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When and How to Partner with Philanthropic Advisers
To paraphrase the ancient Greek philosopher Aristotle, it’s easy to give away money. However, it’s much more difficult to know how and where to give it. Anyone who has managed a grantmaking program understands. Granting money is not difficult. Doing it effectively is another story. That’s why many leanly staffed foundations often enlist philanthropic advisers—organizations... Read More
Lean Funders Can Help Nonprofits Tackle Inflation Costs
Families across the country continue to struggle with the rising cost of food, gas, housing, and more. Even Halloween candy prices were up 13% this year! Even more scary: nonprofits are facing the same inflation pressures—and many of them came into 2022 already facing declines in donations, a cliff in pandemic relief support, workforce shortages,... Read More
Involving Non-Family Members in the Foundation
There are big benefits when a family foundation invites one or more nonfamily members to its board. Nonfamily members can help the family make more objective grantmaking decisions. Similarly, family members tend to behave differently in the presence of nonfamily members. This can help shift family dynamics that may be getting in the way of... Read More
Planting Seeds for Organizational Financial Health and Independence
Over the past few years throughout the social sector, we’ve witnessed an unprecedented number of what many have termed, transformational gifts. These contributions span widely. Depending on the size of the recipient organization, they range from tens of thousands to hundreds of millions of dollars across a broad range of institutions and issues. However, their... Read More
Advocating For State-Level Systems Change: Policy Work By a Small Foundation
Leanly staffed family foundations can punch well above their weight, working with other funders and grantees to change systems. Over the past eight years, the Thornburg Foundation has experienced this firsthand. Given the depth of the challenges facing the state of New Mexico, systemic change is particularly important to our board chair and founder, Garrett... Read More
How Deep Relationships With Community Informs Our Grantmaking
The coronavirus pandemic opened our eyes to how sectors and systems do or do not address the ever-growing health and income inequities in this country. We can approach this in two ways: Admit the inadequacies of our systems. Especially those focused on health, housing, food insecurity and education, or Go a step further to recognize that the... Read More