Here are some key messages that are a theme at this year’s Annual Conference: Collaboration, collaboration, collaboration! Reaching out to others broadens our impact. To be “better together,” we must practice mutual respect and tolerance. These messages are almost common sense, right? Yes, but…

“Roles that I’ve played.” Geena Davis opened her remarks during this morning’s plenary session by stating that her philanthropy is often rooted in roles that she has played. It struck a chord for me. My research agenda around HIV and AIDS in the 1990s also showed that exposure and a family…

Investing in people feels very good. Carrie Avery of the Durfee Foundation, the moderator of the session “Supporting Individuals as Innovators and Change Agents,” described these types of programs as the “R & D” of the nonprofit sector. How do foundations invest in people? Foundations support…

This year’s Paul Ylvisaker Public Policy Award winner, Linda Reed, president and CEO of the Montana Community Foundation, delivered a formal talk on the relationship of rural philanthropy and public policy. Given that Reed was talking about Montana, where there are only three communities with…

After my time at the Emerging Practitioners in Philanthropy (EPIP) conference this past week, I walked away with a lot of reflection points. What struck me most about the conversations I experienced, both during the sessions and with colleagues, was that they were not just about vision, change, and…

Panels of talking heads during conferences are all well and good, especially when they are saying something of importance that we don’t know. However the audiences at Council on Foundations conferences often have knowledge and perspectives that are just as interesting as the speakers. At today’s…

The beginning of opening session is just a few short minutes away. I arrive early to find a seat while trying to avoid the strobe light clearly flashing above my head. As I loiter in the lobby, here are some general impressions thus far. I will not get to every session I want to hit, and need to be…

“It was the best of times, it was the worst of times; it was the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness; it was the epoch of belief, it was the epoch of incredulity; it was the season of Light, it was the season of Darkness; it was the spring of hope, it was the winter of despair; we had…

Last year’s Council on Foundations Annual Meeting was held before the Occupy Wall Street movement highlighted the role and power of corporate America in this nation’s wealth divide. Even then, according to Chris Pinney of the Aspen Institute, one of the researchers behind the new Council report on…

Each one of us has 86,400 seconds per day to live, work, love, play and/or fritter away. Indeed time is the nonrenewable resource. Threaded through the last weeks, I have reached out to colleagues in the foundation sector to be sure that my time at the Council of Foundations Annual Conference is…

The Council on Foundations Annual Conference brings together grantmakers from all over the world to learn from each other and discuss best practices and critical issues in philanthropy. There is something for everyone at this conference, and the energy of all of us together is powerful and…

Especially in our current funding climate, partnership and authentic engagement with those we seek to serve is critical to ensuring that limited philanthropic resources are invested wisely and deliver the greatest possible impact for those most in need. The success of Foundation for Louisiana’s…

For the past two decades, the James A. Joseph Lecture has been one of the intellectual high points of the Council on Foundations Annual Conference. The list of past lecturers at this Association of Black Foundation Executives event helps make the case, not just Ambassador Joseph delivering the…

During the second panel I attended, I really liked the New Field Foundation’s approach to grantmaking and their utilization of local advisers. It is very sensitive to every aspect of their work and the impact it has on all stakeholders. Bravo.  Interestingly, one of the other grantmakers on…

I attended a great panel this morning. It was called “The Future of Philanthropy and Development in the Pursuit of the Human Well-Being: An Update on the Bellagio Initiative.” The presenters were Asif Saleh, director of the BRAC Centre; Fabrice Serfati, managing director and CFO of IGNIA;…

Conferences were a way of life in a previous career. The land of higher education was a vast and strange continent, but as a seasoned and wise elder I could pass seamlessly among the inhabitants. Academics who would barely speak to colleagues in their ivy-covered ivory towers turned into animated…