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Most large U.S. foundations reduced their grantmaking during the Great Recession of 2008-09, but in a recent column for HistPhil, NCRP Director of Research Ryan Schlegel highlighted 2 foundations that did not:

“Neither The California Endowment (TCE) nor the Lumina Foundation are spend-down foundations, and neither is attached to a living mega-donor whose support can replenish their assets periodically. But both TCE and Lumina either maintained or increased their grantmaking during the Great Recession years – TCE gave 23% more in 2009 than in 2007, Lumina gave 98% more. Their grantmaking during the depths of the recession is especially notable when compared with the rest of the largest 100 foundations in the FC1000, whose grantmaking was 11% lower in 2009 than in 2007.”

Schlegel interviewed representatives from both foundations and noted 3 important lessons for philanthropy from Lumina and TCE’s experiences.

Read the entire column to learn more.

Image by Investment Zen. Used under Creative Commons license.

A friend and grassroots organizer recently posted on Facebook that a local women’s shelter needed emergency supplies.

Several people replied that they had items to donate. My friend organized a contact-free pickup process. I went to their houses, picked up 6 bags of clothes and towels from their porches, and dropped them off at the shelter.

Though we didn’t all previously know each other, this was organized in executed in about 36 hours in the DC Mutual Aid Facebook group.

All over the country Mutual Aid Networks have been organizing at the grassroots level to empower individuals to share their talents and resources to help others in their communities.

The networks were well positioned when economic and social systems started to fail in the spread of COVID-19 to connect people making asks and offers in small and large ways.

Members can assist with a range of needs, including groceries, violence interruption, household goods and technology access.

The networks also create easy ways for people to participate in advocacy efforts and social movement activities in their communities.

And, these networks provide direct support to individuals and communities that may have a hard time getting relief from institutions — like undocumented and unhoused residents. 

For decades NCRP has advocated for philanthropy to support the kinds of organizations that bolster Mutual Aid Networks – increasing support for marginalized communities and advocacy.

In recent years, conversations about equity have become more common in the sector, with funders and donors leveraging their power to advance it.

But that conversation can stall when it comes to supporting the most grassroots of efforts. Through our Power Moves initiative, we hear frustration and confusion from staff at foundations who want to advance equity but desire more guidance about how to do it.

Mutual Aid Networks, especially in this moment of crisis, are a good place to start. And given the racial disparities in the impacts of the COVID-19 virus, strong equity practices are more important than ever.

The good news is that if you already fund community organizing or advocacy, your grantee partners might already be connected to the local mutual aid network.

Here are 3 ways that funders can be responsive to the networks:

Share space and credibility

Some organizers for local mutual aid networks are working 7 days a week, at all hours of the day and night. Foundations can lend office space and supplies to organizers, even if your office is officially closed.

And foundations and larger nonprofits can provide documentation naming organizers as “essential volunteers.” With increasingly strict shelter-in-place orders, organizers and other volunteers may be at risk by moving around to support members of the community.

If organizers are questioned by law enforcement, the letter can help them navigate local laws and continue their work.

Simplify your funding process

Many funders have created rapid response funds to support their grantees during the pandemic. Yet few funders have simply given more funding to grantees without an application process.

Weissberg Foundation and Borealis Philanthropy have done so. They notified existing grantees that they would transfer a fixed amount to all of them. No application was required.

The transfer removed the administrative burden – no matter how small – from organizations that are already stressed in their response time.

This is especially true for direct service organizations and organizing groups, many of whom are a part of their local mutual aid networks.

Fund sabbaticals after the crisis

The staff and volunteers at nonprofits involved in Mutual Aid Networks are experiencing heightened levels of stress and trauma during the pandemic; yet, according to Candid data, U.S. foundations gave just $1 million to support sabbaticals between 2006 and 2017.

Organizers will need the opportunity to heal without worrying about time lost from existing work or loss of income.

If you are not already funding movements, now is the time to start. We know that the COVID-19 pandemic is harming Black, Indigenous and people of color the most. We know that people who are incarcerated, experiencing homelessness or who are undocumented are most vulnerable to the disease.

Mutual Aid Networks are a powerful entry point to collections of direct service organizations, community organizing groups and advocates who reach the most marginalized members of our communities.

These networks empower individual community members across race, class and gender to better understand the systems and structures that are failing right now, and provide alternatives to them.

By supporting organizations involved in Mutual Aid Networks with funding and resources, foundations and donors can lay the groundwork for leveraging their power to support movements in the long-term.

Jeanné Lewis is vice president and chief engagement officer at NCRP, and volunteers with the local Mutual Aid Network and direct service organizations in her city. For more information about Mutual Aid Networks and other COVID-19 resources for philanthropy, visit NCRP’s COVID-19 hub.

It’s still early in the COVID-19 crisis, yet many funders have already taken important steps to support grantees.

Dozens of community foundations have established rapid response funds, which will be hugely important. Kudos to Seattle Foundation for being the first.

Many private foundations have indicated they will be flexible with grantees and that grantees should contact them to renegotiate timelines and deliverables.

That flexibility is good. However, the 3 commitments I’ve been most impressed with so far are listed below. They’re notable to me because they’re specific and don’t require each grantee to go to the funder and negotiate changes one at a time.

My favorites are:

Providing an extra year of funding

Robert Sterling Clark Foundation is providing an extra year of funding to grantees. They wrote: “Add one additional year to every grant. We hope that this will ease some funding concerns and allow you to focus on serving your communities, not on us. The ‘Plus One’ pushes grant terms out so you don’t have to do anything in 2020. For multi-year grants that were completed in 2019, we will extend them to include this year. For current grants, we will add one year to the existing agreements.”

Converting all project grants to general operating support

The Eisner Foundation wrote: “If you are a current grantee, we are happy to convert any restricted funds to general operating support. In addition, we are suspending all reporting requirements until further notice. We know you have more important things to do right now than file a report with us, and we know that we can trust you to utilize our funds as most needed.”

Accelerating payments on already-approved grants

Lumina Foundation: “To ensure Lumina’s partners maintain sufficient cash flow, we can accelerate payments under already-approved grants, based on an organization’s circumstances. This includes payments scheduled for later in 2020 or in 2021. For example, if you have a second grant payment due in the fall or even in 2021, we could make this payment earlier.”

What funder responses have you seen that have impressed you? We want to know. Please share in the comments or on Twitter or Facebook.

And please send these examples along to your colleagues in philanthropy.

P.S. I was also impressed with a different take on the rapid response fund. Nellie Mae Education Foundation wrote: “[We] created this rapid response fund to respond to the hate crimes and bias against Asian American communities resulting from COVID-19. The Foundation has allocated resources for the Racism is a Virus Too rapid response grant fund to support Community-Based Organizations (CBOs) that provide services for AAPI communities.”

It’s safe to say that at this point, the nonprofit sector has been pulled into a discussion about COVID-19, as leaders urgently strategize about how to slow the outbreak and help those directly affected.  

However, beyond the need to fund cure, care and containment, we also have a responsibility to the movements and causes that we hold dear to think through how the outbreak will affect our sector more broadly — specifically the intersection of achieving our mission and financial sustainability.

A perfect storm of nonprofit challenges

The economy, natural disasters, big breaking news, election cycles, etc. all make catching potential donors’ attention and investments more difficult. In the course of a normal year, these dynamics are commonplace and even anticipatable. We know how to reschedule campaigns, we’re getting better at planning for the boom and bust of electoral cycle funding and have learned to lean into more resilient sources of independent revenue like sustainer giving to get us through the ups and downs.

But what happens when a boom election year, a global pandemic and a looming recession are on a collision course with your fundraising plans and will ultimately impact if you can fully deliver on your mission in this moment? 

Most of the progressive nonprofit staffers with whom we spoke are not seeing impacts on their revenue just yet, but they are seeing increased demand to deliver on their missions. Jobs With Justice (JWJ), an NCRP nonprofit member that recently secured a $1.3 million planned giving commitment from a project funded by the Progressive Multiplier Fund, is grappling with how hourly workers will be affected by the economic impact of the public health response. JWJ Development Director Brenden Sloan says that the current crisis provides an added sense of urgency to the state and local coalitions work that they are doing on the ground with low-wage workers and other members who don’t have paid family or medical leave. “We have been in talks for a while now about starting a national hardship fund to give direct support to groups of workers affected by natural disasters or events outside of their control,” said Sloan. “This outbreak really puts more urgency on finding funding for that.”

Andrea Hermann, director of development at Clean Water Action and Clean Water Fund, is immediately concerned with how crisis response will impact the organization’s recruitment of members and donors that can help move the political needle in 2020. “We have a pretty diverse revenue source between our field operations, phone operations, direct mail, online, major donors, foundations and corporate donors – but the field is our a significant way of getting new donors in and achieving our programmatic goals in 2020,” said Hermann.  

For the immigrant justice community, the coronavirus outbreak has only added to the constant, fast changing challenges from white nationalists, hate groups and the Trump administration. Even previously agreed to legislative efforts, like the language enshrined in the House’s NO BAN ACT that would stop President Trump’s Muslim ban, are being slowed down by the crisis response.  A full floor vote on the NO BAN ACT that was expected this week now hangs very much in doubt.

“The House Judiciary Committee is adding language in response to the coronavirus that would open up executive authority to exercise discrimination by exploiting public health concerns,” said Lakshmi Sridaran, Executive Director of South Asian Americans Leading Together (SAALT), who has been a leader in promoting the NO BAN ACT. “Our coalition is working hard to fight back, but there is strong bipartisan consensus around this language.”

How philanthropy should respond

Organizations like SAALT are already under-sourced. According to NCRP’s Movement Investment Project brief, the State of Foundation Funding for the Pro Immigrant Movement, less than 1% of the giving from the 1,000 largest foundations went to work that is intended to benefit immigrants or refugees even though immigrants make up 14.4% of the U.S. population.

How can philanthropy help?

Rapid response funding

As this current crisis demonstrates, what organizations need most are additional flexible funds that will quickly allow them to deal with the immediate intersectional challenges posed by the coronavirus outbreak. Funders should specifically provide rapid response funds to organizations or intermediaries such as the Emergent Fund who can move money quickly to the grassroots efforts that focus on areas where:

  • The Trump administration may use this crisis to push an agenda against the will of the American people (i.e. Muslim ban).
  • Corporations may act in such a way that exacerbates the problems that we face (i.e. not paying hourly employees).
  • We can push our own agenda (the need for universal health care, paid leave and more).

A stimulus package for nonprofits

With a potential recession approaching, the philanthropic community must seriously consider moving resources into supporting a nonprofit stimulus package that would diversify and scale nonprofits’ revenue generation. A combination of grants, recoverable grants and loans could help nonprofits raise a multiple of the dollars invested through a variety of techniques. The investment does not need to be more than the annual 5%, although we would encourage that. The Progressive Multiplier Fund, which funds revenue generation efforts, is helping its grantees raise nearly $4 for every $1 that the PMF grants out.

What can nonprofits do now?

While it’s not time to panic, it’s definitely time to prepare, even if that preparation is just in the “form of thought experiments and what-ifs to think through the possibilities and get aligned around the possible outcomes and impacts,” as direct marketing and fundraising consultant Miriam Magnuson said in a recent blog post.

Three things that they should immediately consider doing:

1. Make sure there are no holes in the current revenue generation bucket and learn into sustainable revenue resources.

2. Talk to your organization’s management about revenue forecasts: Whether it’s a shifting internally of resources from fundraising to mission delivery, or a downturn in foundation support or a dip in individual giving as the stock market stumbles, it’s highly likely your fundraising forecast will need to change.

3. Talk to funders specifically about what you need: You will need more funds of course. Take the time to prepare the business case that supports what you need to meet this moment.

At this moment of need, it is our ability to reach out and help each other that will help organizations and the communities continue to do the work of making this world better. We owe it to the long sustainability of these vital movements to not just help the public survive the current challenge, but to also help organizations come out stronger for the future.

Aaron Dorfman is president and CEO of NCRP. Bethany Maki is the director of programs at Progressive Multiplier. Follow @NCRP and @multiplier_fund on Twitter and share your thoughts.

Photo by Malik_Braun. Used under Creative Commons license.

How does Michael Bloomberg’s philanthropy compare to that of other living donors? What percentage did he spend supporting social justice organizations and marginalized communities? What does his charitable giving say about he would run the country.

These and other related questions were discussed last Friday, Feb. 28, as NCRP’s Aaron Dorfman moderated one hour online discussion entitled “Bloomberg’s Billions: Philanthropy, Power and Politics.” Check it out below if you missed it.

Dorfman was joined by a panel of experts that included Inside Philanthropy’s David Callahan, Black Votes Matter Executive Director LaTosha Brown and Farhad Ebrahimi of the Chorus Foundation. Publicly available 2012-2016 domestic data compiled by NCRP Director of Research Ryan Schlegel and unveiled by Dorfman during the discussion noted that Bloomberg trailed other living billionaires in the percentage of giving that went to a number of groups, including, African Americans, women and girls and the disabled.  

His percentage of total giving for people of color (8%) was slightly lower than his percentage of total giving for poor people (10%). Only 1% of his total giving went to women and girls, while only 2.8% of total giving was for people with disabilities.  

The percentages of giving to marginalized communities and social justice organizations were also far off NCRP’s benchmarks of 50% and 25% for marginalized groups and social justice groups respectively.  

Click here to view the replay video on your favorite social media platform, including Facebook. 

Panelist views 

Here are some of the discussion highlights, courtesy of Twitter: 

MORE ON OUR PANELISTS

DAVID CALLAHAN is the founder and editor of Inside Philanthropy. He has written extensively on trends in philanthropy, as well as American culture, public policy and business. David is author, most recently, of “The Givers: Wealth, Power, and Philanthropy in a New Gilded Age.” Before launching Inside Philanthropy in 2014, David co-founded Demos, the national think tank, where he held various leadership positions and conducted research on a wide range of issues related to economic and political inequality, as well as writing on moral values, professional ethics and business. Previously, David was a resident scholar at the Century Foundation and managing editor of The American Prospect, the public policy journal. More.

LATOSHA BROWN is a fellow at the Harvard Kennedy School’s Institute of Politics and the co-founder of Black Voters Matter Fund, a power-building, southern-based civic engagement organization that played an instrumental role in the 2017 Alabama U.S. Senate race. The award-winning organizer, philanthropic consultant, political strategist and jazz singer has more than 20 years of experience working in the nonprofit and philanthropy sectors on a wide variety of issues related to political empowerment, social justice, economic development, leadership development, wealth creation and civil rights. More.

FARHAD EBRAHIMI is an activist, philanthropist and founder of the Chorus Foundation, which works for a just transition to a regenerative economy in the U.S. The Chorus Foundation supports communities on the front lines of the old, extractive economy to build new bases of political, economic and cultural power for systemic change. More.

Elbert Garcia is NCRP’s director of strategic communications. Follow @ElbertGarciaFl and @NCRP on Twitter.

Photo by David Shankbone, used under Creative Commons license.

Donors who are about fostering democracy need to avoid making the “false choice” between supporting political candidates and grassroots civic engagement, NCRP President and CEO Aaron Dorfman noted in his latest column for Forbes.

Dorfman wrote,

“Many donors are giving directly to candidates, which is important. However, supporting great candidates won’t matter if funders don’t also support voter protection and engagement. We won’t truly have a robust election if potential voters are disengaged and voters who want to cast ballots are denied their right to do so.”

Fortunately, donors have good examples of grassroots civic engagement funding to turn to.

A national 12-organization litigation collaborative, supported by NEO Philanthropy and 17 other foundations and several individual donors, helped strike down Kansas’s proof-of-citizen law for voter registration and the redraw districts in North Carolina that were found to be unconstitutionally gerrymandered.

And Marguerite Casey Foundation, which received a 2019 NCRP Impact Award, plans to invest $5 million in integrated voter engagement this year.

To learn more, check out the entire column.

It’s easy to forget, in a sector where Gateses, Fords, Lillys and Hewletts dominate the discourse, that most institutional philanthropies are small, leanly staffed, little-known foundations.

In any given year, roughly a quarter of all U.S. grantmaking comes from the 90%+ of foundations whose annual giving is less than $10 million.

Recent research from Exponent Philanthropy suggests those small foundations believe racial equity is relevant to their work.

At the same time, the data also show that they are overwhelmingly staffed and led by white people.

Exponent’s 2019 Foundation Operations and Management Report survey, which is available to Exponent members and was generously shared with NCRP, found that:

  • 75% of respondent foundations have white-only boards of directors.
  • 78% have white-only staffs.
  • 89% have white CEOs.

These findings are striking in light of the fact that the U.S. as whole is about 40% people of color. The Census Bureau estimates that this year more than half of U.S. children will be non-white.

The contrast between the nation’s demographics and the demographics of small foundations, then, appear to reflect – or even amplify – the racialized nature of the inequitable distribution of wealth and power.

Exponent survey respondent foundations aren’t oblivious to the role that systemic racism plays in the challenges they seek to address through their funding.

Almost 75% of foundations answered that racial equity was at least somewhat relevant to their missions, and more than 33% said that it was very relevant.

Philanthropy lives in a bubble, but isn’t immune to culture change.

It seems likely that the embrace of racial equity is a result of the public awareness and discourse on the issue created by the Movement for Black Lives, the pro-immigrant movement and other movements that center people of color (alongside, of course, the ongoing work of philanthropic sector racial equity advocates like ABFE, Philanthropic Racial Equity and Grantmakers for Effective Organizations).

Unfortunately, that embrace doesn’t appear to have shifted from words to action for many of the surveyed foundations.

Fully 75% said they had made no grants for advocacy or public policy work in the last year, despite NCRP research that shows that grantmaking for advocacy and other social justice strategies is a high-leverage strategy for affecting the kind of structural change necessary to achieve racial equity.

Funders may face operational barriers such as the fact that many small foundations have all-white boards because they have relied only on family to help lead.

But that’s not the only way to run an effective philanthropy. Some of the country’s leading family foundations have found great success adding non-family members to their boards of directors.

As the country and the philanthropic sector moves into a new decade, here are 3 first steps small foundations can take to turn racial equity rhetoric and resolutions into reality:

1. Create an equity baseline using the Power Moves assessment to evaluate your foundation through an equity lens.

NCRP has distilled years of social justice evaluation research into a thorough but easy-to-use self-evaluative framework.

Power Moves is a complete self-assessment toolkit to determine how well you are building, sharing and wielding power and identify ways to transform your programs and operations for lasting, equitable impact.

You may find opportunities for changes in your grantmaking such as funding more people-of-color led organizations, but also in your operations for example by adding non-family members to boards.

It’s especially well-suited to small foundations who may lack the in-house evaluative expertise many large funders possess.

2. Adopt the “Rooney Rule” to hire with racial equity in mind.

It may be time for a philanthropic version of the “Rooney Rule,” requiring that at least 1 person of color is interviewed for each open position, for recruiting new staff.

Organizational psychology research has shown that diverse staff leads to better business outcomes, and there’s every reason to think the same is true for philanthropic outcomes.

The pipelines for excellent Black, Hispanic, Native and other non-white philanthropic leaders exist. Consider the ways your current hiring practices may not be reaching those pipelines and knock down the barriers to better recruitment and more impact.

3. Use the opportunity this year to make an advocacy test grant.

This year is a pivotal year for the future of our communities and our country, with the census and elections from the top of the ballot down to the bottom.

There are plenty of ways that 501(c)3 organizations can engage in important issue advocacy around the policies and processes (such as the census) that will influence the health, wealth and general well-being of Americans for years to come.

More than perhaps anything else you could fund this year, advocacy is a high-leverage investment in our future.

Consider making a test grant for advocacy in your community around the issues you care about. If any of your current grantees already do advocacy work, speak with them to help guide you.

Small funders have an opportunity to impact their local communities in ways that large national funders simply can’t.

With an increased focus on turning racial equity intent into impact, America’s small foundations can create change from the ground up by making a New Year’s resolution to turn their rhetoric into reality.

Ryan Schlegel is NCRP’s director of research. Follow @r_j_schlegel and @NCRP on Twitter.

In the aftermath of this year’s series of devastating earthquakes in Puerto Rico, local nonprofits across the island are providing crucial services to thousands of affected Puerto Ricans. 

Current and former NCRP nonprofit members and coalition partners supporting recovery efforts include Taller Salud, The Center for Popular Democracy’s (CPD) Maria Fund and coalition partner Hispanics in Philanthropy (HIP). 

Nonprofits launch major campaigns to support earthquake recovery 

Taller Salud’s work is threefold. It is raising money for organizations working in the impacted communities; setting up a fund to cover reproductive justice services and accepting donations for women’s health needs; and co-creating a public pressure advocacy campaign to allow Puerto Ricans to speak out in their time of crisis. 

Meanwhile, HIP is on the ground in Puerto Rico and is organizing its network to direct resources to grassroots organizations and identify where to best drive support. Its urgent campaign goal is to raise $15,000 by Feb. 3. 

“If you have been wondering how to help, this is the moment. Now, more than ever, our brothers and sisters in Puerto Rico need our help. Help us meet our $15,000 goal by the end of the week so we can get immediate support to our partners on the ground,” HIP President and CEO Ana Marie Argilagos wrote in an email to supporters. 

CPD is also using its Maria Fund, started in the wake of Hurricane Maria in 2017, to mobilize long-term support for groups working on the island. 

CPD’s Julio Lopez Varona says that these natural disasters would have a less devastating impact on the Puerto Rican people if greater investment was made in the island’s physical and social infrastructure.  

“In order to ensure that Puerto Ricans achieve a just recovery, we must address the root of the issue,” said Lopez Varona, co-director of community dignity campaigns at CPD. “Long-term investments in infrastructure, including building schools and shelters up to code, solidifying the power and water grids, securing hospitals and roads, protecting pensions, and providing safe housing alternatives for low-income families, are just a few of the basic needs that should be immediately championed.”  

Addressing the physical and social toll on the island 

On Dec. 28, 2019, the first of a series of massive earthquakes hit the southern portion of Puerto Rico, coming in at a magnitude of 5.4, killing at least one person, causing numerous injuries and destroying countless buildings. The devastation has continued in subsequent weeks, with 5.8 and 6.4 magnitude earthquakes and dozens of aftershocks. Amid the crisis, federal assistance came weeks after the initial disaster, further worsening already-dire circumstances.  

“The federal government needs to immediately release the billions of dollars in relief money it has on hold since hurricane Maria,” said Lopez Varona. “At the same time, the governor of Puerto Rico and the Fiscal Oversight Management Board need to put forward policies that allow the government to access billions of dollars in funds destined to pay debt so that they are allocated for the reconstruction of the island.” 

Along with the physical destruction of buildings and loss of lives also comes a social, emotional and psychological difficulties for Puerto Ricans. The earthquakes displaced more than 4,000 people with many scared to return to their homes for fear of more to come. Only 20% of schools in Puerto Rico have reopened due to safety concerns, denying children a crucial part of their childhood: education.  

To address this social turmoil, one NCRP member, Mentes Puertorriqueñas en Acción, has activated its civic engagement for disaster response strategy.

They have taken mental health and recreation professionals to tent cities and affected communities as an immediate response, although Executive Director Alejandro Silva Diaz is also thinking about long-term solutions.

“In the long term, we’re matching citizens with reconstruction projects in the south,” Silva Diaz said. “We’re seeking community-based organizations with long-term projects in the south who need interns during the summer to accelerate their projects.”

The current humanitarian crisis is yet another opportunity for the philanthropic sector to show how much it can lead in supporting impacted marginalized communities.

“From Hurricane Maria to these recent earthquakes, the Puerto Rican community has shown a resolve and resiliency that defies imagination. But they shouldn’t have to go it alone,” says NCRP Director of Marketing and Membership Janay Richmond. “When I think of the types of response we’ve seen for other events, like the rebuilding of the famed Notre Dame Cathedral, it makes me dream of a world where not only is the preservation of a beloved church building important, but also where we can’t imagine allowing the kind of prolonged suffering that we are seeing in Puerto Rico. And philanthropy has an opportunity to show us right now that that type of world can exist.” 

Adam Fishbein is NCRP’s membership intern.

I read with interest the recent NCRP blog post that summarized the “Let Communities Lead” session at last year’s great Upswell convening in Chicago.

Because I led a session on rural funder practice at the meeting and got in late, I couldn’t attend the session. But, the summary rekindled some thoughts I had when I first read the session description.

The session title implies that funders are leaders and they must turn over responsibility for leadership to communities.

If we define leadership in philanthropy as somehow identifying, advocating for and working to test or implement solutions to fundamental challenges faced by those without voice, then most funders are not leaders.

Many funders are at best highlighters of important issues but most are essentially followers. So the idea that there is leadership to turn over doesn’t ring true.

It’s more accurate to say that funders need to help communities strengthen and support their (the communities’) leadership skills and sensibilities – whatever that might look like.

What is the risk? Funders strengthen and support communities to practice the bogged-down de-energized leadership that often plagues funders.

Who do funders want to work with when they turn over this “leadership” to communities?

Not surprisingly, the same leaders who have been complicit in being good managers of those archaic funder-nonprofit relationships that have been around since the founding of philanthropy.

If funders want to inspire the elevation of community leadership on important issues, then the traditional nonprofit leaders aren’t going to be the majority of the core group that funders will support.

Funders have somehow decided along the way that community leadership is housed primarily in nonprofits. Sometimes it is, but that is the exception and not the rule.

Funders need to get their arms around the idea that nonprofits aren’t the dominant stakeholder, but are part of much larger and complex ecosystems.

Thankfully, we seem to have reached a mild consensus that longer-term grants – whether for general operating support or projects – are better than short-term and inconsistent support.

Leadership can surface better over time if communities aren’t wondering if support is coming or going.

Unfortunately, though, we need to confront the age-old conversation about dependency that is hard-wired into some funder mindsets and history.

From my first venture into private philanthropy almost 25 years ago, I have heard about how funders are doing folks a disservice by financially supporting them – as if the communities are some struggling relative needing that third or fourth extra chance to get back on their feet.

We say we don’t want organizations to become “dependent.” That is a loaded word, but one that is too frequently used in philanthropy and used with only a passing understanding of how a belief in nonprofit dependency as a risk will prevent any attempts at letting communities lead.

What if a funder of genuine goodwill “Lets the Community Lead” and the response from community is “Just tell us what to do”?

We forget that these sometimes decades old relationships between funders and communities are so entwined around grantmaking and grantseeking that the community sense might be that all the funder has done is create another game, but without the rules being explained.

Thoughtful and strategic funders understand this and spend time testing out different ways to change the game, let local people inside the funder intention and act in ways that signal change but also breathe with periods of learning and reflection.

Trust is a different category that only the community gets to offer, not something interpreted by the funder.

I am hopeful that more funders are getting some of this work right. I am frustrated, however, with the assumption that funders can quickly change what they are doing, provoke the response they want and, as a result, a new system of relationships that is somehow equitable and community-run will fall into place.

It’s not like flicking a light switch. Funder behavior has much less influence on communities lives then all the philanthropic gnashing would lead us to believe – no matter what any provocative conference plenary speaker may have told us.

Philanthropy at its highest value supports people in acting on what the people know is best amidst all the noise and pressures of everyday living. That is an important, achievable and low-ego goal.

Allen Smart of PhilanthropywoRx is a spokesperson and advocate for improving rural philanthropic practice. Follow @allensmart6 on Twitter.