Although philanthropic professionals have strong relationships with their donors and fund holders, they often have yet to develop relationships with the successor trustees or family members who are due to become the next generation of community foundation donors. Using findings from a first-of-its…

Throughout the sessions I attended today, one word seemed to be woven throughout various discussions. That word is “authenticity.” The central purpose of community foundations is to do good in the community. We provide an avenue for donors to use their funds to help organizations address vital…

“The subtlest change in New York is something people don’t speak much about but that is in everyone’s mind. The city, for the first time in its long history, is destructible. A single flight of planes no bigger than a wedge of geese can quickly end this island fantasy, burn the towers, crumble the…

As one who has been in the field as a community foundation CEO since 1994, I have seen many themes. We were sorted by asset size for many of our conversations in the belief that such distinctions defined our capabilities and philanthropic contributions. (We now understand that was absolutely false…

I’m a native New Orleanian representing the Greater Milwaukee Foundation (GMF) attending the Fall Conference in New Orleans. Some might call it fate. I call it homecoming. I have lived in Milwaukee for nearly seven years, and many would agree with the adage, “Home is where the heart is.” However,…

As a “newbie” to the community foundation field in 2007, the first thing I did was attend the ProNet annual meeting in San Francisco, where I met about 75 other program staff from across the country. I was amazed by the geographic diversity and the warm reception by the “ProNetters.” And I was…

My brother-in-law, Alfredo, is a trauma paramedic. He works in an emergency room every weekend from 7 p.m. to 7 a.m. He shares his workday the way I might share mine. “Had some coffee, saved a life, did some paperwork, saved a life….” And yet he somehow remains connected enough to his work to…

At this morning’s opening plenary, Grant Oliphant talked about the difference between a revenue model and a business model. A revenue model is how you make money, such as providing services to donors and charging a fee. A business model, on the other hand, is how you add value—for example, helping…

In preparation for the conference, I scanned the event schedule a few times for the sessions most relevant to my involvement in the community foundation world. The conference has a breadth of participants, and technology is making it easier than ever to explore resources and connect with people who…

Do you ever wish that your foundation had more money to solve social problems and transform your community? As need grows faster than grant dollars, many foundations are making mission and impact investments in order to unlock new capital for social good. Community foundations are investing…

Many people believe facilitation is a role that only designated individuals can play in meetings or planning sessions. But just as leadership is more about how you behave than what your title is, so is facilitation about the contributions you make regardless of your role. Break down the word…

On the morning of August 29, 2005, Hurricane Katrina slammed into the Gulf Coast. Within hours, it became one of the deadliest and costliest hurricanes in U.S. history. As a Southern funder, the Mary Reynolds Babcock Foundation recognized that while Katrina was an equal opportunity destroyer, it…

As our colleagues head to New Orleans this week for the Council on Foundation’s fall conference, the city’s community foundation is serving as a great example of investing in ways to keep residents informed about local issues. In recent years, the Greater New Orleans Foundation invested in a local…

As I continue to reflect on the Council’s recent publication, Increasing Impact, Enhancing Value: A Practitioner’s Guide to Corporate Philanthropy, I am reminded of author Chris Pinney’s suggestion that this is a leadership moment for corporate philanthropy. There are at least three reasons for…

Despite coming from different backgrounds and experiences, it was clear the hundreds of attendees at the Multicultural Oral Health Summit all shared a common vision of increased access to quality oral health services and improvement of oral health for all. The first-ever joint convention of …

As the current chair and webmaster for an affinity group, I decided to create a Flash-based website because I believed it would be more aesthetically pleasing than a site coded in regular HTML. I have been pleased with the results, but recently found out that Android’s new mobile operating system,…