Rural Development: Philanthropy’s Secret to Success

July 27, 2010

At Philanthropy Potluck we love featuring the outstanding work of our MCF members.  Here’s a recent West Central Blogger post written by Kim Embretson, West Central Initiative vice president of development.

How do you create success in rural communities? A small group of foundation leaders from all over the nation have been tackling this question. They have discovered that when you combine the features of economic development, community development and philanthropy you unlock the secret to success.

Often rural community leaders struggle alone trying to build the systems that will make their community successful. Eight years ago, four community foundations all working with rural economic development were brought together as part of an Aspen Institute learning community. They discovered a common thread of activities that influenced the success of rural communities. They decided to work together to help rural communities all over the nation.

West Central Initiative, The Nebraska Community Foundation, The Humboldt Area Foundation in California, The East Tennessee Foundation, The Black Belt Community Foundation, The Aspen Institute Community Strategies Group, The Center for Rural Strategies, and North Carolina Rural Economic Development Center have formed the Rural Development Philanthropy Collaboration steering committee. They have been able to compare years of experience working with successful rural communities to collect the most effective actions that lead to success.

The Rural Development Philanthropy is no longer a secret. Now the core documents are available for anyone interested in the success of their rural community at http://www.wcif.org/?page=Publications#RDP.  Learn how your rural community or region can benefit from combining economic development, community development and philanthropy.

Grant support from the Ford Foundation, California Endowment, Rockefeller Brothers Fund and the community foundations on the steering committee has helped underwrite the cost of meetings and materials to date.

Visit West Central Blogger for more regional community foundation news.

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Admitting Mistakes, Finding Solutions: The Gates Foundation’s Grantee Perceptions Report

July 19, 2010

Bill and Melinda Gates and their philanthropic partner Warren Buffet have been in the news a lot lately following the announcement of their ambitious $600 billion giving pledge, an open challenge to the nation’s billionaires to commit to giving away half of their fortunes to charity.

However, there’s been other recent news regarding The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation that you may not have heard. As I read today in this post on the Philanthrocapitalism blog, a recent Center for Effective Philanthropy Grantee Perceptions Report found that the foundation is facing communications challenges with its grantees.

The report is based on a survey of 1,544 of Gates’ grantees. On the positive side of the ledger, it found that the foundation is perceived by grantees as having a profound positive impact on work in the grantees’ fields, particularly in the areas of knowledge building, public policy and creating effective practices.

However, the assessment of the Gates Foundation’s communications was not so rosey. Grantee partners reported that the organization’s goals and strategies are unclear, and that similarly they felt that the foundation had a poor understanding of their goals and strategies. Respondents also noted confusion about the foundation’s decision-making and grantmaking processes and expressed frustration over program officer turnover.

As you may know, the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation is a member of MCF. So you may be wondering why we would report on one of our members performing poorly at, well, anything. The truth is, although the report found that the Gates Foundation has a need for improvement, its transparency about those challenges is admirable and should serve as a model for those grantmakers that value transparency and accountability in their work, both key tenets of MCF’s own Principles for Minnesota Grantmakers.

The Gates Foundation has been very open about its involvement in the assessment process and the results, posting the findings here on its website, along with the audio from a number of grantee community calls. The foundation also has been clear that it will be addressing these shortcomings by reevaluating its communications and creating new strategies for enhancing cohesion and clarity between program managers and executives at the foundation and its grantee partners.

That’s why I salute the Gates Foundation for being upfront about the challenges that it faces. It’s through this process that the organization will be able to enhance its relationships with grantees, and ultimately the impact of its grant giving.

As physicist Tom Hirshfield once wrote, “If you hit every time, the target is either too big or too near.” Philanthropy is a bold endeavor with high stakes. By learning from our collective mistakes through accountable and transparent practices, we can capitalize not only on success, but failure too, and ameliorate the world-changing work that we all share, while at the same time affirming the public trust.

- Cary Lenore Walski, MCF web communications associate

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New Strategic Philanthropy Resource: Deep Social Impact Blog

July 12, 2010

Boston-based The Philanthropic Initiative Inc. entered the blogosphere mid-June with Deep Social Impact. Striving to broadcast more widely its knowledge gained from 20 years of advising donors and researching, designing and implementing a variety of philanthropic initiatives, TPI says its goal for Deep Social Impact is to wrap “shared learning around practical advice – with a healthy diet of inspiration.”

This “strategic philanthropy blog” will cover a range of topics – philanthropic leadership, women in philanthropy and global philanthropy. Written by TPI senior staff, topics to date have included:

TPI is looking to intertwine their lessons learned and experiments-in-progress with yours, so read and comment away, says Ellen Remmer, TPI’s CEO and president. “We are looking to spark dialogue among donors and philanthropy professionals and hope the Deep Social Impact blog grows to become a valued resource for donors who are committed to increasing the impact of their giving.”

TPI is a nonprofit advisory team that designs, carries out and evaluates philanthropic programs for individual donors, families, foundations and corporations targeting a wide range of social issues, including education, health, issues affecting youth and families, hunger and nutrition, housing and homelessness, community and economic development, civic engagement, environmental issues and the arts.

- Chris Murakami Noonan, MCF communications associate

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New Grantmaker Associations Blog

March 10, 2010

The Forum of Regional Associations of Grantmakers has launched a new blog. The Forum’s Forum will be a collaborative space for sharing information about philanthropy.

In addition to featuring original content written by Forum staff, the blog will post syndicated content from various regional association blogs, like our own Philanthropy Potluck from the Minnesota Council on Foundations.  Check out MCF Manager of Member Services Stephanie Jacobs’ recent post on Switch, a book about creating change within individuals, and across organizations.

Consider checking out the Forum’s blog if you’re interested in keeping tabs on the activities of grantmaker associations around the nation, new resources on grantmaking, and national conferences and online programming opportunities. The most recent Forum post, for example, features a free March 15 webinar by the Foundation Center on the new i3 application, and its impact on education funders.

The blog can be found at givingforum.wordpress.com, and you can subscribe to it in your RSS feed reader by clicking here.

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Can Bloggers Change the World? Some Food for Thought on Blog Action Day 2009

September 28, 2009

Can bloggers change the world? The folks over at change.org certainly think so. They are busy orchestrating the third annual Blog Action Day.

The idea behind Blog Action Day is simple. Individual bloggers can only do so much, but if enough bloggers can be united to write about a single issue on a particular day from their own unique perspective, suddenly that issue has an audience of millions.

Reading about change.org’s Blog Action Day got me thinking about the prospect of this type of cross-organizational communication on common causes within Minnesota. As a communicator working in the nonprofit and philanthropic sphere, I know I daily combat the daunting knowledge that we are all in a sense “competing” for a finite amount of the public’s attention.

Seeing the change.org initiative got me thinking. What if groups hooked arms and pulled together around causes, instead of elbowing each other out of the way?

What do you think? Are there more ways that organizations within Minnesota can be collaborating on communication around common causes? How effective do you think online, cross-organizational strategies like these are, especially when there’s no common message per se, but just a common directive to draw attention to the topic?

Can you think of any groups who are taking steps to communicate jointly around a shared interest using their online communications like the folks over at change.org?

I am all ears! If you have any thoughts or examples to share about this strategy for public engagement, please leave your comments below.

-Cary Lenore Walski, MCF web communications associate

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Second Helpings from the Blogosphere

September 23, 2009

Grab a plate folks, it’s time for your biweekly serving of the latest and greatest commentary from the philanthropy and nonprofit blogosphere.

Are Happiness and Generosity the Future of Marketing Campaigns?
(Beth’s Blog) Beth Kanter waxes philosophical on a micro-trend in marketing towards stressing positivity and affiliation.

Decoding the Future of Philanthropy
(Philanthropy 2173) Lucy Bernholz discusses the future of philanthropy, and how data will be the new platform for determining the flow of philanthropic dollars.

Not Your Mama’s Philanthropy
(New Voices of Philanthropy) Race and gender diversity are often talked about, but what about age diversity? Trista Harris addresses this rarely discussed dynamic and warns us about the consequences of ignoring it.

The Problem with Non
(Seth Godin’s Blog) This is the post that launched a thousand angry comments. If you’re not attuned to the rhythms of the blogosphere, you may be unaware of this particular post which unleashed a shock wave of responses from the nonprofit community. In it Godin lambastes the nonprofit community for not taking risks and engaging in social media.

Why Seth Godin is Wrong
(onPhilanthropy) In this frequently cited response to “The Problem with Non,” Tom Watson criticizes Godin’s arguements, pointing out that fear of embracing new technology is hardly unique to the nonprofit world, and that there many examples of nonprofits successfully leveraging social media to raise funds and awareness.

Photo CC Straitic

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Second Helpings from the Blogosphere

September 9, 2009

Grab a plate folks, it’s time for your biweekly serving of the latest and greatest commentary from the philanthropy and nonprofit blogosphere.

GiveAndDate.com Combines Philanthropy And Online Dating
(CauseCast) There’s a new matchmaker in The Big Apple, GiveAndDate.com. The site allows you to surf for for your soul-mate online, while donating 50% of your monthly membership to the charity of your choice. Sorry TC singles–the site is for New Yorkers only, at least for now.

How to Become a More Resilient Nonprofit Leader
(Stanford Social Innovation Review) Rosetta Thurman shares her thoughts on the dramatic changes occurring in the nonprofit sector, and how individuals can find new ways to innovate and avoid burn-out during these challenging times.

How Do You Create a Culture that is Not Afraid to Fail (or Be More Receptive to Social Media?)
(Beth’s Blog) Beth Kanter suggests redefining “failure” in social media as a “learning experience” with tips on how to help social media skeptics see the engagement opportunities in using new modes of communication.

Social Entrepreneur API
(Tactical Philanthropy Advisors) Sean Stannord-Stockton discuss The Social Entrepreneur API (Application Programming Interface), the first open database of information about social entrepreneurs who have won fellowships and awards from social enterprise funders.

Vote for the Best Taglines — 2009 Getting Attention Nonprofit Tagline Awards
(The Getting Attention Blog) The 60 tagline finalists for Nancy Schwartz’s annual competition are up on the web, and ready for voting. Submit that digital ballot by Sept. 30!

-Cary Lenore Walski, MCF web communications associate

Photo CC Striatic

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Second Helpings from the Blogosphere

July 20, 2009

Grab a plate folks, it’s time for your biweekly serving of the latest and greatest commentary from the philanthropy and nonprofit blogosphere.

Debating NBC’s Drama The Philanthropist
(Tactical Philanthropy) It’s official, folks, The Philanthropist throw-down is happening tomorrow, Tuesday, July 21.  Join Steven Gunderson, Council on Foundations CEO, and Sean Stannord-Stockton, director of Tactical Philanthropy at Ensemble Capital Management, as they debate the merits (or lack there of) of NBC’s show. Stay tuned to Sean’s blog for a complete recap of the event.

How to Innovate
(Donor Power Blog) In this video Guy Kawasaki riffs on the theme of innovation to give us ten shining pearls o’ wisdom. Although awkwardly abbreviated, the video is still a nice pick-me-up for those of us trying to drive change across their organization or across the nation. My favorite? Definitely, “Don’t worry, be crappy.”

Less is More (Again!) — Newark Museum Tagline Success in Just 4 Words
(The Getting Attention Blog) This post is a continuation on Nancy E. Schwartz’s ongoing quest for the best nonprofit tagline. For nonprofits and grantmakers alike, a tagline is one of the best tools you have for making a clear, memorable impression about your organization. Check out this post and Nancy’s tagline contest at her site.

New Models for (Philanthropy) Research & Dialogue
(Philosophy 2.0) Tony Wang critiques the current research paradigm. He recommends some new approaches to sharing information about philanthropy enabled by web 2.0 including crowdsourcing wisdom with wikis, and using twitter hashtags to communicate with grantees and stakeholders.

Using Flickr Creatively
(Beth’s Blog) Deborah Arkanase introduces us to three nonprofits using the photo sharing site Flickr to engage their base in new ways.

-Cary Lenore Walski, MCF web communications associate

Photo CC Striatic

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