“Trust Us” is No Response to Those Who Doubt
April 1, 2010
If Congress were to double or triple the private foundation excise tax, asks Joel Orosz of Grand Valley State University, “does anyone truly think that there will be a groundswell of support for foundations” that resist? In a March 10 guest post to the Center for Effective Philanthropy blog headlined “Déjà vu (or 1969) All over Again?”, Orosz suggests it’s too late for foundations to react effectively to stem a possible backlash against the sector. Still, the philanthropy professor counsels foundations to take steps on their own to improve practices, including training employees to be more professional and more accountable to nonprofits.
Orosz is just one of several commentators recently suggesting that a growing populist fervor in society isn’t just anti-government, but anti-institution – and a threat to philanthropy, one that can’t be summarily dismissed and should propel changes. For example, in Small Change: Why Business Won’t Save The World, Michael Edwards wrote that foundation leaders will vociferously resist and complain about the many suggestions he makes in the book calling on Congress to require more transparency and accountability from foundations. But Edwards, a senior fellow at the think tank Demos and the leading skeptic of philanthro-capitalism, says that public and political pressure will eventually build and force changes in the sector. Similarly, in a Feb. 25 Chronicle of Philanthropy opinion piece, the Hudson Institute’s William Schambra argued that philanthropy’s increasingly business-minded approach is at odds with the populist mood of the American public on both ends of the political spectrum. He thinks the tide is turning against foundations.
To help improve the situation, Thomas David of the Community Clinics Initiative argues that foundations should show they’re making sacrifices in this economy along with everyone else. It should not be a time of hunkering down, cutting grantmaking, trimming staff and expenses or focusing on re-growing endowments. Instead, David writes in an essay published by Grantmakers in Health (GIH) that foundations should make some big bets, ease up on control of grantees and practice mission-related investing. In other words, take risks that put them on the line in ways that might tangibly, not just symbolically, benefit nonprofits in a time of need. More specifically, David advises foundations to increase their grantmaking this year – even if they’re one of those already exceeding 6 percent payout. He complains that over the past couple of decades foundations have evolved to become more risk averse than ever; they’re so focused on assets that growth is their priority, not giving.
David’s hard-charging essay is just one of several included in Taking Risks at a Critical Time, released in March in tandem with GIH’s 2010 annual meeting. Foundations hesitate, according to this publication, in part because of an over-reliance on proven practices, unwarranted anxiety about engaging in public policy and avoidance of failure of any kind, despite the fact that a healthy proportion of failures in a grant portfolio is a sign that a foundation is successfully venturing in new territory. The lead essay includes examples of “risk taking in action,” efforts to improve health.
Tom David is not optimistic, however. He essentially calls foundations fair-weather friends to nonprofits: “It is at times like this that nonprofits, who like to think of foundations as allies in their struggles, have learned not to count on their friends when they need them most.” I wonder. It is not the role of foundations to support nonprofits based on need, but rather based on merit, because doing so fits a larger strategy—one that produces a social benefit. I have a good deal of faith that foundations will do their best to achieve that end. But the way in which they do it must take into account the public mood, and even distrust that these observers so powerfully describe. No institution is being given a pass, particularly one that is seen as opaque while claiming to advance the public good. “Trust us” has never been an adequate response to doubters.
Jane Wales
Vice President, The Aspen Institute
President and CEO, The World Affairs Council
Founding President, The Global Philanthropy Forum
Who’s In Charge Here? Retaining the Next Generation in Philanthropy
March 24, 2010
Baby boomers are hanging on, and next generation leaders are waiting--and waiting--their turn.
According to Trading Power, produced in partnership with the Council on Foundations, Andrea and Charles Bronfman Philanthropies’ 21/64, Emerging Practitioners in Philanthropy and Resource Generation, this is the first time in history that society is experiencing a delay in leadership transition, as people live longer and retire later. The economic recession has further delayed retirement plans, leaving baby boomers in positions that even they expected to have left by now. And some seasoned leaders are turning to a model of “leadership expansion” rather than “leadership transfer,” sharing leadership duties with younger employees. Some retain an executive emeritus role. Others take a sabbatical while potential successors serve in “acting” capacities.
In each instance the elder leader needs to respect new ideas coming from his or her younger partner, according to the report. If the philanthropic sector fails to tap the next generation’s skills and knowledge, the emerging leaders will simply move on to sectors that will.
But would younger workers stay put, even if they had a clear path toward a leadership position? The Pew Research Center’s ongoing study, The Millennials, contrasts the attitudes of Generation Xers and Millennials with that of aging Boomers. Pew finds that expectations about career advancement differ between younger and older workers; Millennials in particular are accustomed to the idea that they will – indeed, must – find their own path of career advancement. In other words, they may jump among organizations, and sectors, in any case.
And it turns out that the same demographic trends that are driving later retirement within the nonprofit sector are affecting movement of Boomers across sectors. On Friday, The New York Times ran a story that explores what boomers are doing with the “bonus decade or three added to the average life span.” The article quotes Stanford professor Laura Carstensen: “The culture hasn’t had time to catch up. All the added years of life have been put into leisure, and that’s crazy.” The Times story details an organization called Civic Ventures that is placing longtime managers and professionals from the for-profit world in nonprofit positions uniquely suited to their skills. Opportunities like this point to the positive effects that this “bonus decade or three” from Boomers could have on the nonprofit sector.
But to the extent that the nonprofit world is characterized by more leaders than leadership positions, the notion of offering sabbaticals for executives has gained salience. According to a recent report by Deborah S. Linnell of Third Sector New England and Tim Wolfred of CompassPoint Nonprofit Services, sabbaticals allow the next rung of leaders to learn new skills and take on new responsibilities during the director’s absence. And they often continue to have enhanced responsibility and authority upon the director’s return, sharing leadership tasks. A sabbatical can serve as a dry run for a future transition, according to this report, Creative Disruption.
Jossey-Bass has also published a volume on the subject of nonprofit leadership, collecting previously published articles, research studies and essays from experts in the field – including Bridgespan’s study on the sector’s pending “leadership deficit”. Edited by Indiana University’s James L. Perry, The Jossey-Bass Reader on Nonprofit and Public Leadership stresses the importance of cultivating, sharing and delegating leadership throughout nonprofit organizations.
This is probably true now more than ever as the nonprofit sector grows bigger in size and importance. Part of increasing the sector’s impact has to include more investment in the development of its employees.
So, if you find yourself waiting, and waiting, apparently you are not alone. The question is, are the career development opportunities enriching your lives, and readying you for the moment when it finally comes.
Jane Wales
Vice President, The Aspen Institute
President and CEO, The World Affairs Council
Founding President, The Global Philanthropy Forum
The Widow Mary Gargar meets the Global Positioning System (GPS)
February 27, 2010
Sitting on a ramshackle assortment of wooden benches under the shade of a mango tree, we listen to the story of the widow Mary Gargar. An elderly and weathered Liberian woman with a look of determination just short of defiance, Mrs. Gargar tells us of how she purchased land from a man falsely representing himself as its rightful owner. Now that the war is over, a reverend who the government confirms is the rightful owner has returned and wants to build. While she holds a deed for the land in her name, and depends on its crops for survival, he too needs the land for his livelihood. How are they to resolve the dispute and meet their competing needs?
Land disputes are a recurring theme in the developing world and are at the root of much violent conflict. For the majority of the world’s poor, poverty is predominantly a rural issue. More than three quarters of those who live on just one or two dollars each day still live in the countryside. Living further from commercial centers, schools and health facilities and outside the range of many government and social services, the rural poor lack access to the inputs and infrastructure necessary for development. Residence in rural areas exacerbates poverty on nearly every level.
In Liberia, nearly 60 percent of the population is rural. Fourteen years of civil war devastated the physical infrastructure and destroyed what little access to systems and services that Liberia’s rural poor once enjoyed. Slowly, however, President Ellen Johnson Sirleaf’s government is working with partners to rebuild, increasing access to the inputs critical for development.
What role can philanthropists play in creating the conditions necessary for wide-spread economic growth in rural areas? While the challenges facing the rural poor are daunting, there are three key areas where strategic giving by private philanthropists can make a difference: agriculture, legal systems and education.
In Liberia’s post-war period, agriculture has accounted for over half of GDP. To ensure that agriculture continues to grow, philanthropists must direct targeted support to rural areas. Projects that improve access to agricultural inputs, including high-yield rice and other new technologies, and those that strengthen agricultural institutions and build supply chains from rural to urban areas should be a priority. Aside from direct agricultural skills training and education, donors can design financial services targeted to small-scale farmers that will enable them to invest and plan for the future with confidence. In a place like Liberia, where the war destroyed the country’s livestock population, the introduction of something as simple as donations or loans to purchase and insure livestock would have a dramatic impact on the capacity for rural development.
But to invest in and develop agriculture on a piece of land, one must first be sure that he or she is the rightful owner, as we learned with the story of Mrs. Gargar. Land and property rights are central to poverty alleviation efforts -- to stability, food security, income-generation and status within one’s community. However, legal systems for registering and protecting these property rights face a number of hurdles, particularly in poor, post-conflict settings. As part of its Poverty Reduction Strategy (PRS), the Liberian Government commits to promoting effective land administration and management. Toward this goal, the government has established a commission and works with several key NGO partners, including the Norwegian Refugee Council (NRC) and the Carter Center. The NRC works with the government to collect deeds and land records, increase the number of trained land surveyors and put a national system in place for land registration. Through outreach, the NRC spreads information about property rights and facilitates community resolution of land disputes, such as Mrs. Gargar’s. In addition, they put an essential new tool in surveyors’ (and land owners’) hands: global positioning systems. The process followed for making a determination includes the community and is viewed as fair—and the results are uncontested.
Complementing this work, organizations like the Carter Center support small programs in underserved rural areas to educate people about new laws and the legal means for resolving disputes. In a country where illiteracy rates are high, and access to information limited, the Carter Center sends traveling troops of local actors into the villages to perform entertaining and educational skits, followed by Q&A sessions with the villagers. On Saturday, I and 20 philanthropists, who are members of the Global Philanthropy Forum, took a UN helicopter to visit Liberia’s most isolated and rural region, the South East, to participate in one of these village gatherings and the robust Q&A session that followed the play.
We also viewed the re-opening of Tubman University in Harper city, the first and only institution of higher education in the region, which had been closed down during the war. It is nearly impossible to emphasize the importance of education to lifting the rural poor from poverty. Despite the government’s Free and Compulsory Primary Education Initiative, unofficial fees still prevent many children in Liberia from attending school. Over 70 percent of schools were destroyed or damaged during the war, and those that still operate do so with few supplies and poorly trained teachers with poor attendance records due to inconsistent pay. But, by efforts such as underwriting teacher salaries, providing books and supplies, funding the construction of new schools and providing the safe transportation of students to schools, philanthropists can have an enormously positive impact on rural education, and thus economic development.
On the final day of our trip, we visited a safe-house and rehabilitation center for vulnerable girls run by Touching Humanity In Need of Kindness (THINK). Many of the girls in the program were fighters during the war, or were trafficked to Monrovia under false promises of education in the capital city. Families willingly send their children to Monrovia, believing that they will receive an education and a chance for a better life. Too often, however, these children are forced into near slave-labor conditions as market sellers, house cleaners or prostitutes. The stories of these young women, although now on a positive path, represent an ugly nexus between rural and urban poverty. The rural poor are trafficked to the city because of the desperation of the urban poor. If affordable education in rural areas is provided and reliable means for families to make a living through agricultural development and property right protection are strengthened, women may be spared from making these dangerous decisions about how to educate their children.
This all sounds like a tall order, and many of these goals require the investments of governments, but each can be advanced substantially by small grants, especially to organizations like THINK, NRC and the Carter Center, each of which is having powerful impact on the lives of many who have suffered too much – including the strong willed Mrs. Gargar.
Jane Wales
Vice President, The Aspen Institute
President and CEO, The World Affairs Council
Founding President, The Global Philanthropy Forum
Advancing Women & Girls in Liberia
February 26, 2010
“Women are part of the development agenda for the first time – and we are making use of our time. Traditional culture has made us reticent. But, no more. Our eyes are now open and there is no way they will close again.” These are the words of Liberia’s Vabah Gayflor, Minister of Gender and Development. Soft-spoken and patient, when her moment comes to speak, her voice drops to a whisper that commands the attention of all in the room. The 19 philanthropists with whom I am traveling in Liberia are focused; we have met a truly powerful person.
Gayflor, who is not a member of any political party, is an unmistakable champion of the person and policies of President Ellen Johnson Sirleaf. Her colleagues speak of two revolutions led by Liberian women, and the one to come. The first was their struggle for peace in 2003. The second came in 2005 when they registered to vote and stood for election. Now, the third revolution is a more sustainable approach to economic development, one that provides benefits for all.
Quiet power characterizes the women of Liberia with whom we have met. They and their daughters have been the victims of extraordinary gender-based violence throughout the country’s 14 year civil war and still to this day, for the culture of impunity lingers on. However, in Minister Gayflor’s words, “women believe their time has come.” Meeting them persuades us that is so.
Throughout our day today, we met with women and girls who were being given economic opportunity, albeit modest, for the first time. Job creation has not come near to keeping up with the need, and remains an urgent necessity for President Sirleaf, who met with us over dinner last night. While some of those jobs will come from large corporations in search of coffee, rubber and cocoa, Sirleaf notes that the extractive industries are “capital intensive, and will not provide all the jobs we need.” And so the prospect of small and medium sized enterprises (SMEs) attracts the donors with whom I am now traveling, leaders of the Global Philanthropy Forum and The Philanthropy Workshop West.
In a large building on Monrovia’s main thoroughfare, we met with the exuberant members of the Liberian Women’s Sewing Project, a pilot enterprise of Chid Liberty’s Made In: Liberia, a promising new business to manufacture apparel that would be fair trade certified and a source of employment. Elsewhere in Monrovia, each woman who opens a stall at the Nancy B. Doe Market, funded by the Sirleaf Market Women’s Fund, is required to open a savings account at the ECO Bank branch located within the market. And she is given access to daily literacy classes within the market walls. In a country where 60 percent of agricultural output and 80 percent of trading activities are carried out by women, ensuring that they have training and access to credit is essential.
Liberian women have found ways to advance other aspects of the Sirleaf government’s Poverty Reduction Strategy (PRS). Members of the West Africa Network for Peace Building (WANEP) told us of their efforts to increase women’s participation in peace-building at all levels in the country, through advocacy, capacity-building, radio outreach and rural initiatives.
And the truly extraordinary women of West Point - the largest slum within Liberia – have formed their own West Point Women for Health and Development. Forty eight percent of West Point’s population is comprised of children, 35% women (mostly single parents) and 15% men. In this area not yet reached by government services, these remarkable women concluded that “enough is enough” after seeing too many children raped and killed. They self-organized and took responsibility for their impoverished community, with each paying weekly dues of 30 Liberian Liberty Dollars (roughly 40 cents US). With this money, they fund grassroots efforts to improve health and sanitation, reduce gender-based violence, provide literacy classes, reduce prostitution – and see to it that the police do their jobs. And if the police fail them, as is so often the case, they take matters to higher authorities until perpetrators of violence are prosecuted and some form of order is achieved. Their annual budget is $10,000. With funding, they would like to expand their skills training to teaching a woman to drive a car. Newly empowered with that skill, she could be a taxi driver and make a living for her family.
So what is the role for private actors—philanthropists and social investors? Is the right entry point a community based organization, an NGO that provides skills training and meets basic needs? Or is it to create the conditions for small enterprises to take seed, so that the economy can expand more than its current 5% per year. With funding and technical assistance, increased access to education, skills development, credit and inputs, women will be able to lift their families from poverty.
Women did not get the vote in Liberia until 1948. Their country did not get peace until the women demanded it in 2003. Now a woman holds the presidency, powerful women are heading ministries, holding Senate seats and women with no education and no obvious reason for hope have transformed West Point from being a daily, deadly danger to their sisters and their children. Their eyes are now open to the power they wield. Will they turn back? And how can the rest of us ease their path forward?
Jane Wales
Vice President, The Aspen Institute
President and CEO, The World Affairs Council
Founding President, The Global Philanthropy Forum
Strengthening Governing Capacity in Post-Conflict Liberia
Febuary 25, 2010
“I fear my own conscience on Africa. I fear the judgment of future generations,” former British Prime Minister Tony Blair is quoted as saying. “I fear their asking how can wealthy people, so aware of such suffering, so capable of acting, simply turn away?”
While in office, that sentiment led Blair to commit British troops to quelling Sierra Leone’s civil war and to later establish the Commission on Africa to advance the continent’s growth and development. Now, as former Prime Minister, it has inspired him to create the African Government Initiative (AGI), a non-profit foundation that offers African reformers Blair’s personal help and that of teams of up to 15 UK or US-trained technocrats who are embedded in their ministries. Neither Blair nor these teams comes with policy prescriptions, but rather their task is to help far-sighted leaders achieve their own goals – goals that have been vetted by the process of democratic elections.
Arguing that good governance “is not simply the absence of corruption, but the presence of capacity,” Blair and his AGI have worked with President Ernest Bai Koroma of Sierra Leone and President Paul Kagame of Rwanda on matters as mundane as how to manage the president’s schedule to the harder political question of how to manage public expectations at a time of transition. Each country has made great strides in rebuilding its society and economy. While they are not without problems, they are both expanding their economies and broadening participation in the gains. Blair argues that as a result the citizens have a growing stake in their country’s future and an increasing reason to believe that hard work and merit – rather than political connections and favors – will provide the ticket to a better life.
Blair has now taken his model of philanthropy to Liberia, which its president, Ellen Johnson Sirleaf, says “is not a poor country” with its rich natural resources, “but is a country that has been managed poorly.” Fourteen years of civil war have decimated its infrastructure and impoverished its young population, 75% if whom are under age 25 and all of whom have spent more time in battle than in school.
But, soon after the country chose peace it also chose a remarkable leader in Ellen Johnson-Sirleaf. A former Assistant Minister of Finance (in the William Tolbert government), Sirleaf now leads a government committed to transparency and an ambitious Poverty Reduction Strategy.
Blair is not the first to invest in the capacity of Sirleaf’s reform government. Soon after Sirleaf’s election, philanthropist Ed Scott created the Scott Fellowship program, which places young professionals in Liberia’s ministries for one-year stints to work along side mid-level officials in carrying out the day to day tasks of governance. While Scott fellows were initially Americans without familial ties to Liberia, they are now predominately Liberian-Americans returning to the country from which they, their parents or their grandparents came. Many are hoping to stay.
Philanthropist George Soros has similarly helped to strengthen governmental capacity. And, Pam Omidyar’s Humanity United joined forces with the Open Society Institute, the NoVo Foundation, the Daphne Foundation, Trust Africa and McCall MacBain Foundation in creating the Philanthropy Secretariat within the office of President Sirleaf. They did so as part of a 2008 Clinton Global Initiative “commitment” of which the Global Philanthropy Forum (GPF) was also a part.
The grant-makers agreed to finance the creation of the Secretariat. The GPF agreed to expand the number of new philanthropists alert to Liberia’s cause. As part of that effort, I am now traveling with 19 GPF members, many of whom are also alumni and leaders of our close collaborators, The Philanthropy Workshop-West. We will be learning what we can and reporting to you along the way.
We’ll be cognizant that Liberia has a special history – having been settled by former American slaves – which may give us a special responsibility. But beyond that sentiment lies the practical recognition that if Sirleaf – a tough leader with integrity, vision and smart policies – does not succeed, that failure may stand as a discouraging lesson to all states struggling to emerge from crisis. Some might argue that it will tell them whether the outside world will be there for them, or whether we, despite being “so aware of such suffering, so capable of acting, simply turn away.”
Jane Wales
Vice President, The Aspen Institute
President and CEO, The World Affairs Council
Founding President, The Global Philanthropy Forum
Wednesday February 24th Blog: From Liberia – Post-Conflict Philanthropy
“Liberia is not a poor country. It is a country that has been managed poorly,” according Ellen Johnson Sirleaf, Liberia’s president and Africa’s first female head of state.
Poverty is both a cause and a consequence of violent conflict, which decimates economies, destroys infrastructure and undermines a state’s capacity to meet basic needs. Yet Sierra Leone and Rwanda have each demonstrated that with the right policies and the right partners, countries can emerge from conflict and achieve positive economic results for their publics. Liberia can be a third example – and wealthy countries, far-sighted investors and strategic philanthropists alike are betting on the policies of its reform-minded leader.
Undaunted by the problems inherited from 14 years of civil war, Sirleaf’s government undertook a highly inclusive public process to develop its Poverty Reduction Strategy (PRS). It encompasses policies aimed at integrating former combatants, promoting reconciliation, combating corruption, welcoming investment and encouraging the growth of civil society. It is a blueprint that has persuaded wealthy countries to provide much-needed debt relief and both private philanthropists and investors to work in close coordination with each other – and with a government they feel they can trust.
I write from Liberia where I am traveling with 19 philanthropists committed to Liberia’s success. The origins of this trip lie in a 2008 Clinton Global Initiative “commitment” undertaken by Pam Omidyar’s Humanity United, the Global Philanthropy Forum (GPF), the Open Society Institute, the Daphne Foundation, the NoVo Foundation, McCall-MacBain, Trust Africa and the government of Liberia.
As part of the commitment, the grant-making foundations stepped forward to finance the establishment of a Philanthropy Secretariat within President Sirleaf’s offices, with the mandate to coordinate their investments so as to best support Liberia’s reform agenda. For our part at the GPF, we agreed to expand the number of “new philanthropists” alert to Liberia’s potential and to test and refine this extraordinary model of partnership between a post-crisis government and a consortium of private donors and investors.
Ultimately, our hope is to be able to demonstrate – to our satisfaction and to other donors seeking to engage – that this model of highly disciplined and collaborative philanthropic engagement can be adapted and made portable to other post-crisis situations. Many of the GPF members who joined the trip are also leaders of The Philanthropy Workshop-West or members of the Aspen Society of Fellows. They are strategic philanthropists, discerning, intent on impact – and deeply respectful of local voices.
They recognize that many of the prescriptions contained in Liberia’s poverty reduction strategy would apply to most post-crisis states. At the same time, they are cognizant that Liberia’s history is unique. Founded by freed American slaves in 1847, it became the first independent republic in Africa. It established a constitution that met the needs of those settlers, but excluded indigenous peoples. The inequities inherent in that formula helped lead to political instability and ultimately a brutal civil war during which the GDP of the country dropped 90%, poverty rates rose 64%, the physical infrastructure was decimated, the management class was dispersed, 270,000 died and many hundreds of thousands were displaced. Its young population, 75% of whom are under age 25, has spent more time in battle than in school.
As a group we will explore whether and how private actors can contribute to the public goals that are designed not only to reverse the damage done, but to build a new Liberia that can be a model for others emerging from crisis.
In particular, we will report to you – and gain your views – on four hurdles ahead: improving security, promoting public health, rehabilitating infrastructure and strengthening government capacity.
As we report out to you on the status of each of these areas, we will be eager to hear your views on the role that private actors can play and how they can best work in partnership with each other and with Liberia’s government. Barack Obama has often said that government alone cannot solve all of our country’s problems. If this is true for us, it can be no less true for Liberia, where philanthropy and investment have a significant role to play.
Jane Wales
Vice President, The Aspen Institute
President and CEO, The World Affairs Council
Founding President, The Global Philanthropy Forum
Foundations and Advocacy: New Focus in the Wake of Supreme Court Ruling?
February 1, 2010
Will the Supreme Court ruling giving greater political voice to corporations have the effect of focusing the minds of those funders who support policy advocacy?
Many foundations now appreciate that the impact of policy advocacy is not as hard to measure as once thought. Less clear, according to papers in the most recent issue of the Foundation Review, is how fully foundations appreciate the importance of their support for advocacy as part of a larger social change strategy, and how much investment they are willing to make in its evaluation. The recent Supreme Court ruling allowing corporations to spend more money on political campaigns may change their perspective.
The latest issue of the Foundation Review offers a number of research papers with insights for foundations working in the public policy realm. In particular, one paper from Innovation Network’s Johanna Morariu and Kathleen Brennan notes that three-quarters of advocacy organizations have not evaluated their work, and more than 80 percent of them have never worked with an outside evaluator. What advocacy strategies are appropriate in what contexts? What combinations of organizational capacities are most important? What are the most meaningful interim indicators in the journey from grassroots organizing to sweeping social change? The authors say these and other critical questions can’t truly be answered without greater support from foundations for advocacy evaluation. Morariu and Brennan go on to identify the key qualities of an effective advocacy funder, which include the usual suspects of offering extended grant cycles, support for program evaluation, and general operating support to enable grantees to respond flexibly to changing circumstances.
Another paper in this issue of the Foundation Review offers specific insights for foundations working to influence policy across the U.S. Ann Whitney Breihan of the College of Notre Dame of Maryland focuses on a multi-state program of the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation that has impacted national policies on care for developmentally disabled adults. Among her suggestions: To build momentum for a particular policy, resist a temptation to fund states scattered across the country and instead focus funding in a region. Her study bears out that states are more likely to “follow the pack” in their own region. She also says funders should focus funding in those states that have already demonstrated interest – by spending their own funds – in a particular policy area. They’re more likely to consider further innovation in the area.
In general, philanthropists may be less hesitant about helping to define the voice of the social sector. Noting the success of highly strategic politically conservative foundations, other funders across the political spectrum have come to believe that nonprofits and foundations need to gain a greater voice when it comes to public policy. Many have taken concrete steps to do so by hiring more communications and policy specialists and more frequently collaborating and engaging with politicians and government agencies. As borne out in the Foundation Review, evaluation of these efforts is necessary in order to gauge how effective the current strategies and programs are and what can be done to improve them. With the recent Supreme Court ruling, the need for these steps has become ever more apparent.
For further reading, the book Seen but Not Heard: Strengthening Nonprofit Advocacy (published by the Aspen Institute) presents the findings of a multi-year research project called the Strengthening Nonprofit Advocacy Project (SNAP), conducted by OMB Watch, Tufts University, and the Center for Lobbying in the Public Interest and offers specific suggestions that nonprofit leaders can take to strengthen their organization's advocacy work.
Jane Wales
Vice President, The Aspen Institute
President and CEO, The World Affairs Council
Founding President, The Global Philanthropy Forum
Enlisting Trustees as Communicators: A New Model for Foundation Communications?
January 28, 2010
Might trustees be the solution to the woeful lack of knowledge civically engaged Americans have about foundations?
That’s the hypothesis of an experiment underway from the Philanthropy Awareness Initiative. PAI is the foundation-funded organization that has reported in study after study that very few engaged Americans, those who represent the 12 percent of the adult population active in their communities as civic or business leaders, could cite even one example of a foundation benefiting its community or addressing their concerns. As I noted in a post about PAI’s latest survey, it is the culture of private foundations to shun the spotlight and direct attention to the issues they advance or the grantees they support. This notion is seconded in another recent survey, this one from the Council of Michigan Foundations. According to this survey, foundation trustees tend to focus on their role as investing, growing and distributing foundation resources, not in communicating with other non-foundation leaders.
But what if that changed? Building on its survey, the Council teamed up with PAI to launch a pilot project with 14 members through which they have offered “message training” to trustees, focused on the value of foundations, well beyond their grantmaking role. The goal is to encourage trustees to engage peers in their personal and professional networks – in essence, enlisting trustees as strategic foundation communicators. In a Jan. 20 post for the Communications Network blog, the Council’s Rebecca Noricks offered details about this Philanthropy 3-D-Michigan (3D) pilot, noting that its goal is to develop a new communications model for the field. It has the potential to radically change traditional foundation communications and the heavy reliance on press releases about grants, she said, as well as to boost understanding about the work of foundations. The organization is currently testing and evaluating the pilot, with plans to release a report this spring on its progress and adapt it for use among grantmaking affinity groups in Indiana and Wisconsin.
Early comments from participants suggest the pilot is on to something. Noricks quotes Joseph M. Stewart, chair of the W.K. Kellogg Foundation, saying that trustees should be “educating others to the important role that foundations play in society today and letting other leaders from other sectors know we want to work with them. Together we can make a difference. Better communication methods and techniques is one way that can be achieved.”
Given the renewed interest in collaboration across sectors, Stewart makes an important point. Leaders throughout society need to know that foundations are transparent, open and willing partners. Foundation trustees are often employed by or have close ties with for-profit or nonprofit organizations. There could be substantial, long-term payoffs if trustees were to directly talk to others intheir networks about foundation missions, programs and successes. Foundation leaders worry that the story of philanthropy is not well told. Awareness of PAI’s project may spur some to discuss the idea with their trustees now.
Jane Wales
Vice President, The Aspen Institute
President and CEO, The World Affairs Council
Founding President, The Global Philanthropy Forum
Haiti Inspires New Givers--Will those in Philanthropy’s “Long Tail” Have Long Memories?
January 26, 2010
Americans have been donating in record numbers through new means—from phone texting to social media links—to provide relief to the victims of Haiti’s earthquake. The outpouring has been impressive, as revealed by the combination of on-line giving, the response to George Clooney’s global telethon (including iTunes sales) and the Council on Foundations’ list of its members’ grants.
Ultimately, Haiti’s recovery will be enabled by a similar mobilization of dollars and talent on behalf of Haiti’s long-term needs, for this is a country that has suffered from generations of mismanagement, endemic poverty, political instability, a weak civil society and autocratic governance. Its citizens deserve a better future. Perhaps new donors, inspired by this tragedy, will not only represent the “long tail” of philanthropy’s graph, but will have long memories as well and will be there ten year’s hence.
Our own country’s stance toward the small nation, which in 1804 produced the world’s first successful slave rebellion, has been wary and ineffectual, according to Mark Danner in a January 21 op-ed in The New York Times. A very different future for Haiti requires not only strategic philanthropy, but also sound U.S. policy, including the opening of our markets to Haitian agricultural produce and manufactured goods, and aid that translates into jobs for the Haitian people rather than patronage for its government.
Private philanthropy can complement good policy if the initial outpouring of support for relief efforts is matched by a longer-term commitment to sustainable development, a need most recently identified by Haiti’s Prime Minister. But re-imagining Haiti is more easily said than done. The U.S. is engaged in state-building in Afghanistan and Iraq. Each offers its own opportunities for public-private partnerships. And each offers is own best practices, and discouraging lessons. Philanthropists point to remarkable and courageous social entrepreneurs, especially among women, such as Afghanistan’s Dr. Sakena Yacoobi, who secretly taught girls throughout the Taliban’s rule. But the enterprise of poppy growing continues to outpace that of schooling young girls. Corruption not only precedes crises. It often follows as well.
How to pivot from immediate disaster relief to a long-term plan for what Secretary of State Clinton refers to as a Haiti that has come back “stronger and better” than before will be on the minds of “new philanthropists” as they gather for their ninth annual Global Philanthropy Forum from April 19-21 in Silicon Valley. This year’s focus on global health, food security and access to safe drinking water and sanitation seems especially apt in the wake of the earthquake’s shocks. Each represents a particularly crying need in Haiti. The philanthropists’ focus on results will likely make them sympathetic in the near-term to the argument made in a post to the University of Pennsylvania’s Center for High Impact Philanthropy blog, which called for support of organizations offering impact, rather than low overhead, as their metric for success. As for the medium-term, the recommendations in Arabella Philanthropic Investment Advisors’ Haiti Emergency Update, stressing the importance of the later stages of disaster recovery may resonate. And the Inter-American Development Bank’s President, Luis Alberto Moreno, will surely make the case for investing in Haiti’s water and sanitation infrastructure, education system, housing and building stock, access to healthcare and other needs identified by the Bank over the years. Former High Commissioner for Human Rights, Louise Arbour of the Crisis Group, will speak to the linkages between civil conflict on the one hand, and state failure on the other. Peter Gleick will shed light on the role that water management or mismanagement can play. Actor Jim Carrey will speak to breakthroughs in sustainable agriculture. David Aylward of mHealth Alliance will speak to new ways to deliver heath care in stressful conditions where infrastructure is lacking. And former Ghanaian President, John Kufuor, will speak to the responsibility of neighbors and regional organizations to strengthen societies before crises occur, so that those societies are able to prepare for or rebound from inevitable shocks.
As they consider the opportunities available to them, the gathering’s new philanthropists and political office holders will consider ways to partner with more recent entrants into the world of giving—the on-line donors, cell phone texters, twitter followers, iTunes purchasers—who are now part of the world of philanthropy. If those who represent the long tail of the giving graph also have long memories, then the tragic past of Haiti, and countries that are similarly weak, need not be their future for generations to come. Instead they can be among those societies that have the resilience to absorb and overcome the shocks that nature has to offer.
Jane Wales
Vice President, The Aspen Institute
President and CEO, The World Affairs Council
Founding President, The Global Philanthropy Forum
McKinsey and IFC add Cost Curve Analysis to Water Debate
January 15, 2010
Water scarcity is damaging livelihoods, human health and ecosystems around the world – both in urgent situations, such as Haiti, and in long term crises in the making. But strategies are at hand according to a report from McKinsey & Company, undertaken in partnership with the World Bank’s International Finance Corporation. Charting Our Water Future finds that in just 20 years, demand for water will be 40-percent higher than it is now. Unless local, national and global communities come together and dramatically improve the way water is managed, increasing efficiency and productivity, there will be many more hungry villages and degraded environments, according to the report. And it will be very difficult to meet related resource challenges, such as providing sufficient food or generating energy for the world’s population.
The report was developed as part of the 2030 Water Resources Group, a consortium of public and private-sector actors working to advance solutions in presentations to governmental, commercial and philanthropic decision-makers. It offers a “cost curve” as a means of analysis—one which demonstrates the long-term costs associated with failure to make near-term investments in infrastructure or conservation. And it demonstrates that multiple interventions are needed at all levels of investment and at differing stages, which is a reminder that we can each play a role within a larger strategy.
The report is meant to provide a means by which to compare the impact, cost and achievability of a range of measures and technologies that address water scarcity by boosting efficiency, augmenting supply and lessening the water-intensity of a country’s economy. Through case studies of India, China, Brazil’s Sao Paulo state and South Africa, the study reports that while improved efficiency in industry and municipal water systems is critical, enhanced agricultural productivity – increasing “crop per drop” – is essential to closing the gap between demand and supply. Agriculture today consumes 70 percent of the world’s water.
As the report makes plain, business as usual on the issue of water is not an option for most countries. Philanthropists and foundations that work in the area of international development are similarly committed to increasing awareness and promoting policies that address this issue. Family foundations have been key players in this space, and the Global Philanthropy Forum will feature access to safe water and sanitation as among its major foci at its annual conference in Silicon Valley, April 19-21. This gathering will include foundation executives, key officials from governments, private sector leaders and such expert voices as Peter Gleick of the Pacific Institute; Atiq Rahman of the Bangladesh Center for Advanced Studies; Barbara Frost of WaterAid; Gary White of Water.org; Monica Ellis of the Global Environment and Technology Foundation; Gebisa Ejeta, recipient of the 2009 World Food Prize Award; as well as an author of Charting our Water Future.
Jane Wales
Vice President, The Aspen Institute
President and CEO, The World Affairs Council
Founding President, The Global Philanthropy Forum
December 21, 2009
In a reminder that philanthropy’s story goes untold, a recent survey of civically engaged Americans reports that only 19 percent had heard or seen anything in the news about philanthropy’s response to the economic downturn. Reflecting previous surveys from the foundation-funded Philanthropy Awareness Initiative (PAI), very few respondents could cite an example of how a foundation had benefited the community or an issue about which these citizens care. Yet PAI reports in High Expectations, High Opportunity that these engaged Americans, who represent the 12 percent of the adult population who are active in their communities as civic or business leaders, are looking to foundations to find solutions to society’s problems. Specifically, they think foundations should voluntarily shift funding priorities to ease the pain of this economic recession. Given the fact that many foundations are already taking such steps, there is an information gap that needs to be filled, according to the PAI report. PAI notes that nearly 90 percent think foundations should be more open with the public about their activities, mistakes and lessons learned.
Points taken….I think.
Although they acknowledge the significance of PAI’s findings, it is deep within the culture of most private foundations to shun the spotlight and instead direct attention to the issues that concern them or the grantees they support.
Among the topics on the agenda of the Aspen Philanthropy Group is the question of whether foundations can be truly effective in advancing the public good while falling silent on the strategies that guide and the unique role that foundations play.
As this and previous PAI surveys demonstrate, it is a conversation that is overdue.
Jane Wales
Vice President, The Aspen Institute
President and CEO, The World Affairs Council
Founding President, The Global Philanthropy Forum
‘Change Philanthropy’: Book Highlights 10 Funders Engaged in Social Justice Philanthropy
December 18, 2009
A new book sponsored by the Center for Community Change and written by nonprofit and foundation consultant Alicia Epstein Korten, Change Philanthropy: Candid Stories of Foundations Maximizing Results through Social Justice, provides the inside stories of 10 funding organizations that have leveraged grant dollars, and in many cases endowments and influence, to transform systems in all sectors of society. The profiled funders, a mix of national, regional and small, from the Ford Foundation to the Global Fund for Women to the Jacobs Family Foundation, have moved beyond a focus solely on services, such as homeless shelters and hospitals, to one aimed at helping people influence the context in which they live. According to the book, they ask why a social problem or need exists, not just how a foundation can help – and then focus their grantmaking on the answers uncovered. All told, Korten writes, echoing others, foundations must be particularly strategic in the deployment of their various resources to have greatest impact: analyzing problems effectively, choosing partners and paths wisely and continually evaluating benchmarks along the way to assess progress. Korten writes that many foundation trustees and staff she interviewed shared information and stories publicly for the first time, offering a rare glimpse into the “often soundproof halls” of foundations.
Books like these are valuable resources, offering concrete examples of what it takes for foundations to make significant change. We would all benefit were foundations and donors to share more often their most effective programs and strategies, including reporting the steps, even mistakes, made along the way. Not only can this potentially improve the work of other organizations, it instills hope that no matter how daunting a challenge, change is possible.
So as to practice what we preach, the Global Philanthropy Forum has partnered with Foundations such as the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, Humanity United and Fundacion AVINA for just this purpose—so that these experienced grant-makers will reveal their strategies, successes and failures with principals of family foundations choosing to pursue a similar path.
Jane Wales
Vice President, The Aspen Institute
President and CEO, The World Affairs Council
Founding President, The Global Philanthropy Forum
December 9, 2009
For philanthropists seeking to help meet the needs of lower-income Americans falling into poverty, the University of Pennsylvania’s Center for High Impact Philanthropy argues that investing now in preventing foreclosures, sustaining primary and preventive health programs and ensuring access to food can prevent enormous costs and suffering later.
Philanthropists can get “the biggest bang for their (charitable) bucks” in the current economic recession by helping with these three basic needs, according to High Impact Philanthropy in the Downturn: Focus on Housing, Health & Hunger. The Center’s guide puts dollar figures on the aid that will, for example, help feed a family ($50 a week), prevent a family from losing its house ($300), or deliver health care to a newly uninsured person ($600). It also estimates how much more it would cost society if such aid were not to materialize now, arguing, for example that billions would be saved by greater investment in community health centers, avoiding more costly hospital- or ER-based care.
The Center’s work was informed by direct interviews, site visits, academic research, data from nonprofits, and statistics on the nation’s economy. The goal is to provide independent, practical advice. To this end the guide includes examples of nonprofits working in these three areas, and follows on a preliminary “Action Agenda” the Center had released in April.
With sustained strategic philanthropy, donors seek to address the underlying causes of poverty, and to find sustainable ways of ensuring that each person can reach his or her potential. The Global Philanthropy Forum focuses its agenda on these long term solutions worldwide. In these times of extraordinary need here at home, there is an opportunity to leverage increased government investments. And, the Center would argue that the time to act is now.
Jane Wales
Vice President, The Aspen Institute
President and CEO, The World Affairs Council
Founding President, The Global Philanthropy Forum
December 7, 2009
Some of the best nonprofits have been prevented from growing as large or becoming as capable as they should be. What’s needed, according to Steven Goldberg, a consultant to nonprofits and social entrepreneurs, is a new nonprofit capital market that would take the form of a prediction, or information, market, akin to political polls. In a new book, Billions of Drops in Millions of Buckets: Why Philanthropy Doesn’t Advance Social Progress, Goldberg argues that such a market, while not a silver bullet, would increase social impact by fundamentally restructuring the sector, turning philanthropy from being loyalty-based – guided by fundraising and relationships – to merit-based – guided by performance. The idea of a nonprofit capital market has been mentioned by many thought leaders in the sector, Goldberg acknowledges. Nonetheless, he feels it has not received sufficient attention to date. Such a virtual stock market or “Impact Index” would allow philanthropists to know what various nonprofits accomplish, through evaluation and transparency, and not just what nonprofits are trying to accomplish, through anecdotal reporting. Such data will help make the most promising nonprofits, with the greatest likelihood of “transformative social impact,” stand out from the “weeds,” he writes.
Goldberg is not alone. Most established foundations are making the case for improved impact assessment -- and for a decision-making process that is based on objective measures. And most organizations that study or support the sector -- including GEO, FSG, Independent Sector, the
Before detailing his plan for this Impact Index, Goldberg writes about the problems of the current financial structure governing the sector. Traditional fundraising takes too much time and offers too little money, as foundations offer too many small, short-term grants with lots of strings attached. This practice reduces foundations’ risks of failure, he writes – but may also lead to less significant achievement. The sector’s most critical flaw, he says, is the fact that funding is tied to relationships, not performance.
The release of Goldberg’s book is timed to take place when the discussion of metrics and evaluation is taking place in all corners of the sector -- but has not yet exhausted us. Superb work has been done and is being undertaken by many organizations on both the local and the national levels. For some, this is the time to take the discussion the last mile, from thought and successful experiment to field-wide change. But, in trying to do so, we might want to bear in mind the resilience of human nature. Both performance and relationships will surely play a role.
Jane Wales
Vice President, The
President & CEO, The World Affairs Council
Founding President, The Global Philanthropy Forum