company,”” Edry explains.
Trustifi plans to repeat that effort at this year’s Black Hat conference, scheduled for August in Las Vegas. 
“”It’s an amazing opportunity, because it’s not only that they’re coming to a big, giant conference with a lot of fun stuff to do, but actually they learn how the business world acts, engaging [in] social media activities and any type of marketing activities.”” Trustifi pays them too, Edry says.
“”We are really, really pushing them, and helping them, and supporting them as individuals and as a company. I think this is, for me, a flagship of Trustifi of supporting the community. Obviously, we have the money that we’re donating as well. But money is one thing. This is something else. This is time. This is effort. All our team supporting them and them having a lot of fun with us. And they’re feeling a part of the team.””
Edry considers himself lucky to have assembled a team who all care about and voluntarily participate in giving back activities. Edry himself is a mentor for a local nonprofit that helps teens with disabilities and those coming from difficult backgrounds.
Finding employees with shared core values is not all luck, though. “”The way we interview people that want to join the Trustifi family, part of it is to see that they have the necessary chemistry with all the team,”” Edry says. Kitchen skills are a bonus!
Update: For businesses impacted by COVID-19, Trustifi is offering free 90-day trial licenses of its email encryption solutions. See here for other vendors offering assistance as well.
