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January 2012

Putting Grantees In the Center of Your Map

by Paul Beaudet | January 24th, 2012

This is the second post written by Paul Beaudet of Wilburforce Foundation on the complex relationship between funders and grantees. Last week in Doing Less with Less, he raised the issue of unrealistic expectations by some funders that nonprofit organizations would maintain their prior level of activity despite the impact of the economic downturn and the subsequent recession. ...

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Data Point: Is Evaluation Resulting in Meaningful Insight for Foundations?

by Ellie Buteau, PhD | January 20th, 2012

For our recent State of Foundation Performance Assessment report, we gathered data from 173 CEOs of U.S. ...

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Doing Less With Less

by Paul Beaudet | January 18th, 2012

Those of us who work for foundations want our grantees to invest in core activities that more efficiently and effectively contribute to desired outcomes. Yet funders may make it harder for grantees to do so, often by focusing exclusively on specific grant-funded activities — as opposed to outcomes — and by underinvesting in core organizational needs. ...

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Seven “New” Concepts that Are Not So New After All: Reflections on a History of Philanthropy

by Phil Buchanan | January 10th, 2012

There seems to be an increasing number of books and reports about philanthropy and nonprofits, most promising to improve the efficacy of those who follow their wise words. The best of these acknowledge the distinct challenges of philanthropic and nonprofit effectiveness, and modestly build on what we know – basing their conclusions on real data. ...

5 comments

What Strategy Is…And Isn’t – Hint: It’s Not Rocket Science

by Cindy Gibson | January 3rd, 2012

Strategy is something that people in philanthropy seem to talk about a lot. What they do, though, may be another matter. ...

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Assessing Performance

Funder/Grantee Relationships

Guest Author

Managing Operations

Optimizing Governance

Programming and Communications

Uncategorized

YouthTruth

A Transparency Mindset in the Foundation Boardroom

The 7 Habits of Highly Ineffective Foundation Boards

Are Funders and Their Grantees Discussing Racial Diversity?

Recasting the Relationship Between Foundations and Nonprofits

Companies to the Rescue

Using Social Media to Shift from Delivering Information to Creating Value

A CEP Advisory Board Member Weighs In

Our Starry-Eyed Idealization of Markets

Data Point: Board Materials

Searching for Certitude in the Nuance of Numbers

Will What Was Said in Detroit Stay in Detroit?
Carola Weil on May 30th
While I unable to attend the conference, I was interested in this edition of your blog. As someone who has moved in and out of...

Lessons from a Risk Taken
Julia Coffman on May 2nd
I really appreciate your willingness to share this and your assessment of what didn't work out as planned or anticipated. Thanks.

Lessons from a Risk Taken
Kevin Bolduc on April 30th
Jon, thanks for the comment. If there’s one thing we learned, it’s that the cost in time and effort and dollars were all higher than...

Lessons from a Risk Taken
Jon Pratt on April 25th
Thanks for sharing the lessons learned, and what I sense are second thoughts about the cost/benefit of the whole enterprise. I appreciate the thirst for...

Foundations and Impact Investing: What Is Really Going On?
The Children's ISA on April 22nd
Great insight. Sometimes it's great to invest in multiple countries as security as the economy in one country might decrease and increase in another.