Archive for the ‘Big ideas’ Category
Posted by Gayle Gifford on June 1, 2010 in Big ideas, Good reads
Despite our incredibly full work schedules, Jon and I actually spent a weekend away from work. The weather was just gorgeous, sunny and warm, and even the downpour Saturday night couldn’t spoil our much needed respite.
I finally pulled those weeds and planted the last of the veggies and annuals I’ve been staring at for the last week. I accomplished my first bike trek over 25 miles this spring on the East Bay Bike Path — I finished 30 and even had a few more miles in me, really I did, but those two flat tires within minutes ended the trip for me. Thanks to instant service from Legend Bicycle, a mere $11.60 for a new tube, rim tape and installation and I’m back in the saddle.)
Throughout the weekend I’ve been using some of my leisure time to catch up on the stack of magazines and newsletters piling up at home and in the office. And in doing so I’ve been reminded why it is so critical to take time out from the work. What applicable gems of information I’ve been missing!
The Spring/Summer magazine, Land & People, of the Trust for Public Land led with a fascinating story about an innovative collaboration among five conservation groups inspired by two of their donors. The groups have come together as the Northern Sierra Partnership to share “strategy, leadership – and most unusually donors and funding — to prioritize and execute conservation projects across a five-million-acre swath mountains.”
I’m always on the lookout for examples of great collaborations, with a special eye for fundraising partnerships. These groups believe that by working together they will raise more money than any of them could on their own — in this case, Read More >>
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Posted by Gayle Gifford on April 9, 2010 in Better Boards, Big ideas, Strategic Thinking
With the extremely poor financial condition that states are experiencing and the coming wave of dramatic cutbacks in state and local funding of services delivered through nonprofits (one colleague noted close to 15 nonprofits on the financial brink in her Florida community), one would think that boards would crave new thinking around program delivery, organizational structure, partnership or cost reduction.
But a conversation yesterday brought back to me a dynamic that I’ve been observing for many years: the role of boards as conservators.
A little background.
Yesterday I made my bi-annual trek to life portfolio company New Directions to discuss life in the nonprofit sector with their clients. New Directions clients are accomplished people in business or the professions who are designing the next stage of their life journeys.
My portion of the conversation was “The rewarding and confounding world of the nonprofit sector,” which is partly nonprofit 101 and partly DEEP THOUGHTS.
A fellow “interpreter of the sector” was the Executive Director of a capacity building (smallish, $500K budget) nonprofit. He mentioned that for the last two years he had been a co-executive director, a leadership team that resulted from a merger. He mentioned that the other ED was winding up his term and he would soon be the sole ED. When I asked how the co-directorship worked for him, he shared he really liked the arrangement, but his Board just wasn’t comfortable with the shared leadership model.
Boards as Conservators
At first a bit surprised by this tale, it reminded me that many boards are naturally suited to their role as conservators.
Here I’m using conservator in its definition as someone who conserves or keeps safe. Like a custodian, guardian, or protector.
The words we use to describe board duties — like prudent, loyalty, care, fiduciary — imply moderation and caution. Another word I might use would be “conservative.”
In my experience, most Boards of Directors are loathe, and rightfully so, to take big risks. In their conservator role, boards put the breaks on reckless spending. Because boards usually reflect the mindset of the communities they serve, they often restrain choices, decisions or actions Read More >>
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Posted by Jon Howard on November 17, 2009 in Big ideas, Effectiveness
Last week, I attended the Social Enterprise Rhode Island Summit, a project of Social Venture Partners of Rhode Island. I came with a chip on my shoulder.
The term “social enterprise” has swept the non-profit world. Everyone from startups to the old dinosaurs of the public service world now claim to be “social entrepreneurs.” It’s a great style statement. Just tell me: what does it mean?
What’s the harm in a buzzword? For one, hoopla about “innovative, market-based models” gives business and government more cover for starving health care, education and other critical social investments of the real resources they need. Be that as it may, the SERI Summit knocked the chip off my shoulder with its energy, optimism, good will and some really smart solutions to problems described by featured panelists.
Who could be grumpy about Hippowater International, a cool low-tech solution to the huge burdens that fetching water imposes on women and girls around the world? Who would not admire Rajiv Kumar’s clever use of peer pressure to mass-market healthy exercise through Shape Up Rhode Island or the way his group’s leveraged the market value of the mission to underwrite national impact? What child of the Sixties wouldn’t be charmed by John Abram’s stories about South Mountain, the employee-owned design and construction company he founded?
What else I loved about this summit:
- Lots of stories, lots of ages, lots of perspectives.
- A big, lively crowd – 200? 300? More? – full of people I knew and didn’t know.
- Just enough slack in the schedule for random encounters.
- Lots of energy and curiosity and a refreshing lack of certainty.
- Mashups: new-tech/no-tech, for-profit/non, thinkers/doers.
The conference moderators frankly refused to define social enterprise. (Check here for Wikipedia’s definition, or this one, from the British government’s Office of the Third Sector). Instead we heard a wide range of ideas and stories from people who put themselves under this big umbrella. Here are some common threads I captured:
- Problem-solving
- Profit-seeking
- Social mission
- Innovative, inventive, creative
- Values design
- High- and low-tech solutions
- Focus on cost reduction
- Bias for data
- No “conventional wisdom”
A list isn’t a definition and none of these are qualities are exclusive to “social enterprises.” Lots of the organizations that presented looked like regular old, resourceful, dedicated and professional nonprofits to me. But, there’s no denying that this was a different crowd with a different vibe than you’ll find at conferences called by the Association for Fundraising Professionals, the Rhode Island Foundation or the United Way, all still vital centers of learning and support for nonprofits
I still think that the lack of serious, well-directed investment capital, not a shortage of clever ideas, is the chief barrier to moving the national needle on education, among other critical needs. Social entrepreneurs won’t get the job done if they settle for praise and token funding. But I’m now more hopeful that a generation of who speak a business dialect and live in an enterprise culture could really generate or attract that investment.
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Posted by Gayle Gifford on November 3, 2009 in Big ideas, Tidbits
“Nearly half of children will be on food stamps” read the headline on page B4 of my newspaper this morning. You can read more about it here.
I have to say, I was pretty shocked at the findings. The paper was reporting a study by Mark Rank of Washington University and his Cornell University colleague Thomas Hirschl. It went on to say that “90% of black youngsters will be on food stamps at some point during childhood.”
Then I turned the page and read an editorial explaining why I shouldn’t be upset about huge compensation packages for Wall Street Traders. After all, “Wall Street professionals… lost a lot more money than Main Street did.”
Right.
Then a story came on the radio that the president of our local Ivy League University earned $800,000 last year. That put her below the over $1 million in compensation received by her peers at 23 other private colleges, as reported in the Chronicle of Higher Education.
The Chronicle of Higher Education also reported that over 58 private colleges now charge over $50,000 per year for tuition, room and board. For a family of four to be eligible for food stamps, their take home pay has to be less than $22,000 a year. according to that food stamp report.
For many, myself included, a college education was the path to a better income. But today, over two-thirds of college students graduate with debt averaging over $20,000.
Even in this recession, colleges continue to raise tuition and fees to their students – and that includes the public colleges of cash strapped states. The college graduation rate of black students nationwide is 43%, though much higher at those ivy leagues. But then again, I have to wonder how that breaks out by income of students enrolled as many lower and middle class students can’t afford private colleges and 3/4 of all African American students are enrolled at state universities, according to a 2007 article in the Journal of Blacks in Higher Education.
“Income inequality is at an all time high.” Nonprofit income inequality is also shocking.
Education is touted as the solution.
I still ask: How much is enough? What do we owe each other?
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Posted by Jon Howard on October 28, 2009 in Big ideas, Fundraising
The genius of the subscription marketing model lies in flipping the vast power of personal inertia from “don’t buy” to “buy.” How can we in the nonprofit world convert many separate donation decisions into the one long-term commitment of subscription? How can we help our most loyal supporters make “donate” their default setting?
That’s what “Looking at Life as One Big Subscription” by Damon Darlin of the New York Times got us thinking about recently.
Magazines, gym memberships, cell phone plans, online computer backup services and cable TV all rely on variations of the subscription business model. Netflix has used this old model to transform the movie rental business. The details vary but the basic subscription model has the consumer pay (or at least commit to pay) up front for access to a product or service over a period of time.
Consumers get reliable and often privileged access to the offering, usually at a compelling discount. Providers get an assured revenue stream and reduced marketing costs. Even better, they get paid whether or not customers actually use their cell phones or gym memberships.
As Isaac Newton taught us, bodies at rest tend to stay at rest. Subscribers must get off the couch and take an action to cancel the agreement. As long as providers don’t anger them with bad service, most subscribers will sit back and let the revenues flow.
Does this powerful business model work for philanthropy? Well, symphony orchestras and museums already use the subscription model with season tickets or admission-based memberships. However, they actually provide goods and services over time directly to the consumer, more or less like a for-profit business.
What about the usual three-cornered nonprofit proposition where A gives money to B to deliver a service to C? Direct self-interest doesn’t operate here. Still, one category of non-profits have used the subscription model to support service to third parties since the 1930s with great success. Can you name that nonprofit sector? Have you adapted the subscription model to fundraising?
I’ll provide the answer and look at what that example could mean for other nonprofit fundraisers in a future post.
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Posted by Gayle Gifford on October 19, 2009 in 100 Things We've Learned, Big ideas, Nonprofit Highlights, World News
“The Humanities make us RICH.” Or so goes the sentiment on my morning tea mug.
October is once again National Arts and Humanities Month.It just so happens that I’ve been thinking a lot about the value of the humanities over the last few weeks.
What are the humanities?
According to the National Endowment for the Humanities, as described in the 1965 National Foundation on the Arts and the Humanities Act:
“The term ‘humanities’ includes, but is not limited to, the study of the following: language, both modern and classical; linguistics; literature; history; jurisprudence; philosophy; archaeology; comparative religion; ethics; the history, criticism and theory of the arts; those aspects of social sciences which have humanistic content and employ humanistic methods; and the study and application of the humanities to the human environment with particular attention to reflecting our diverse heritage, traditions, and history and to the relevance of the humanities to the current conditions of national life.”
The humanities are essential to Cause & Effect Inc.
In an evaluation of our work, we asked a colleague to interview a number of our clients. Our clients told her that one of the things that they appreciated about working with us was that we “got it.”
While clients meant our understanding of their organizational challenges, they also mentioned our ability to appreciate and comprehend the complexity of the societal issues that they faced.
In college, I was a geography major (concentration in urban social) with a strong sociology background. Jon was a history major with literature right behind. You might say we studied the humanities.
And while there are days that I long for more of an engineering or science background, I have always been grateful for the systems perspective that college studies helped me develop. I was constantly challenged to consider the interrelationships between political systems, markets, history, culture, art, climate, habitat, food production and more. To this day, we bring that approach to our work with clients – whether we are writing, facilitating strategic planning, or framing a strong fund development program.
The humanities provide the tools that help us make meaning of our world and our lives.
Just over the last few weeks, it seems that I’ve been especially reminded how the humanities manifest in our daily lives.
Last month, Lizzi Ross, the former director of adult programming at the ICA in Boston, spoke to the students in the class I teach at Brown. In describing how she went about designing programming to enable us to appreciate art that isn’t pretty pictures, Lizzi explained that contemporary art requires us to call on our knowledge of history, contemporary culture, literature, art, science and more.
“Ah, the humanities,” I thought.
Last Wednesday, I attended “What Now? 1932 – The Highlander Center Opens Its Doors,” a live taping from Action Speaks Radio. The premise of Action Speaks is to take an “under appreciated day in American History” and look at it through a contemporary lens. That show talked about the popular education approach of the Highlander Research and Education Center, which encourages activists from multiple walks of life to explore their personal experiences and connect them to larger historical and societal issues. “That’s the humanities in action,” I whispered to my neighbor. Rosa Parks, Andrew Young, and Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. are just a few of the “graduates” of Highlander.
A love of the humanities can be demonstrated beyond textbooks and scholarly works.
Tonight I’m heading to the Rhode Island Council for the Humanities’ celebration of the humanities and their contribution to life in RI. I’m especially excited as I sat on the committee that nominated tonight’s awardees. A lifetime achievement award goes to cartoonist Don Bousquet, whose humorous cartoons have been lampooning Rhode Read More >>
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Posted by Gayle Gifford on October 15, 2009 in Big ideas, Nonprofit Highlights, World News
Today is Blog Action Day 2009. The theme is Climate Change.
Bloggers around the world are helping to raise awareness and build support for gover
nment and personal action to significantly reduce greenhouse gasses which threaten the way humans live on this planet.
I decided to add our blog to this action because I care. Maybe it’s because I live in the Ocean State of Rhode Island and care about the impact that rising sea level and warming waters will have on its coastal habitat, wildlife, fisheries, and beaches. Or because so many of our clients are working so hard on this issue. Or because I’ve been environmentally aware most of my adult life. Or just because I consider myself a global citizen, accountable to current and future generations.
Why does climate change matter to you?
I recently wrote about the small ways that our household has tried to lower its environmental footprint. See “Green Musings on a Monday.” Hopefully you’ll try some yourself.
I also want to take this occasion to highlight the amazing work of the clients we’ve had over the last 13 years. These organizations do the hard work needed to restore, protect and preserve the environment.
While it may seem daunting to try to affect climate change at the micro level, every action matters.
While a local land trust or watershed organization may not be able to stop climate change in its tracks, their work creates healthier ecosystems which may prove more resilient to climate change. Resilient ecosystems are better prepared to resist, tolerate or recover from climate change.
I hope that you’ll take seek out and support some of these critical organizations or similar organizations in your own community.
On this day to build awareness of climate change, we’d like to highlight the good work of:
Aquidneck Land Trust
John H. Chafee Blackstone River Valley National Heritage Corridor Commission
Connecticut Fund for the Environment/Save The Sound
Grow Smart RI
Knox Parks Foundation
Rhode Island Department of Environmental Management
Rhode Island Land and Water Partnership
Rhode Island Natural History Survey
Narragansett Bay Estuary Program
Nashua River Watershed Association
Natural Resources Conservation Service
Rhode Island Land Trust Council
Save The Bay
Tiverton Land Trust
Wood Pawcatucket Watershed Association
Woonasquatucket River Watershed Council
Westerly Land Trust
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Posted by Gayle Gifford on August 29, 2009 in Big ideas, Great quotes, Profiles of passion and courage
“Circumstances may change, but the work of compassion must continue. It is surely correct that we cannot solve problems by throwing money at them, but it is also correct that we dare not throw our national problems onto a scrap heap of inattention and indifference. The poor may be out of political fashion, but they are not without human needs. The middle class may be angry, but they have not lost the dream that all Americans can advance together…
“A fair prosperity and a just society are within our vision and our grasp, and we do not have every answer. There are questions not yet asked, waiting for us in the recesses of the future, but of this much we can be certain because it is the lesson of all our history: Together a president and the people can make a difference. I have found that faith still alive wherever I have traveled across this land. So let us reject the counsel of retreat and the call to reaction. Let us go forward in the knowledge that history only helps those who help themselves.
“There will be setbacks and sacrifices in the years ahead but I am convinced that we as a people are ready to give something back to our country in return for all it has given to us.
“Let this be our commitment: Whatever sacrifices must be made will be shared and shared fairly. And let this be our confidence: At the end of our journey and always before us shines that ideal of liberty and justice for all.”
Senator Edward M. Kennedy, Democratic National Convention 1980
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Posted by Gayle Gifford on August 24, 2009 in 100 Things We've Learned, Big ideas, Fundraising
“Take no more than your fair share.”
That was one definition of sustainability offered by Margo Flood, Executive Director of the Environmenal Leadership Center and Chief Sustainability Official at the new student plenary at Warren Wilson College last week. (One of our sons transferred there this year).
If you’ve been following this blog, you’ll know that one of my great concerns is the concentration of the resources of the nonprofit sector in the hands of so few organizations. Fewer than 6% of US institutions hold more than 80% of the income and assets of the sector.
I’ve asked the question before “How much is enough? Philanthropic greed”
That’s why Ms. Flood’s definition resonated so strongly with me. What would happen if all philanthropic institutions held themselves to the standard of taking no more than their fair share. Perhaps more philanthropy, bequests, grants and government funding would flow to organizations that are just as worthy (maybe even more so) but without the class connections and fund development capacity that accrue to many of the largest institutions.
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Posted by Gayle Gifford on July 28, 2009 in Big ideas, Effectiveness, Fundraising
A robust sector includes nonprofits big and small and in-between. Keep repeating that.
In her latest op ed piece in The Nonprofit Quarterly, “Mom and Pop Giving Over to Big Brother?,” editor-in-chief Ruth McCambridge, shares our concern about national trends that overlook the value of “small, locally controlled organizations to civic life.”
She goes on to note that small businesses have disproportionately shed jobs in this recession and cites examples that indicate that this may be the result of government policy directing recovery funds toward the biggest corporations and away from the small guys. Ruth worries whether this will be repeated for nonprofits as this Administration works with “large philanthropic organizations to craft … approaches to ’social innovation.’”
We have raised the same question in different forms in this blog . See Now I’m Worried – Who decides what is effective and who should be funded or Are nonprofits only safety nets? among other entries.
If we get too caught up in focusing funder attention on “taking programs to scale,” we are destined to overlook the critical community building that can only be done by small, in-the-neighborhood organizations. Or, those scale-ups may overlook the impact of design that is an adaptation to local circumstances that doesn’t scale well or shouldn’t be scaled but should be redesigned for a new locale or new population. Or, even more likely, we may tend to forget that social change depends on a continuum of organizations, people and actions to finally tip power balances and produce desired improvements.
Thanks to The Nonprofit Quarterly for using its national platform to continue to remind the top of the nonprofit infrastructure that this is a complicated world and that the contributions of the little guys can’t be dismissed or ignored.
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