Consider these current examples:

1. The Andrea and Charles Bronfman Foundation is offering a prize of a two-year professorship at Brandeis, plus other perks- for the next big idea in Jewish communal innovation (source)

2. The Charles Bronfman Prize, which is separate from the above, is offering a prize of $100,000 to young visionaries who improve the world through humanitarian efforts (see their website)

3. Ronny Maman is holding a contest attempting to find ways to improve civility in Israeli society with a reward of $60,000, along with the promise that the best ideas will be published in a book. I write about it here.

4. And of course, you’ve mentioned Slingshot in this post, which I also write about with a bit more detail.

Overall, this thinking is a real shift in the standard practice of nonprofit handouts because yes, there are givers and receivers, but the recipients are idealists, thinkers, and innovators.

I consider this all very exciting and can’t wait to see where it goes.

Keep in mind that the last contest of this kind in the Jewish community was in 1929 when Mordechai Kaplan wrote his treatise on Reform Judaism, which became a transformative movement in America and changed the face of the Diasporic Jewish community.

Best,

Maya Norton

The New Jew: Blogging Jewish Philanthropy

I’m at least partially with you on point 2. This is why I’ve argued both sides of the issue. But I think that there needs to be more stimulus for innovation in the philanthropy/nonprofit world. The huge payoffs that accrue to successful innovators in the for-profit world do not exist. But I do agree that innovation is not an end to itself, I just think that spurring pure innovation will lead to innovation that produces results.

1. Have you seen the Slingshot handbook? It seems like 50 promotional blurbs, barely different from mission statements. Sure, someone presumably looked at more than 50 organizations to find these, but who? How?

I’m interested in your thoughts on the handbook itself. It’s unclear to me who would find this useful.

2. I believe we need to reward charities for getting results, not for innovating. If we do that, the dynamic you describe up top would happen. Coming up with an innovative new way to improve children’s math skills would result in taking in a ton of funds, just as in the for-profit world. Coming up with something less “flashy” but equally effective would do the same. That’s a better situation than rewarding the flash itself.