Funders shift their priorities and distribution processes for a variety of reasons. Some work in partnership with the communities they serve and are responsive to changing dynamics, while others modify their strategies with the goal of increasing impact. Still others, like the Maine Technology Institute (MTI), shift to be more adaptive and to fit the needs of their grantees.
“Think of a funnel—or a sausage grinder, if you’d like. You put the information in the SWOT’s grinder, and out come your best strategies,” writes Mark Light in this damning disquisition on the ever-prevalent SWOT model. The SWOT model is presented as rigorous, but really it leads to educated guesses at best, and at worst it can be a drag on your creativity and ambition.
A Pennsylvania grand jury report blasts the Catholic Church for its response to reports of child abuse by its priests.
A recent HBR article begins with this frivolous pronouncement: “Too few nonprofits use the advantages of their nonprofit status.” We might do better asking what few nonprofits would not be practiced in, let alone not be aware of, these advantages?
Four months after city support for a community land trust in Buffalo’s large Black “Fruit Belt” neighborhood was announced, the City acts to begin to transfer an initial set of four properties to the community nonprofit’s control. The land trust forms one part of a broader community-guided strategic development plan.
Even though the feds have downplayed climate risks, companies, often prodded by environmentally oriented investors, are accelerating their carbon emission reduction efforts.
Investment note offering by a leading national loan fund forms part of a growing trend of emerging community investing vehicles that enable anyone who is willing to lend $1,000 or more to help finance local, community-based business development and economic empowerment initiatives.
This Wallace Foundation study is useful, showing how one can envision the scaling-up process in terms of programming, but it remains nowhere near able to support a claim that expanding the reach of particular social programs equals systems change.
For experienced nonprofit leaders, the good news is not in the findings themselves, but in that they are being offered by foundation leaders, who are beginning to recognize that much of the responsibility for change lies on their shoulders. Still, unintended consequences loom.
The response to hurricanes, wildfires, and other natural disasters must incorporate both immediate and long-term engagement and rebuilding.
