Monthly Archives: September 2012

Sep 28 2012
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Sara Beggs, Tax & Legal

IRS Reduces International Giving Regulations

By Sara Beggs, ASF

Sara BeggsWouldn’t it be great if your foundation could respond to the latest international crisis without loads of regulatory burdens? While expenditure responsibility rules are potentially less burdensome than some may think, it is still a process that is a significant barrier to international giving – especially for foundations with few or no staff.

But what if the government made it easier for your foundation to evaluate whether a non-U.S. NGO is equivalent to a U.S. public charity and you didn’t have to do expenditure responsibility at all? Impossible, you say? Well, as impossible as it may seem, that’s exactly what is happening. And, just to increase the shock value, it’s also not years or months down the road; it has already started. Continue reading →

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Sep 27 2012
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Investments, Peter Berliner

Program Related Investments: A Fit for Your Foundation?

By Peter Berliner, Mission Investors Exchange

Peter BerlinerWhen you scroll through the agenda for the upcoming ASF National Conference and alight on Amp Up Your Impact with Program Related Investments, you may wonder, “How is this relevant to me?” Program Related Investments (PRIs) are in the realm of the giants—Annie E. Casey, Ford, and Gates. Can a small foundation with only handful of dollars (comparatively speaking) get into the act too?

The answer is, yes. In fact, foundations of all types and sizes throughout the country are already using PRIs and other mission investments to complement their grantmaking. Why? It could be because it makes more sense to loan money than to give it away to meet a short-term need for a construction loan or working capital. It’s also a way to idle capital to use in the neighborhoods you care about by making deposits in a community bank or credit union. It doesn’t have to be complicated to be effective. In addition, when a loan or equity investment is repaid, you get to use the dollars all over again. What’s greener than recycling cash? Continue reading →

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Sep 24 2012
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Administration, Patricia St. Onge

Hiring Foundation Staff With Complementary Work Styles

By Patricia St. Onge, Seven Generations Consulting and Coaching

I was pleased to be asked to share some thoughts about hiring staff in small foundations. I have served as interim director to more than a dozen organizations and foundations where I have facilitated the process of hiring new leadership. I would like to share a few tools I use when supporting the process of hiring.

The most important element of the search is to find a person who is the right fit for your foundation at its particular moment in history. I take board members and staff through a process of identifying the developmental stage at which they find themselves at their foundation. We then imagine where we want to be in the next three-to-five years and what kind of leadership we need to facilitate our growth as we imagine it. We consider both specific hard skills, such as knowledge about how to make Program Related Investments, and also personality and leadership characteristics. We use that information to write a job description.

To help ensure the best fit for a new employee, I use the medicine wheel, an indigenous model for determining complementary work styles. This provides insight into different working or leadership styles associated with each of the four directions – visionary, nurturer, warrior, or critical thinker. Continue reading →

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Sep 21 2012
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Henry Berman, Leadership

How Does Your Foundation See the World?

By Henry Berman, ASF

Henry BermanIt is often hard to truly understand and empathize with organizations asking foundations for funding. I recall once visiting a pre-school program and being told the children left each day heading to homes with no books. The first time I heard this I honestly could not grasp that concept. Having grown up in a home surrounded by books and a mother who was a librarian, the idea of no books was, to me, totally foreign.

The story is told that Eleanor Roosevelt was giving a lecture when a hostile audience member asked if she thought her husband Franklin’s illness had affected his mind. “Yes” she answered. “Anyone who has gone through great suffering is bound to have greater sympathy and understanding of the problems of mankind.”

Given that we may not have experienced illiteracy, homelessness, or certain diseases in the first person, how do we try to better understand those we want to serve? Continue reading →

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Sep 19 2012
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Impact & Evaluation, Lauren Kotkin

How Do You Focus Your Giving?

By Lauren Kotkin, ASF

Lauren KotkinThere’s a phenomenon that started a few years ago in major urban areas. Perhaps you live in a city, or visited one, and experienced this. You’re walking down the street and two young people in matching t-shirts holding clipboards stand right in front of you and ask, “Do you care about kids?” They want you to say yes so you can sign up for their organization’s e-list and become a donor.

I am formerly an early childhood educator, so yes, I do care about kids. But the next question is if I have time to stop on my way to the Metro, grocery store, home, etc., to talk about a charity that raises money to help children, and even more importantly, still, is whether I will give.

And that’s when I hatched my plan. Continue reading →

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Sep 17 2012
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Grantmaking, Lisa Philp

Scanning the Landscape in the Information Age

By Lisa Philp, Foundation Center

“After reading the Scan 2.0 guide, I recognize that many things that we do can be considered scanning, even though I had only viewed them as “knowing our communities.” — Leslie Cheu, Executive Director, The Troy Savings Bank Charitable Foundation, Troy, NY

“Thoroughly understanding the systems dynamics of the fields in which we are granting is fundamentally important. To understand, we need to ‘scan the landscape’ routinely and effectively. Without making the effort to scan, we run the risk of flying blind in our grantmaking.” — Mary Anthony, Executive Director, 1772 Foundation, Pomfret, CT

To increase your impact as a small foundation, you may find it necessary to look for targets of opportunity—places where your foundation’s support could be especially influential, where its resources could help develop a new direction or innovation, or where you might be able to join forces or align your funding with others in order to accomplish something bigger than you could do alone. Finding those opportunities and understanding how a given field or community works are often referred to as “scanning the landscape.”

Scans can be tailored for different needs such as finding a strategic direction, hearing from key constituencies, understanding emerging issues, mapping the funding environment, or synthesizing information and finding gaps. In this age of information overload, an increasing number of funders are feeling a need to scan more or less continually and are using technology tools to streamline and simplify the process. Continue reading →

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Sep 12 2012
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Henry Berman, Leadership

Inspired by Inspiring

By Henry Berman, ASF

Teachers talk about star pupils. Business executives about mentors. Athletes about coaches. We all have people, or perhaps events, in our lives that inspire or motivate us.

Sometimes the source is crystal clear and easy to recognize. Other times it may be more subtle. Often we look into our past for motivation. For example, we remember the high school teacher or coach who went that extra mile for us and in doing so helped us recognize our own potential. Yet other times the inspiration is found right before us, staring us in the face. The recent Olympic Games certainly provided many moments which left me, and I venture many of you, moved and inspired.

In the introduction to her book, Giving 2.0: Transform Your Giving and Our World, philanthropist, social entrepreneur, and educator Laura Arrillaga-Andreessen talks about what inspired her to help make the world a better place. Speaking in the first person Laura wrote:

Laura Arrillaga-Andreessen“[My] own first inspiration came from my family, and in particular my mother. Frances Arrillaga was my best friend, my mentor, my soul mate. In her living, she inspired me, and in her dying, she showed me a new life path. I took the tragedy of losing her and transformed it into my life’s greatest blessing—my giving.”

All of this has me wondering about what motivates my philanthropy, my giving — whether as a foundation trustee or personally. Continue reading →

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Sep 06 2012
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Gerald P. McCarthy, Grantmaking

Small Foundations and Public Policy

Gerald McCarthyBy Gerald P. McCarthy, Virginia Environmental Endowment

How might foundations improve public policies that affect the issues and programs they care about?

There is hardly a field that foundations support that is not affected by local, state, or federal laws and policies. Whether it is K-12 education, healthy lifestyles, affordable housing, persistent poverty, or improving the environment, there are policies that can help or hinder our work. If your foundation is not engaging in public policy, you could be missing out on one of the most effective tools in your foundation toolbox.

“Who, me?” you ask. Sure. Engaging in public policy is one good way to increase your foundation’s impact — even if you grant less than $100,000 a year. And it is perfectly legal. (See Legal Parameters for foundations, from Northern California Grantmakers.)

What kinds of things can you fund? 

You can help solve problems. A few years ago one local government had a smelly stretch of river in its downtown that discouraged revitalization. It wanted to know the source of that problem. For less than $3,000 we funded a local college student (with help from her professor) to find the answer. The city council was delighted with her study and approved the funds to invest in her solution and end the problem. Continue reading →

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Sep 04 2012
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Effectiveness Skills, Janice Simsohn Shaw

5 Facilitation Tips for Foundation Leaders

By Janice Simsohn Shaw, ASF

Last week I wrote about why strong facilitation skills are important in philanthropy. Here are 5 facilitation tips I shared at a recent ASF Local Program with Delaware Valley Grantmakers.

Janice-Simsohn-Shaw1. TIME – Build in plenty of planning time for facilitating. One handy rule of thumb: for a really productive meeting, spend twice as much time on planning as you would for the meeting itself. Do everyone a favor and spend the time to craft a realistic agenda. More times than not, we know what we can accomplish realistically in a given amount of time. Consider what’s most valuable to do when people are together in person (or by phone) and focus your energies there. An overstuffed agenda leaves everyone feeling frustrated. A manageable one leaves everyone feeling accomplished and proud. Which do you prefer? Continue reading →

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