These 2024 conference sessions will help advance your DEI learning journey:
Thursday, November 14, 2024
10:30 AM – 11:45 AM
SESSION: Investing in the People Who Deliver Change
We aim to create change, but it is what happens behind closed doors that influences program success. Some of the hardest work leaders do isn’t visible but is vital as they piece together organizational sustainability. A BIPOC leader and family foundation president will discuss how capacity building benefits small/BIPOC-led organizations and share six lessons for supporting leaders of these organizations.
Learning Objectives:
- Explain the role that capacity building plays in small/BIPOC-led organizational sustainability
- Describe how risk might be better framed in your organization
- Name one way you might strengthen relationships to create authentic partnerships
This session is supported by Cedarmere Foundation.
10:30 AM – 11:45 AM
SESSION: Using Demographic Data to Support Systems Change
What does systems change around demographic data look like? We invite you to a conversation rethinking demographic data collection for funders and the nonprofit sector. In 2023, Candid introduced Demographics via Candid to encourage efficiency in nonprofit demographic data collection and sharing. We will discuss how and why funders can support open-source demographic data collection to promote and advance equity.
Learning Objective:
- Express actionable steps to improve how nonprofit demographic data is collected and used to advance equity
Friday, November 15, 2024
9:00 AM – 10:15 AM
SESSION: Supporting Diverse Leaders and Emergent Grassroots Work
Grants to hard-working diverse leaders and smaller community-driven projects can lead to outsized impact in our local communities but many funders do not invest in this kind of change making. But small funders are uniquely positioned to support innovative change by learning the nuts and bolts of providing grants to individuals and fiscally sponsored projects of underinvested communities. It is easier than you think! We’ll share a primer on how to lead this process, tell the story of successful impact, and invite other you to share lessons from your own experiences.
Learning Objectives:
- Explain why funding underinvested individuals and emergent grassroots groups is a worthy and impactful investment that you can apply to your grants process
- Recognize simplified tools and resources to help you start giving grants to individuals and grassroots groups
- Exchange ideas with fellow practitioners on challenges and successes of giving grants to individuals and for grassroots work
10:45 AM – 12:00 PM
SESSION: Putting Equity at the Center of Grantmaking
Join us for an insightful and candid interview about the Melville Trust’s grantmaking journey to address the root causes of homelessness and housing insecurity on Black, Indigenous and Latino/a/x populations. Facilitated by our partner, Success Measures, we will explore changes to internal and external processes during our grantmaking shift, how we hold accountability by measuring impact, and the many ways our adaptive work continues.
Learning Objectives:
- Repeat practical ideas about deeply imbedding equity into grantmaking and impact assessment
- Restate how a funder refocused grantmaking to address root causes and retooled operations to create more productive grantee relationships, streamlined applications and reports, and clearer staff roles
- Workshop your own challenges and take home ideas for next steps if you are pursuing similar strategies
10:45 AM – 12:00 PM
SESSION: Representation Matters: Building Boards that Drive Sustainable Change
How do you know if you’re diversifying your board for diversity’s sake? How can you prepare your board for transformation? Leaders challenged with answering these two questions will find it hard to know what strategies work well or don’t. We’ll review five red flags that highlight performative diversity, and five green flags that prepare boards for the transformational process towards diversity.
Learning Objectives:
- Explain and apply practical strategies for building diverse boards
- Understand the challenges and changes needed to create board cultures in which diversity is valued and fully utilized
- Interpret examples from peers who have engaged in transformational processes within their own organizations or with their grantees
2:00 PM – 3:15 PM
SESSION: Supporting Black-Led Nonprofit Leaders: A Case Study
The Northeast Oklahoma City Nonprofit Incubator helps Black-led nonprofits and those serving Oklahoma City’s African American community overcome funding and growth challenges caused by historic inequities. Now in their third cohort, the founders, a funder, and a participant will discuss the incubator’s origins, successes, lessons, and impact on participants and community funders.
Learning Objectives:
- Recognize how to provide capacity building resources to nonprofits that serve historically under-resourced communities using local infrastructure
- Repeat the benefits of a grassroots approach to support nonprofit leaders
Saturday, November 16, 2024
9:00 AM – 11:00 AM
SESSION: Making the Most of Your Foundation for Catalytic Impact
Foundations are high performance vehicles, capable of catalyzing impact far beyond the size of their resources with grants and actions beyond grants such as convening, raising public awareness, advocacy, technical assistance, and impact investing. But many foundations use only a fraction of their capabilities and potential. Get a picture of the full range of assets and strategies at your disposal, and then join a facilitated conversation to dive deeper into one type of asset.
Learning Objectives:
- Broaden your perspective by describing six types of assets you can leverage to increase your impact and influence
- Choose one type of foundation asset to explore in more depth, to discover specific strategies and tactics and ways to position yourself to get started
- Re-energize and re-inspire your work by the creativity and resourcefulness of small foundation philanthropy, and the potential to ramp up your impact within weeks
Still have questions?
Members can access staff experts through our Q&A service by calling 202-580-6560, or post a question to the member community to hear form peers in the field.
Explore our Q&A archive