Category Archives: Foundations

What’s it Like to Work for a Family Foundation?

November 29, 2007 – 11:44 am

This entry to the One Post Challenge comes from Elizabeth Miller. Elizabeth works as a Program Associate for The Overbrook Foundation, a New York City-based family foundation established in 1948 by Frank and Helen Altschul. Its mission is to improve the lives of people by supporting projects that protect human and civil rights, advance the self-sufficiency and well being of individuals and their communities, and conserve the natural environment.

This post first appeared on the Future Leaders of Philanthropy blog.

By Elizabeth Miller

Growing up, my favorite books to read were those from Sydney Taylor’s series, “All of a Kind Family.” The five books detailed the lives of an immigrant family living on New York’s Upper East Side just prior to World War I. I read the books over and over and at one point, my grandmother even recorded the books so that I could fall asleep listening to a tape of them every night. Looking back, I’d like to think it was a sign that I’d someday go to work for a family foundation in New York.

Now that I have that job, I realize that a lot of my friends and family don’t really understand what I do. When I tell people I work for a family foundation the most common response I get is, “Oh so you must write a lot of grants.” Well, not exactly.  I wasn’t even quite sure what I was getting myself into when I first came to The Overbrook Foundation in the spring of 2004.

In order to understand what it’s like to work for a family foundation you first have to understand why families would be motivated to start a foundation in the first place. The overarching reason is usually a desire to give back to a community that you care about. Families might want to support issues that they feel strongly about, or pass on the tradition of giving to future generations, and they also probably have a general desire to unite all the branches of the family with a shared sense of purpose. Along the way of figuring out all of the above (for example, what issues in a community are you going to focus on - education, health, environment?), people probably come across unique challenges and opportunities, enriched by the lively personalities in their families.

So what is it really like to work for a family foundation? On a daily basis, the tasks I undertake vary tremendously. In “All of a Kind Family” the five young girls encounter everything from everyday chores, to missing library books, to trips to the Rivington Street market. Ironically, I too have “chores” whether it’s drafting minutes from committee or board meetings, responding to letters of inquiry that the Foundation is unable to fund, cleaning out grant files or setting up for meetings; I search for missing pieces of grant proposals; I even make trips downtown to the flower district to pick up orchids before our quarterly Board Meetings.

Taylor’s books also had a unique way of illustrating life in the 1900s. There were episodes of scarlet fever, peddlers, and weekends spent at Coney Island. Likewise, my job is often impacted by modern-day New York City. Just this summer the steam pipe explosion on Lexington Avenue closed our offices for two weeks; I had to walk to work from Battery Park City during the subway strike in December of 2005. And likewise, our grantmaking at the foundation can be impacted by big-scale events or issues, such as September 11th or the Board’s desire to create a climate change initiative, respectively.

There’s a chapter in one of Sydney’s books where the girls spend their penny allowance at the local candy store. The girls would stand next to the counters, trying to decide which chocolate or treat was worth their precious allowance. I’m sure a penny went a lot further almost a hundred years ago, but fundamentally what the Foundation staff does with our annual grants budget is similar: we try to be strategic in the way we manage our portfolio of grants and try to figure out how to best spend the limited resources that the Foundation has available. We look for opportunities that support our Board of Directors’ interest in the Environment and Human Rights Programs, whether it’s continuing old programs or being more innovative with new grants. We try to be responsive to the needs of our grantees and to understand how to improve the grantmaking process.

In the end, I think what makes my experience at a family foundation truly unique from other foundations is the interests and personalities of the Directors. What is different about my job from others who work in philanthropy is that The Overbrook Foundation’s entire philosophy is based around a set of family values, values that have evolved over time. Each family has unique traditions and values, and it’s those values to a large extent that shape the Foundation’s grantmaking. Luckily, I happen to share the specific set of values with the family I’m employed by (which is why I’m so happy with my job). Yet I constantly remind myself that I’m merely a steward of a family and that the work I do is for them. (Of course there is a famed family tree on the wall in front of my computer in case I need a reminder, although I must admit that even with a family tree it took me over a year to figure how everyone was related to each other).

According to The National Center on Family Philanthropy’s recent estimates, there are between 30,000 and 40,000 family foundations in the US that distribute approximately $5 billion dollars a year. While factors such as families’ motivations for giving, personal giving interests, level of assets, and number of generations and family branches interested in participating will inevitably vary from family to family, I’d be willing to bet there’s at least one thing that will remain constant - like the five sisters from “All of a Kind Family,” you’ll always feel like it’s an adventure.

By Sean Stannard-Stockton | Also posted in Cross-Disciplinary Conversations, Grantmaking, One Post Challenge, Philanthropy | Comments (3)

The Futures of Philanthropy, Fundraising, and Advertising

November 28, 2007 – 12:50 pm

This entry to the One Post Challenge comes from Peter Deitz. Peter writes a blog called About Micro-Philanthropy and is the founder of Social Actions, a community website that aggregates person-to-person fundraising campaigns and helps people to start their own. Deitz also works as a consultant to nonprofits and philanthropists interested in leveraging the power of social networks.

By Peter Deitz

The Futures of Philanthropy, Fundraising, and Advertising

The futures of philanthropy, fundraising, and advertising are looking remarkably similar. In all three fields, technology innovators are turning to real people to do the hard work of moving money.

Foundations are asking non-specialists to “crowd source” their grant recipients. Development teams are using “wired fundraisers” to increase online donations. Companies are relying on “fansumers” to promote their latest products.

The online marketing guru Seth Godin first reported on this trend in a series of e-books entitled Flipping the Funnel. In three versions of the same e-book, Godin addresses companies, nonprofits, and politicians. He instructs them on how individuals can be empowered to sell products, raise money, and recruit votes respectively.

Godin could easily have written a fourth version of Flipping the Funnel, one tailored to the needs of foundations and private philanthropists. The hypothetical e-book would have emphasized the important role that non-wealthy and non-specialist individuals can play in awarding grants and redistributing wealth.

Flipping the Funnel for Foundations and Private Philanthropists would have noted that:

  • Real people are often excellent judges of innovation and long-term impact;
  • If provided with the right incentives, individuals may back their grant recommendations with donations of their own, resulting in larger grants and more grantees;
  • People who are involved in grant-making are more likely to recognize a philanthropist for his or her contribution to the field.

Today, only a handful of nonprofits are effectively using wired fundraisers to raise money. Companies experimenting with fansumerism are drawing criticism for their attack on consumer privacy. And only a handful of foundations and private philanthropists are actually crowd-sourcing grant-making.

And yet, the innovators in these fields are continuing to experiment with new technologies that enable person-to-person communications and discernment. Overtime, the pioneers who balance privacy and fraud concerns with the opportunity for greater sales, donations, and grants will reap rewards for their early adoption.

Compared to fundraisers and advertisers, philanthropists have been the least exuberant in their embrace of the peer-to-peer economy. The sector needs leadership and technology innovation so that more wealth can be moved, and more effectively.

This post will hopefully serve as a starting point for discussing the trend as it pertains to philanthropy. Lessons from person-to-person fundraising and advertising will no doubt inform the discussion and provoke more innovation.

I look forward to exchanging ideas with the Tactical Philanthropy community and the larger world of emerging philanthropy bloggers.

By Sean Stannard-Stockton | Also posted in Cross-Disciplinary Conversations, Effective Giving, Fundraising, New Philanthropy, One Post Challenge, Philanthropic Technology, Philanthropy, Social Media, nptech | Comments (2)

Are We Killing Our Grantees?

November 27, 2007 – 11:13 am

This entry to the One Post Challenge comes from Suzanne Walsh. Suzanne is a program director at the Lumina Foundation for Education. She previously worked as a program officer at The Heinz Endowments. Says Suzanne, “Before joining the world of philanthropy I was on the “other side”, working in non-profits where my job entailed writing grants and working on a large capital campaign. I have also served as the fundraising chair for boards on which I have served and have had to make those dreaded calls to prospective donors so I have seen this issue from all sides. I was even a telemarketer for an opera company!” Suzanne’s views do not necessarily represent those of the Lumina Foundation for Education.

By Suzanne Walsh

Are we killing our grantees?

Is there such a thing as too much money? Here is what has been bothering me lately: we give and we give and we give…to the same organizations. Is there ever a moment when we have given too much? Yes, you heard me, too much.

What happens when every local foundation discovers the hot new leader? We all want to invest in her and her organization for anything and everything. And then we wonder a year later why she is overextended and drowning and why she can’t do the core things she used to do. [I want to now pause to apologize for trying to kill my grantees, I didn't mean it. It was out of admiration for your talent.]

What happens when national foundations discover hot intermediary organizations to help them make grants and run programs? The same thing, every foundation invests in those few for all their work and then those organizations become overextended and start to drown not able to do the basics well any more.

Sometimes there is an executive director who says no thanks to the money but it’s not easy to say no to millions when you aren’t sure if by saying no now, you have ruined your chances forever with that foundation.  The dating game between foundations and non-profits is awkward at best. It’s nice to be courted by the rich suitor and hard to say no when that large grant means the ability to hire new staff, pay the bills without worrying about writing more proposals for a while, becoming one of the “chosen” of an important foundation, and being able to take your work to scale.

That all sounds great but what I am still trying to figure out is can an organization maintain the same level of excellence if it is working with not just one foundation but if every foundation brings its large projects to bear on a single organization. Because now, there are the idiosyncrasies  of each foundation to contend with: funding cycles differ, reports are due at different times, the kinds of data needed by each foundation are different, the way each foundation wants to be treated is completely different…And if you thought that is only in instances where each foundation is funding a different project, think again. Even when foundations come together to fund projects, each foundation may still have its own requirements. So, yes, an organization may have more staff but it must also spend a lot of time killing itself responding to the various needs of the various foundations. When and how can any work get done?

Maybe it is time for foundations to do what we have asked of our grantees. Maybe we should start to work together so that we can give but make it OK non-profits to say no when they have reached capacity. Maybe we can work together to have common reporting requirements, at least when we jointly fund projects. Otherwise, I do think we are going to kill our grantees and we need them perhaps more than they need us.

By Sean Stannard-Stockton | Also posted in Cross-Disciplinary Conversations, Effective Giving, Grantmaking, One Post Challenge, Philanthropy | Comments (6)

Blogs Aren’t For Everyone

November 26, 2007 – 9:19 am

This entry to the One Post Challenge comes from an anonymous writer named “S”. S works in communications at a large California-based foundation and has worked in the philanthropy sector for more than a decade.

By “S”

You know what? Blogs aren’t for everyone. I get so tired of hearing how important it is to start a conversation online and care for it and feed it and make it go. Blogging can be a great tool, but has anyone thought about the fact the blogging may not be the greatest thing to ever come to philanthropy? How is posting a blog and receiving comments really a conversation? I post, you post, I post…

Paul Brest needs a blog. Really? What for? Let’s step back and think about this for a moment. Paul Brest needs a blog why? So that his completely scrubbed words can help philanthropy make its mark on the world? Let’s be real. Not only is Paul Brest too busy to have a blog, but the honest truth is, people don’t crave news about philanthropies, they just don’t. I work for a foundation and we share about our work only as much as we want to. Other than that, no go.

This blogging community in philanthropy is tiny. The only people who regularly comment on others’ posts are the bloggers themselves. When you need to ask people to Digg it or to StumbleUpon it, what are you doing? Skewing the result of what normal people might do. People aren’t Digg-ing it or StumblingUpon it because it’s not what is on their agenda.

Philanthropy is a great thing and helping out all kinds of people is a great thing. But foundations get so wrapped up in trying to tell everyone about their work and how great they are. Who cares about what the general public thinks? We are important and we are doing great work. We are so convinced that we need to get out there with our message.

The foundation I work for has spent nearly four decades doing good work. And before the Internet and blogging and Digg and StumbleUpon and other avenues online, we have been able to get the word out as necessary.

I am not against an online conversation or building the interest around philanthropy. We just need to think about it and not assume that everyone should be interested. They have their lives, too.

By Sean Stannard-Stockton | Also posted in Cross-Disciplinary Conversations, Giving Blogs, Media, One Post Challenge, Philanthropic Technology, Philanthropy, Social Media, Transparency, nptech | Comments (11)

I Really Can’t Have It Both Ways?

November 20, 2007 – 11:14 am

This entry to the One Post Challenge comes from Suzy Meneguzzo. Suzy works at a community foundation based in the Midwest.  Her work in the philanthropic sector has included grant making, programming, evaluation and governance.

By Suzy Meneguzzo

I really can’t have it both ways?

A great deal has been written recently about the appropriateness of foundations existing in perpetuity, level of payout and the desired life span of foundations.  Arguments seem to run to one extreme or the other: Everything should be paid out now or keep the endowment growing and maintain the 5% payout so that we can continue to work on these problems as the solutions evolve in the future.

It makes me wonder, though, if the discussion shouldn’t be framed differently.  Shouldn’t the question be, given the outcome we are trying to achieve (insert mission here); it is most effective if we spend, don’t spend (insert action here)?  Isn’t it really about which tactic will accomplish the goal?

I can envision situations in which an “all in” investment makes sense- disease eradication pops to mind.  However, I can also imagine funds with goals that lend themselves to existing in perpetuity: empowering girls and young women as an example.  The most interesting cases may be foundations with missions and strategies that fall cleanly into neither category.

Working in an organization that supports economic development in a specific geographic area, I can envision an approach that both spends and saves.  We might invest 3 million dollars from the endowment in an investment fund here, invest a million in an innovative business concept there, make grants to our communities to support their economic development projects.  All of this, while at the same time sitting on funds with an eye for next year’s or next decade’s opportunities.

Perhaps not as clean as a 20 year drop dead date or fattening up that endowment but the environment in which we live isn’t always neat and clean either.  And shouldn’t it really be about what we’re trying to accomplish?

By Sean Stannard-Stockton | Also posted in Cross-Disciplinary Conversations, Effective Giving, Grantmaking, One Post Challenge, Philanthropy | Comments (1)

Foundations Should Be More Like Public Companies

November 19, 2007 – 4:04 pm

This entry to the One Post Challenge comes from Dahna Goldstein. Dahna is the Founder of PhilanTech, provider of the PhilanTrack online grants management system for foundations and nonprofits.  Prior to starting PhilanTech, Dahna worked for venture philanthropies and as a producer of interactive eLearning programs.  She is a member of the board of the I Do Foundation.

By Dahna Goldstein

Thank you for issuing this challenge.  I’ve been thinking about these issues for a while, and haven’t been able to make the time to write frequently enough to warrant my own blog.  This challenge provided just the push I needed to start writing.

Foundations should be more like public companies.  Now before you start arguing that foundations aren’t and shouldn’t be like public companies at all, and before you quickly point to Enron to make your point, let me say two things: (1) the point of the One Post Challenge is to encourage conversation, and (2) I’m going to amend my statement slightly – foundations should be more like good public companies.

If you’re still reading, you either like a good fight, or perhaps you think there might be something to this comparison.

In the interests of time and blog post length, I’m going to limit my comparison to three areas: public disclosure, customer service, and shareholder vs. stakeholder responsibility.

Public disclosure: Public companies are required to make not only quarterly and annual disclosures to the SEC, but also to report any material information.  If they disclose good news, they are rewarded for it (generally in the form of an up tick in stock price).  If they disclose bad news, they are frequently judged by how well they react to and resolve issues.

Where’s the parallel, you ask? Well, it’s not perfect, but it’s something like this: foundations are required to file 990 PFs with the IRS, but they should disclose more material information – and disclose it more broadly.  What made a project or grant successful?  What elements of the foundation’s grantmaking or of the grantee’s program are replicable and could be reproduced with similar success in another community, for example?  Equally, if not more, important is sharing failures.  Some foundations (notably the Irvine and Hewlett Foundations) have begun to do that, and they should be applauded for those efforts.  They should also be emulated.  By sharing failures and the causes of those failures with the philanthropic community, foundations can help ensure that bad projects, bad initiatives, and (dare I say it?) bad nonprofits aren’t repeatedly funded only to generate the same bad results.  On the flip side, they can help magnify the impact of good projects, good initiatives, and good nonprofits.

Customer service: A good company has good customer service.  It’s really that simple.  Companies need customers.  A company with bad customer service loses customers as soon as there is a substitute product available.  You might argue that foundations don’t have customers.  That perception is a fundamental problem with philanthropy in this country.  Foundations are seen – by both the foundation and the nonprofit – as sources of funding, not as service providers.  Yes, nonprofits need foundations.  But foundations need nonprofits, too.  Funding nonprofits (or, more broadly, funding philanthropic and charitable activities) is foundations’ raison d’etre.  It is in exchange for that obligation that foundations, charitable trusts, etc. are entitled to be tax exempt organizations.  Foundations need nonprofits – and need happy nonprofits – just as much as corporations need happy customers.  Grants are a product of philanthropy, and nonprofits are the customers.  I don’t know too many nonprofits that would switch to another foundation because of bad customer service, but that doesn’t entitle foundations to deliver bad customer service.  Some foundations have started to be more responsive to their customer base, as is evidenced in things like the Center for Effective Philanthropy’s Grantee Perception Reports.  More foundations need to get on this bandwagon.

Shareholder vs. stakeholder responsibility: Companies have faced significant pressure in recent years to be accountable not only to their shareholders (by maximizing shareholder value) but also to their stakeholders – including their employees and the communities in which they operate (by acting in socially- and environmentally-responsible ways).  Many in the philanthropic sector would no doubt agree that corporations should be socially and environmentally responsible.  But what does this have to do with foundations?  Like public companies, foundations have “shareholders” – their donors (living or not) and their boards of trustees.  But they also have stakeholders – members of the communities in which they operate, and society at large.  Foundations have a duty to be responsible actors in society, and that has to go beyond simply making grants.  This responsibility is heightened when one considers the tremendous public trust that is invested in the success of foundations by virtue of their tax exempt status.  Foundations should contribute to growing the field, to building on past successes and failures, to sharing those successes and failures so that others can learn from them, build upon them, and ensure that the public trust is honored.  Foundations collect vast amounts of information about how pressing social issues are being tackled – most foundation grants over $10,000 require the grantee to at least submit a year-end report.  Those reports, if used well – and if shared with others – could provide significant insights into what is working and what isn’t in addressing social issues.  Sharing that information could not only help funders to learn from other funders (from their successes and their failures), but could also help nonprofits learn from other nonprofits.  Who else is addressing a similar issue?  What is working for them?  What isn’t?  What lessons can be learned and applied to the problems a given nonprofit is facing and to the social issues it is trying to address?  By not sharing candid, detailed feedback about funded programs and grantmaking initiatives, foundations are violating their stakeholder responsibility.  Good public companies are now acknowledging that maximizing stakeholder value should be pursued alongside maximizing shareholder value.  Foundations should, too.

So what do you think?  Should foundations be more like good public companies?  If you don’t buy the comparison, why not?  If you do, are there other areas in which you think foundations should be more like good public companies?

By Sean Stannard-Stockton | Also posted in Cross-Disciplinary Conversations, Effective Giving, New Philanthropy, One Post Challenge, Philanthropic Technology, Philanthropy, Transparency | Comments (14)

Is Performance Measurement Undermining Social Change?

November 15, 2007 – 6:04 am

This entry to the One Post Challenge comes from Tony Pipa. Tony is a founder and senior consultant to the Louisiana Disaster Recovery Foundation and the former executive director of the Warner Foundation in Durham, NC.

By Tony Pipa

Is Performance Measurement Undermining Social Change?

Becoming more strategic and measuring one’s effectiveness is all the philanthropic rage.  It’s a movement with merit, as most foundations were ripe to benefit from more rigor and analysis in their work.
But as I watch the field move in almost reflexive fashion to adopt quantitative performance measures and require high-impact modeling from prospective grantees, I fear it may be eroding its potential to stimulate social change at the deepest levels.  As Katherine Fulton, president of the Monitor Institute, recently asked at an event sponsored by the Stanford Center for Social Innovation:  Would today’s new philanthropies have funded the civil rights movement?

Pervasive social and economic inequities – the racial achievement gap in our public education system, the gaps in wealth among whites, blacks, and other communities of color – require more than technical fixes.  They require grassroots leadership development, community building, political advocacy, and public problem-solving processes that involve and balance the interests of multiple stakeholders.  This requires investment in ideas, people, and process that is often messy and non-linear.  Progress along the way can be hard to discern.

In the current environment, the harder it becomes, the fewer there may be to take it on.  I especially fear that in the quest for greater impact, more and more foundations will move away from investing at the very local, grassroots level where many of the ideas and leaders that transform communities are generated.

High-impact models, quantitative measures, improved business management – all are good and important tools.  But, as in most things, moderation is key.

Transformational philanthropy is an art.  It is necessary to be informed by scientific methods, but it will never be a science.  And, as Paul Ylvisaker said 30 years ago, making social progress flow to those in need will require philanthropy to “move out of fixed and safe positions into more independent, flexible, and far more exposed stances between contradictory forces.”  The current drive would appear to do exactly the opposite – provide cover, rather than inspire foundations to take even greater risks in leadership on the most difficult issues facing our society.  I hope I’m wrong.

By Sean Stannard-Stockton | Also posted in Cross-Disciplinary Conversations, Impact Measurement, New Philanthropy, One Post Challenge, Philanthropy | Comments (9)

The Burden of “Burden of Disease”

November 14, 2007 – 9:19 am

This entry to the One Post Challenge comes from Matt (who is withholding his last name). Matt is an employee in the development office of a nonprofit devoted to providing fracture care in developing countries. These are his views, not those of his employer.

By Matt

The Burden of “Burden of Disease”

Working in development, I get frustrated with some foundations’ tendency to have rigid, mathematically determined goals that we simply can’t furnish the data to meet.

Individual people respond well to our campaigns - they intuitively grasp that fractures are a real problem. We can speak to them on an emotional basis, and they don’t feel patronized; we can use anecdotes, and they don’t cry out for footnoted tables. Foundations, on the other hand, seem to have an obsessive need for facts and figures. This is understandable, given their duty to weed out programs that aren’t necessary or cost-effective. What irks me is the extreme that this bean-counting goes to. I’m speaking of the apples-to-oranges comparison known as Disability-Adjusted Life Years – a measurement of mortality and morbidity, or the “burden of disease”. What I want to say is, “Here - we have numbers on how much money we save patients, how much time in the hospital they can avoid, how many patients we’ve served, how many dollars we’ve spent, how many instruments and implants we’ve produced - the only figure we don’t have is DALYs. Pick something else, anything else, in any units - furlongs per nanosecond, I don’t care. No more DALYs.” We simply don’t have that data. We can estimate, extrapolate - we could even prevaricate (I would get fired, but we could). But we don’t have the numbers.

That puts us at a severe disadvantage writing to a large foundation, one that’s never considered injuries to be comparable to AIDS, TB, malaria, and the like. Providing our own metric doesn’t wash. Nobody wants us controlling the terms; that would be akin to allowing OJ to handle the glove. Instead, I’m forced to say things like, “Assuming one surgery can avert at least three DALYs, our methods are more cost-effective than preventing the mother-to-child transmission of HIV.” It’s a flattering comparison, but “assuming” casts it into doubt. I have little choice in the phrasing, though, because it is an assumption.

Measuring the impact of our treatments with any certainty and objectivity would require 1) a precise estimation of a disability weight (difficult to do) and 2) much more data from our patients. Asking them to return to the hospital to submit that data would be, frankly, inexcusable, considering the hardship some of them go through to even get to the hospital in the first place. The only remotely comparable demand in our lives is a summons to jury duty. Imagine being summoned to jury duty hundreds of miles away, over rocky terrain, while you’re working twelve hours a day to feed your family of five, then being greeted by a battery of tests and dismissed without any compensation. We could conceivably do this. By giving them a surgical implant, we create a feeling of gratitude and indebtedness, and we could exploit that. What I want to know is, who in their right mind would think it justifiable to exploit patients’ gratitude, waste their time, waste their doctors’ time, and waste our own funding (paying for the doctors’ time), simply on account of one column of data? When foundations demand DALYs from organizations like mine, that’s what they’re asking us to do.

This may seem like an exaggeration.

1) Disability weights can’t be that hard to guess, can they? Take a look at this table. There’s no differentiation between treated and untreated broken bones. There’s no definition of “short term” or “long term.” There’s no “long term” data for many fractures. And this is only the start of the problem.

2) What more data do you need? We know that we prevent treatment by traction or amputation. What we don’t know is the ratio of those treatments or the increase in DALYs averted due to the change to our treatment. There’s no DALY weight for traction; it’s not an illness. If we had data on the percentage of traction cases that end in failure – malunion, nonunion, gangrene – perhaps we could calculate DALYs for those conditions, right? Nope, there’s no values for them. Well, what about amputation? The difference between “treated femur fracture, long-term” and “leg amputation, long-term”: .028. Essentially none. This is no doubt due to “treated” being a misnomer in the data table. So, what can we use instead of that weight? Data from the patient. If they report normal leg function, for example, that’s tantamount to zero disability. If they don’t – well, we’re back to guesswork, but at least we have data to work with.

3) Why must patients return in person? Ask someone how they’re doing, and they’ll reply “fine.” Ask a patient how their fracture has healed, and they’ll reply “fine” – even if your questions are so precise as to demand a numerical response, no questionnaire will be accurate. They need to be examined in person for the data to be objective.

4) Say you do this only in urban areas, where patients can return without too much trouble – wouldn’t that work? In a certain sense. We would be able to estimate DALYs averted on some basis – a skewed basis that we couldn’t justify using for rural patients, who have different injury patterns and post-recovery activity. Further problems that would arise: it would still be an estimate. It would still be unreliable. It would still cost time and money to collect. And it would still be on the foundations’ terms. Even in the very best case, we can’t change the basis of the argument to something rational, because foundations don’t accept that DALYs aren’t a nice little simulacrum of reality. We’re stuck within that framework until foundations realize that DALYs are the wrong measurement for complex conditions.

By Sean Stannard-Stockton | Also posted in Cross-Disciplinary Conversations, Impact Measurement, One Post Challenge, Philanthropy | Comments (10)

Council on Foundations: Director of Public Relations

November 13, 2007 – 5:59 pm

Roy Clason is the Vice President of Strategic Communications at the Council on Foundations. The Council needs a new Director of Public Relations and Roy thinks that a reader of Tactical Philanthropy might make a great fit. So he asked me to pass the job description on to you (see link at end of post).
Jeff Martin, the last person to fill the job, was the one to invite bloggers (and give them press credentials) to the Council’s annual conference for the first time. What if the new director was the kind of person who understood philanthropy and social media so well that they understood how to win the One Post Challenge while cultivating an important dialog?

Do you know someone like that? Are you someone like that? Check out the job description (link below) and send your (appropriately social media savvy) resume to the Council or to me and I’ll pass it directly to Roy.

You can also listen/read a podcast I recorded with Jeff Martin directly after the conference.

Council on Foundations: Director of Public Relations

By Sean Stannard-Stockton | Also posted in Media, Philanthropy | Comments (0)

An Evacuation of the Ivory Towers

November 9, 2007 – 11:10 am

Today One Post Challenge entry comes from Trista Harris, a Program Officer and the voice behind www.newvoicesofphilanthropy.org, a blog about next generation philanthropy issues.

By Trista Harris

Today I am proposing nothing short of a revolution in the philanthropic field. What if foundations were connected to the communities that they were serving; innovation and creativity were encouraged; knowledge was shared within organizations and with the larger philanthropic and nonprofit sectors; and foundations were measured on the results of their investments, not just amount of money spent or number of staff? I know you are probably asking yourselves right now, “what kind of crazy alternative universe are you living in Trista Harris?”

I should probably back up. Any time you are proposing a revolution, it’s important to give proper background or else you scare people off. The philanthropic landscape is changing. Baby Boomers are beginning to retire or re-imagine their positions. Donors are more actively engaged and want measurable results, and the government is spending a lot of time and energy trying to reign in the philanthropic sector. Professional philanthropic staff are trying to figure out how to do more with less time. How do we re-invigorate our troops of professional do-gooders to make sure that are connected to the communities that they serve and have the capacity to move the philanthropic sector from potential to results?

As a life long staff member of nonprofits, I always cringe when someone, usually a board member, says “if you just applied business principals to your work, all your problems would be solved.” But, I think I have found an idea from the for-profit sector that could solve a variety of our sector’s ills. Flexible work schedules and telecommuting have become commonplace in many for-profit organizations, but a Minnesota company has taken flexibility to the next level with the results-only work environment. Best Buy, an electronics retailer, has given its employees full control of how, when, and where they work. A guiding premise is that “work is something you do, not somewhere you go.” This means that employees take conference calls while fishing and start project planning after their kids go to bed. This new model has decreased turnover but, more important to our conversation, has improved productivity by 35%.

What if Program Officers suddenly became office-less? What if we spent our time in the communities that we serve, rather than in a stuffy conference room talking about the community? Would this change force us to create knowledge management systems to connect this out-based workforce? Would that system then institutionalize the wisdom that is currently only available inside of an “about to retire” program officer’s head? How much more effective could our work be? Flexibility breeds innovation and it encourages collaboration outside of the “usual suspects.” The people that probably have the best insight about the need for a new community center are the moms and dads that are at a nearby playground during the day. That’s not who most Program Officers are rubbing shoulders with at 11am.

When people are measured by what they accomplish, not how much time they are at their desks, the rules change. Suddenly the star employee isn’t the one who arrives at 6am and leaves at 6pm, it is the one who is most knowledgeable about community solutions and has the most positive effect on their program area. How different would the sector be if we were all working at full capacity and still had time to be a good parent and an engaged community member?

I am proposing a revolution. So let me know, are you in or are you out?

By Sean Stannard-Stockton | Also posted in Cross-Disciplinary Conversations, New Philanthropy, One Post Challenge, Philanthropy | Comments (17)

Blogging Anonymously

November 5, 2007 – 1:00 pm

This entry to the One Post Challenge comes from the anonymous author(s) of the Gates Keepers blog:

Gates Keepers amplifies civil society voices on the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation. Anyone can join us in exercising our rights by blogging and commenting anonymously at http://gateskeepers.civiblog.org

By Gates Keepers

If we want to develop a critical analysis of the activities of Big Philanthropy we need to exercise our rights to freedom of opinion and expression without interference. To exercise these rights without fear we must blog anonymously.

Digital technology has allowed those of us who disagree with mainstream views and manufactured consent on Big Philanthropy to safely amplify our voices. Where formerly we feared retribution from governments, foundations, and the private sector, we can now speak out about the hegemony of the philanthropy-industrial complex in setting the agenda for global development and public health.

In the case of the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, we are afraid of what we like to call ‘Bill Chill’. If we criticise the Foundation in our own names our funding will be cut or we will lose our jobs. Anonymity is necessary for us to survive in our professional activities and our daily work. It allows us to exercise our right to expression without fear.

By Sean Stannard-Stockton | Also posted in Cross-Disciplinary Conversations, Giving Blogs, One Post Challenge, Philanthropy, Transparency | Comments (13)

Susan Bell Talks Online Philanthropy Marketplaces

October 19, 2007 – 12:10 pm

Susan Bell is director of the William and Flora Hewlett Foundation’s philanthropy program. When Paul Brest talks about an “Online Information Marketplace for Giving”, he’s talking about an idea that is the province of Hewlett’s philanthropy program.

Here’s an interview with Susan on the topic, which the Hewlett Foundation released recently.

I noted two items of particular interest to me:

  1. Susan refers to a “social marketplace”. This is important to me since I’ve been arguing that marketplaces are not just transactions, but are fueled by human interactions.
  2. She predicts a future 5-10 years from now where “there will be more funders of nonprofit organizations who will be making better decisions so more money flows to the higher-performing ones. That might mean that there is some fallout in the marketplace. There might be some nonprofits that are not as strong that don’t make it. But the silver lining of that is that more money would then be focused on the best organizations.” I agree with this 100%. Functioning philanthropic capital markets will be a huge boon for high impact nonprofits that will benefit from funders finding them, rather than them having to spend so much time and money on fundraising. These markets will be devastating for nonprofits that do not actually impact the cause they are focused on. They will uplift the entire field as “weak competitors” fold and capital flows to the highest sources of “social return on investment”.

Here’s the full interview:

Susan Bell, vice president of the Hewlett Foundation, also directs its Philanthropy Program, which works to improve the Foundation’s grantmaking and makes grants to improve philanthropic practice and the effectiveness of nonprofit organizations. A key element of that work is to improve the information available to philanthropists when making decisions about where to give. With the assistance of the consulting firm McKinsey & Company, Hewlett’s Philanthropy Program currently is exploring how to create such a "social marketplace" of information.

       Before joining the Foundation, Susan Bell spent more than fourteen years in strategic planning, development, alumni relations, and communications for Northwestern University, the Sierra Club, and Stanford University. At Stanford, she also helped direct the Environmental and Natural Resources Law & Policy Program.

       How do philanthropists, large and small, currently make their decisions, since the most helpful information often isn’t available?

       Unfortunately, philanthropists who are thoughtful about the changes they’d like to make happen don’t have good tools to guide them. So they make decisions based on word of mouth, gut feel, or where they already have existing affiliations. It’s pretty clear when they come to us for advice that they don’t have an easy way to make sound decisions.

       Generally speaking, do they have any ideas about what they would find helpful?

       Yes and no. Those that know enough about the kind of information that could be made available would like more. But many haven’t even thought of that. So as we go about building some kind of repository of information about nonprofit organizations, there are two kinds of questions we’re trying to answer: What type and quality of information could be put in it? And, if we build it, will they come?

       What do you mean when you say there needs to be a "social marketplace" of information for the philanthropic world?

       It’s analogous to the business world, where you have information and people that you can turn to, essentially, to shop. In the business world, access to information lets investors make sound decisions about which enterprises deserve their support. We’d like to see something similar in the world of charitable giving. It would be helpful to people who want to give to know what options exist and what options are best, based on their interests.

       But at some point the metaphor breaks down, doesn’t it? In business, you essentially have a widget that you want to invest in. It’s not so simple when you’re trying to solve social problems, as varied as they can be.

       Right, a nonprofit’s widgets tend to be people doing good things by trying to make change happen. So philanthropists aren’t investing in products; they’re investing in people doing work. Making the most effective investment presents some incredible difficulties because it’s hard to attribute change to the actions that someone in a nonprofit takes, and it’s hard to compare one kind of change with another to know which one might be having more impact on a problem.

       Your choice to give is very values laden. It’s not based on objective information in the same way you might decide to fund a business. It’s based on what interests you as a donor. But that’s also the beauty and excitement of philanthropy. You get to invest in what you really care about by investing in people who are doing good work on that issue.

       Still, given two organizations doing the same kind of work, it stands to reason that one might be more effective. And we’d like to create tools to help that one get more support.

       Whom do you see this marketplace of information primarily serving? Are we talking about people who give $100 to the United Way, or to wealthy prospective donors who may give tens of thousands of dollars?

       We’re in the process right now of working with McKinsey and Company to determine who would be the best audience. It’s probably major individual donors or family foundations more than large professional foundations, where the donor or a person handling his or her finances would be readily able to get the information needed.

       But we’re not ruling out smaller donors. Anyone might do an Internet search and welcome landing at a Web site with a helpful tool for decision-making.

       More specifically, what kind of tool does the Hewlett Philanthropy Program envision creating to help with this?

       It’s probably some kind of technology-based application. We don’t know what it looks like yet. But if you take DonorEdge, the great resource site that the Greater Kansas City Community Foundation created, and amplify it, that’s what we’re considering. You as a consumer could go online and be able to see an easy-to-use form with information on a variety of nonprofits that goes beyond financial information to describe a group’s work, what its goals are, and whether it’s reaching them. You’d want to see its strategic plan, how that’s being implemented, and what effect it’s had.

       Like DonorEdge, there might also be some consulting services. Most people need help to think through what it is they care about and what they are trying to do before the tool really becomes effective.

       How long will it be before this tool is developed, and how will we know we’ve arrived at your goal?

       Right now we’re just launching the study of what motivates people to give, if they will use a tool if it’s available, and what kind of information would be available to put into it. We should know in the next few months what the possibilities are and what form the tool should take.

       Then we have some decisions to make working with a lot of partners-other funders, other nonprofits already are working on these kinds of tools-to decide where to go next. I’d say in the next year we should have some real progress on the design of something if it looks like it’s feasible and helpful. We’ll either put people together to work on the project, or create something, or both.

       Are other foundations interested in this?

       The reason Paul [Hewlett Foundation President Paul Brest] focused on this in our most recent annual report is we hope very much to have partners on the funding side. The number of donors interested in funding things in the field of philanthropy unfortunately remains relatively small. But when we have some more detail, we hope to present the idea to other funders and see if they will join us. We’ve had some early interest.

       What will the world of giving look like in five or ten years if you succeed?

       If we’re successful, there will be more funders of nonprofit organizations who will be making better decisions so more money flows to the higher-performing ones. That might mean that there is some fallout in the marketplace. There might be some nonprofits that are not as strong that don’t make it. But the silver lining of that is that more money would then be focused on the best organizations.

By Sean Stannard-Stockton | Also posted in New Philanthropy, Philanthropic Capital Markets, Philanthropy, Transparency, nptech | Comments (8)

Small Foundations

October 18, 2007 – 9:49 am

PhilanTopic is a great new philanthropy blog. Authored by Mitch Nauffts, the publisher of Philanthropy News Digest, PhilanTopic has been posting regularly and insightfully about a variety of issues and even posted live from the Clinton Global Initiative.

Recently Mitch discussed my theory of a Second Great Wave of Philanthropy. He agreed with some of it, but questioned my statement that, “The philanthropists of the 21st century will be smaller in size, but much larger in numbers than the philanthropists of the last century.”

Mitch wrote:

[I] have yet to see much evidence to support [this argument]. Indeed, just as the rich are getting richer, big organizations, of all kinds, are getting bigger. I think this has a lot to do with network effects, the compounding "returns" that accrue to reputation in an attention-based economy, and other externalities.

I responded via a comment on PhilanTopic that I repost here:

Regarding evidence that "The philanthropists of the 21st century will be smaller in size, but much larger in numbers than the philanthropists of the last century." I think that the two areas of evidence come from the fact that foundations with assets under $1 mil are the fastest growing asset segment and the explosive growth of the Fidelity and Schwab Gift Funds and Foundation Source (catering to smaller foundations). We’re also seeing mainstream publications like the Financial Times, Wall Street Journal and New York Times focusing more and more on philanthropy so they must believe that this subject is of interest to their mainstream readership (ie. smaller donors). Also , "charitable planning" is becoming a hot area for financial planners who cater to the less than ultra-wealthy, so we’re seeing the demand from smaller donors there as well.

But all of that being said, I think that the big influence is still with the big philanthropists. "The Second Great Wave" is still in its early stages and we’ll have to see if my prediction comes to fruition or not.

Today I ran across an article titled Foundation Trend: Less is More in the San Francisco Examiner:

Though large and small have their place in the nonprofit sector, smaller foundations are effecting change greater than their size and numbers suggest. It is the smaller, often family foundations that many believe are the wave of philanthropy’s future.

Next, I next I found a great collection of articles about the importance of small foundations on the Association of Small Foundations’ website.

The 1980’s and 90’s showed a consistent trend of wealth being concentrated in the hands of the ultra wealthy. Nevertheless, that did not stop the major macro trend impacting the financial markets from being the emergence of the individual investor. The big story of the next two decades is going to be the emergence of the “individual philanthropist” and the development of the infrastructure to serve their needs.

By Sean Stannard-Stockton | Also posted in Giving Blogs, New Philanthropy, Philanthropy | Comments (0)

The Center for Effective Philanthropy

October 11, 2007 – 8:54 am

I went to an excellent presentation yesterday put on by the Center for Effective Philanthropy. CEP’s report Beyond the Rhetoric examines how strategic foundations are in their grant making. The presentation and report show that although most all foundations say they are strategic and believe in the value of strategy, most are not actually following a strategy.

The study breaks foundations down into four groups:

  • Charitable Bankers
  • Perpetual Adjusters
  • Partial Strategists
  • Total Strategists

The spectrum runs from foundations whose decision making framework is internally focused and lacking any hypothesized connection between the use of their resources and goal achievement, to foundations who focus on the external environment in which they operate and direct resources to support their goals.

Rather than summarizing their extensive findings, I’m pleased to say that CEP has created an excellent website dedicated to the research. With audio, video and flash presentations, plus links to the full report and data, the Beyond the Rhetoric website is one of the most advanced and effective philanthropic web resources I’ve come across. You can access the site here.

I’m also in the process of booking CEP executive director Phil Buchanan, a member of the 2007 Nonprofit Times Power & Influence Top 50, for a future podcast.

The research report is focused on strategy in big foundations. But I think a lot of the lessons can be applied to individual giving as well. While it may take years for a large foundation to move from Charitable Banker to Total Strategist, an individual or family could embrace strategy literally by putting a weekend of thinking into it. I’ll be exploring the implications of the Beyond the Rhetoric research for individual and family philanthropist in future posts.

By Sean Stannard-Stockton | Also posted in Effective Giving, Philanthropy | Comments (0)

Gates Foundation Funds Innovation in Philanthropy

October 10, 2007 – 8:44 am

The Wall Street Journal reports this week that the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation will launch a $100 million fund specifically to support “unorthodox approaches to global health”:

Typical multimillion-dollar Gates Foundation grants require lengthy applications supported by data, financial oversight and peer review often taking six months to a year or more — which can overwhelm scientists in underdeveloped countries. "As grants get big, the risk element can get squeezed out," Mr. Gates said, adding "if you’re giving away $5 million at a whack," it requires accounting oversight and a mature development plan at odds with novelty.

…"New ideas shouldn’t have to battle for oxygen as hard as they do," said Tadataka "Tachi" Yamada, the foundation’s executive director of global health. He points out that one "ludicrous" challenge to conventional wisdom — the idea that bacteria and not stomach acid caused ulcers — eventually won a Nobel Prize and changed the standard of medical care.

One example Mr. Gates cited was the foundation’s sponsorship of a program that uses radiation to zap malaria parasites in their invasive stage, known as sporozoites. "Most people look at that and say, ‘Whoa, this is pretty wild,’ " Mr. Gates said.

In investment management, it is accepted theory that even conservatively managed portfolios can have high-risk investments in them. This is because the overall risk of the portfolio is the relevant measure to the investor, not the risk characteristics of each investment. With this concept in mind you can see how even large, conservative foundations do not need to keep all of their grant dollars in proven methods.

In addition, I think that there is something very important about that concept that one of philanthropy’s strengths is the fact that it can take risks that don’t pan out without being voted out of office or enduring shareholders wrath. Maybe in philanthropy, innovation for the sake of innovation does make sense.

By Sean Stannard-Stockton | Also posted in Effective Giving, New Philanthropy, Philanthropy | Comments (0)