or...All You Need is Cash Ages ago, I took economic development finance and nonprofit finance classes. I now can’t run a detailed pro forma if you stuck a loaded spreadsheet to my head. But the basic concepts have been tugging at my brain as I’ve followed news about three issues. First, the United Way of [...]
Category: community
The Foundation World Needs Community Philanthropy to Succeed
“Participation is the new endowment.” This observation from the Aspen Institute’s Janet Topolsky has been stuck in my head since I read it a month ago in the Nonprofit Quarterly. She was part of a panel discussing the recent report The Value of Community Philanthropy by the C.S Mott Foundation and Aga Khan Foundation. The [...]
Foundation Executive as Community Builder
“…outside resources will be much more effectively used if the local community is itself fully mobilized and invested, and if it can define the agendas for which additional resources must be obtained.” - Building Communities from the Inside Out, John P. Kretzmann and John L. McKnight, 1993. I’ve been reflecting on how much my early training [...]
Whom do you trust to lead community improvement?
Whom do you trust to lead community improvement? This question keeps rolling through my head as I’m participating in the Growing Social Impact for a Networked World conference. It’s not an easy question. It gets to the heart of a person’s values, upbringing, work history, own sense of self-control, and more. And, it’s a tough [...]
