The philanthropic force of connected giving

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As governments around the world pull back, the philanthropic sector will be a critical force in meeting global needs. In what is called the “Giving Pledge”, 81 billionaires have committed to give more than half of their wealth to charitable organizations.  This level of philanthropy, over $37 billion by Warren Buffett alone, is historically unprecedented.

Warren Buffett most lasting contribution will not be his money; rather that he has successfully leveraged his social network and the media to inspire other billionaires to give extraordinary wealth for charitable good.  He is reshaping the way the rich think about money and giving.

And in the same way Warren Buffett has used media to get other billionaires to pledge their fortune to charity, people all over the world have used social media to raise money and inspire their network to join them in giving.

Indeed, according to Blackbaud, people are 200 times more likely to donate to a cause if their friends ask them to support a charity, in comparison to receiving an e-mail solicitation from the organization.  This is part of a distinct cultural shift – you no longer have to be a professional to be a fundraiser.

With the rise in connected giving will come the use of social data for fundraising.  Seventy percent of Millennials ages 20-35 report they prefer to give online, making online giving as the #1 preferred method of giving.

The IDC, a technology research firm, estimates that the total amount of data doubles every two years.  Social media data is a major part of this growth.  Marketers are interested in the “social network value” of a customer– how one person’s purchase influences others to buy a product.  Similarly, nonprofits are becoming aware how a donation can have a ripple effect in the donor’s network.

–Matt Bishop, founder and CEO of iGiveMore

 

 

Humanitarian aid plus covert aid to Syria

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The United States has announced it is sending an additional $12 million in humanitarian aid to Syria, warning of a “dire and rapidly deteriorating” situation inside the country.

Citing U.N. estimates, the White House said up to 1.5 million Syrians are in need of aid, including more than 130,000 who have fled the country amid the uprising against President Bashar al-Assad.

“With these additional funds, the United States is now providing over $76 million in assistance for food, water, medical supplies, clothing, hygiene kits, and other humanitarian relief to those most urgently in need,” the White House said.

The move comes a day after U.S. officials told CNN that President Barack Obama had signed a directive authorizing covert, supposed non-lethal U.S. support for Syrian rebel fighters by the CIA and other agencies. It was unclear exactly what the secret order, referred to as an intelligence “finding,” authorized and when it was signed, but the sources said it was within the past several months.

Food production for developing nations

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The Obama administration drafted some of the world’s largest food and finance companies to invest more than $3 billion in projects aimed at helping the world’s poorest farmers grow enough food to not only feed themselves and their families but to earn a livelihood as well.

President Obama and the leaders of four African countries introduced the group of 45 companies, the New Alliance for Food Security and Nutrition, at the last summit meeting of the Group of 8 industrialized nations. The alliance includes well-known multinational giants like Monsanto, Diageo and Swiss Re as well as little-known businesses like Mullege, an Ethiopian coffee exporter.

The U.S. administration also reported on the progress of what is known as the L’Aquila Food Security Initiative, the largest international effort in decades to combat hunger by investing in the fundamentals of agriculture, including seeds, fertilizer, grain storage, roads and infrastructure. The initiative, first agreed upon by the Group of 8 leaders at their meeting in L’Aquila, Italy, in 2009, was a pledge to put $22 billion into food and agriculture projects. Although much of the money had previously been earmarked for agriculture projects, about $6 billion was new. Apparently most all of the $22 billion is budgeted and appropriated, and over half of this disbursed.

Polio has sprung back to life

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Nothing demonstrates human interconnectedness like the spread of infectious disease. Polio is endemic to just three countries: Afghanistan, Nigeria and Pakistan. In recent years however, visitors have carried polio back to 39 previously polio-free states. Thus people everywhere have a stake in eradicating polio, as we have stamped out smallpox.

Immunizing the last unvaccinated children on the planet is an expensive and complex undertaking, and worth it in the long run. The world not only would be forever spared an incurable, crippling and often fatal disease. It would also save a lot of money. If polio transmission could be stopped by 2015, the net benefit from reduced treatment costs and productivity gains through 2035 would be $40 billion to $50 billion, according to a 2010 study.

Thanks to the efforts of the Global Polio Eradication Initiative — which links national governments to the World Health Organization, the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, Unicef, Rotary International and the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation — progress has been tremendous.

The coalition has adopted an emergency plan that prioritizes efforts in the three endemic countries.  (Remarkably, India, which because of population density and poor sanitation was considered the greatest challenge, had zero new polio cases last year.) The idea is to stop the virus at the source and hope it doesn’t spread to places where vigilance has been lightened.

Social Entrepreneurship under the heading Community Wealth Enterprise

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In his book, “Revolution of the Heart”, Bill Shore defines a facet of social entrepreneurship: “Instead of businesses deciding what nonprofit causes to support with some of their excess profit, nonprofits need to decide what line of business they can devise to create profits needed to support their public-interest efforts.”

Nonprofits creating a business to create the cash they need to support their efforts. This hybrid entity has a name: Community Wealth Enterprise (CWE).

Instead of fighting for a slice of the charitable pie, a CWE bakes its own pie.

It’s not a business where profit margins are top priority, and it’s not a non-profit that strives for philanthropy but has no money of its own.

[Excerpts of an article by William Long]

Would your organization have given Gandhi a grant?

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Here’s a thought-provoking question: Would your organization have given Gandhi a grant? How about Martin Luther King?

Speaking on the state of philanthropy, Dr. Bob Ross, the CEO of The California Endowment, said: “I shudder to think what would have happened if Martin Luther King, or Gandhi, or Cesar Chavez had submitted a grant application to us.”

He made this observation while discussing the ways his organization tries to push the boundaries on risk-taking while also being conscious of its mission, its appetite for risk, and the political and cultural climate in which it operates.

Generally, he said, foundations are very risk averse.

And of course, what impacted the audience was the thought that we could possibly pass on supporting someone who would go on to change the world in a really big way. Or that we already had.

A Paradigm Shift for Corporate Philanthropy

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Even before the Occupy Wall Street movement highlighted the role and power of corporate America in this nation’s wealth divide, according to researchers on corporate philanthropy, corporate foundation grantmakers felt “disconnected.”

It must be even more difficult since the occupiers targeted Wall Street and a spin-off, the 99% Movement, is marching on corporate shareholder meetings. Think of the quandary of corporate foundation staff: seen by the critics as factotums for a corporate agenda, seen from within their corporations as “do-gooders” perhaps not as connected to the “strategic” corporate agenda as bottom line-focused employees, and seen by themselves as people engaged, or wanting to be engaged, in philanthropy.

The researcher suggested corporate philanthropy is in that dreaded moment of “paradigm shift.” This is usually a term contributed by consultants and think tankers, but maybe it does apply in the corporate world as well.

Putting this in context:  “We need a new narrative about who we are, a narrative about value creation, how we’re creating more value for society.”

60 percent of Americans think that business is best equipped to solve our nation’s social problems, compared to a much smaller percentage who would turn to government.

[Excerpt of an article by Rick Cohen]

Grants as a source of funding

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Access to capital is one of the greatest challenges for both small business owners and small non-profits and NGOs. Knowing where to look and how to sift through grant information that applies specifically to your business can be laborious. But, it can also be very rewarding.

Grant writing is a very specialized discipline and requires strong compliance, research, and writing skills. The relationship between grant makers and grant seekers is governed by specific grant protocol, which refers to the rules and requirements governing the provision and award of grant funding. Protocols are grant-specific.

Grant makers include foundations, nonprofits, businesses, corporations, clubs, and professional organizations. Grants are also provided by state, local, and federal governmental agencies.

State, local, and federal government grants are driven by legislation. Every year, the U.S. government awards $400 billion in grants. Private grant funding sources include foundations, nonprofits, businesses, corporations, clubs, and professional organizations. Information on private grants can be found on the Grantsmanship Center website (tgci.com). The website provides information on top grant making foundations, community foundations, corporate giving programs, and state government grant opportunities by state.

Information on independent, corporate, and community foundation funding sources are also available on the Foundation Center website (foundationcenter.org) and the Council on Foundations (cof.org). The Foundation Center provides grant seekers with information on philanthropy opportunities, proposal writing, research, and training. The Council on Foundations provides grant makers (foundations, corporations, and philanthropic entities) with foundation management services.

Foundations and corporate giving programs offer two types of grants: general purpose or program development. General purpose grant awards can be used to fund operating expenses and special programs. Program development grant awards are restricted to funding specific projects.

Bottom line, the quality and completeness of your grant proposal has a tremendous impact on whether or not your project is selected for funding. It behooves those seeking grants to build a relationship with the grant maker to validate the grant proposal approach, if possible. If a face-to-face meeting is not feasible, a letter of introduction and a conference call is the next best option.