July 24th, 2008
Operating under the theory that a strong regional economy helps everyone, nonprofits are springing up around the country to fund start-ups that would have trouble attracting capital from more traditional investors. The starring role in today’s New York Times trend story is played by the Cleveland-area nonprofit Jumpstart Inc.
Like a venture capital firm, Jumpstart identifies companies to invest in and advises them on their next steps.
But unlike a venture firm, Jumpstart relies on charitable donations, many of them from the private sector, for its financing and does not return a share of profits to those who provide the investment dollars. The return comes as satisfaction for elevating a region’s economic standing.
I love this kind of partnership, but my cynical side tells me that the private funders are in it for something more than regional pride. The kind of start-ups they’re funding attract talented workers, people who like to spend money. Economically strong regions are able to command higher real estate prices. Entrepreneurs who don’t have to kick back a percentage of their funding look positively on their funders. You get the idea. Like I said, it’s a cool notion, but while the funding organizations are nonprofits, many of their donors most certainly are not — and they’re the kind of people whose motivation isn’t the warm-and-fuzzies. | 501(c)
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By Tom Durso -- 0 comments
July 23rd, 2008
Interesting damage-control tactic: Point to how you help charities. And so, facing criticism that its attempts to go green are nowhere near as comprehensive as they should be, the direct-mail industry’s response is to play the nonprofit card:
“Our industry employs quite a few people, generates billions of dollars in revenues for the economy and a huge number of donations for nonprofits,” said Richard E. Bushee III, president of MSP, a direct mailer. “Yes, the guidelines are a bit loose, and yes, we need to put numbers to them soon. But at least we’re showing the world that we’re talking about this, that we think it’s important.”
As the piece, from today’s New York Times, notes, the reason direct mail is so prevalent is that it works. “The return on investment is just too high,” notes one corporate marketing director. That said, should nonprofits, many of which lean green, rethink the abuse of the environment that their direct mail entails? Especially when a very profitable industry is using the sector to justify a greening that many critics feel is merely cosmetic? | 501(c)
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By Tom Durso -- 1 comment
July 23rd, 2008
How much would you pay to hang in Howard Stern’s Sirius studio while he and his crew do one of their daily broadcasts? To buy a piano Elton John played on tour? To name a new species of monkey?
Charity auctions are nothing new, but as BusinessWeek notes, nonprofits are using online auctions to open up the fundraising to new audiences — and to garner far larger winning bids in the process. The auctions noted above, all conducted online, are among the most lucrative ever conducted. Technology has long been touted as a great way to do more with less. In this case, it would seem, the hype has been worth it. | 501(c)
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By Tom Durso -- 0 comments
July 22nd, 2008
The September 11 attacks elicited, however briefly, a spirit of common decency that united Americans as nothing had in decades. There was real dialogue about the need to engage our fellow citizens humanly and humanely. Donations poured in to organizations set up to help victims of those horrendous deeds. Charities and foundations seemed poised to leverage the new wave of American civic-mindedness.
Yet according to a harsh new report from the nonprofit OMB Watch and Grantmakers Without Borders, “since Sept. 11, 2001, we have witnessed counterterrorism programs erode the freedom and ability of charities and their funders to carry out their missions and improve the lives of the world’s people. We believe that this is damaging civil society in the United States and negatively impacting the nation’s reputation and effectiveness on the global stage.”
That’s an awfully serious charge.
The authors write that the government’s view of “nonprofits as conduits for terrorist funding and a breeding ground for aggressive dissent” means that those organizations now “operate within a legal regime that harms charitable programs, undermines the independence of the nonprofit sector, and weakens civil society.” The report describes a massive overreaction by federal officials to a few isolated incidents of nonprofit malfeasance, leading to a crackdown that has weakened nonprofits’ ability to effectively carry out their missions.
After watching the Constitution get trampled by an ethically sketchy executive branch and overly compliant legislature who all seem to believe that we need to destroy liberty in order to save it, I sympathize greatly with the sector’s complaints. I also wish it luck in convincing the American public, which has allowed itself to be scared into submission, that the threat to nonprofits is real. It will need that luck. | 501(c)
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By Tom Durso -- 0 comments
July 21st, 2008
Bad news, Generation X, Generation Y, Millennials, and whatever the hell else they’re calling anybody under the age of 50 these days: The Baby Boomers are coming to the nonprofit sector.
Yesterday New York Times columnist Nicholas Kristof wrote breathlessly about the coming trend of retiring Boomers who are shelving their golf clubs in favor of “encore careers” that involve “giving back”:
Some 78 million American baby boomers are now beginning to retire, and one survey this year by a research institute found that half of boomers are interested in starting such new careers with a positive social impact. If we boomers decide to use our retirement to change the world, rather than our golf game, our dodderdom will have consequences for society every bit as profound as our youth did.
And, later, after swooning over a British management consultant who launched an anti-malaria charity:
Some 78 million American baby boomers are now beginning to retire, and one survey this year by a research institute found that half of boomers are interested in starting such new careers with a positive social impact. If we boomers decide to use our retirement to change the world, rather than our golf game, our dodderdom will have consequences for society every bit as profound as our youth did.
It’s terrific that Bill Gates is making such a visible jump from corporate America to foundation work. It’s terrific that, if the trend spotters are right, a lot of his contemporaries will be joining him. But let’s not forget that there were plenty of retirees who were riding that train before Gates et al got on board, and there were plenty of younger folks getting their hands dirty setting up the organizations that the Boomers plan on helping while they were spending their newfound wealth on Botox milkshakes. Over-extolling the ambitions of those who rediscovered their ideals when it was convenient does a disservice to those who live the mission daily. | 501(c)
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July 20th, 2008
- Debt forgiveness for young nonprofiteers holding student loans. | Mission-Based Management
- A call for fundraisers to watch what they say. | the fundit
- How do you stay focused on the mission when the work pushes you to the brink of exhaustion? | Perspectives from the Pipeline
- It’s wicked easy to subscribe to 501(c) Files feeds: Just click here and follow the simple instructions. As always, thanks for reading! | 501(c)
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July 18th, 2008
Writing in InformationWeek, John Soat says that chief information officers in coming years must develop a greater sense of altruism. Perceptively, he observes that information technology is one of those putatively non-impact areas that donors don’t like to fund:
The problem is this: Contributors don’t want charities to spend money on IT because they see it as overhead rather than opportunity. Unfortunately, many in executive management in the nonprofit sector feel the same way.
Soat writes about efforts by CIOs in central Ohio to land on nonprofit boards there in hopes of persuading the organizations that IT expertise and resources are worthy spending money on. But the payoff for that kind of investment can be huge, he notes, which is all the more reason for senior-level IT executives to share their skills with nonprofits.
It’s important for Tomorrow’s CIOs to be involved in charitable work because (a) it’s the right thing to do; (b) CIOs have skills, not just in technology but in project management, that are valuable and needed; and (c) more people need to see evidence that technology is a solution, not a problem. | 501(c)
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By Tom Durso -- 1 comment
July 17th, 2008
Nancy Schwartz’s Getting Attention Nonprofit Tagline Awards today recognized a dozen nonprofits for their exceptional efforts in capturing the essences of their respective organizations in just a few words. From arts and culture to education to human services and several other categories, the sector was well represented in all of its diverse glory. More than 3,000 nonprofit professionals voted in Schwartz’s online poll to choose the winners from among 62 finalists.
My favorite? “Where Actors Find Their Space,” the tagline of NYC Theatre Spaces, a free database of New York’s rehearsal and performance venues. Clever, meaningful, and concise, it says an awful lot in just those five words. | 501(c)
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July 16th, 2008
Red-blooded Americans are not the only ones recoiling in horror that before long, each case of Budweiser they buy will dump money into the coffers of a Belgian company.
Nonprofits in St. Louis, where Anheuser-Busch’s headquarters are located, are worried that the brewer’s new owner, InBev, may not provide the kind of support they’ve come to depend upon over the years.
Anheuser-Busch gave $13 million to charitable causes in the St. Louis region last year. At least 70 local organizations got money from A-B. Carlos Brito, the chief executive officer of InBev, has said his company would maintain a St. Louis civic presence.
As indifferent as I am to who owns a brewer whose products I find to be watered-down, flavorless excuses for beer, 13 million bucks is nothing to sneeze at. And with TWA long gone, I’m hard-pressed to identify a corporate titan who can provide St. Louis with the charitable presence it’s come to rely on. It just might be time for the city’s suds drinkers to switch to Miller High Life. | 501(c)
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By Tom Durso -- 3 comments
July 16th, 2008
Jailbreak fundraisers, in which local celebrities go behind bars until enough money can be donated to “free” them, are a familiar feature of the charitable landscape, so kudos to the Nova Scotia chapter of the Children’s Wish Foundation for putting a new twist on things:
[The chapter] is currently working to grant 43 wishes, and has come up with a creative fundraising effort to help fund those wishes.
It’s called “Exile Island,” and it’s based on the landmark reality TV program “Survivor.” The plan is to have ten “tribes” of ten banished to George’s Island on Friday, September 19, where they will compete to win their way off the island. …
The tribes will compete to build a shelter, to pass mental and physical challenges and, most importantly, to raise funds. So despite being exiled out of their offices, they’ll get to hang on to their Blackberries. “A lot of their big donations come while they’re on the island, so there’s pretty fierce competition on the island,” [chapter director Cheryl] Matthews says.
Survivor’s producers have used the show to raise money for good causes in the past, so if I were Ms. Matthews, I’d be trying to reach Mark Burnett in advance of September 19. Wonder what Rupert is doing that day … | 501(c)
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