Jumo is supposed to be Facebook for nonprofits. Founded by Facebook co-founder and chief digital organizer of the Obama 2008 campaign, Chris Hughes, Jumo launched with great fanfare and grant funding from the Ford Foundation, Omidyar Network and Knight Foundation. GOOD is a publishing and marketing company “for people who want to live well and […]
Category Archives: New Philanthropy
Philanthropy’s Community: Observers, Fans, Evangelists & Ambassadors
June 22, 2011 – 9:02 am
Speaking at the Millennial Donor Summit this morning, Matt Britton of acclaimed social media agency Mr. Youth talked about what makes a community. In his words, the key elements of community are: Observers, who watch, Fans, who participate, Evangelists, who recruit, and Ambassadors, who represent. Now there are all sorts of models like this that […]
Collective Intelligence in Philanthropy
June 17, 2011 – 8:19 am
This is a guest post by Eugene Eric Kim of Blue Oxen Associates. Eugene works with organizations to help them develop collaborative strategies. His past clients include NASA and the Wikimedia Foundation. By Eugene Eric Kim Recently I spoke at the GEO Learning Conference on collective intelligence. My focus is on collaboration, but thanks to […]
Push Back on Pay For Success
May 17, 2011 – 9:43 am
Along with my supportive column on the Pay For Success program, Peter York of TCC Group wrote a more caution piece: President Obama’s budget proposal for 2012 includes a $100-million idea that could revolutionize the way social programs are financed—or could put a ticking time bomb next to the heart of some of our society’s […]
Pay For Success
May 16, 2011 – 8:33 am
President Obama’s 2012 budget includes an innovative proposal called Pay For Success that has the potential to revolutionize the way the government provides funding for social services. The program creates a framework for government payments to be contingent on positive program results rather than paying for program delivery. Pay For Success is a nonpartisan program […]
The Rebranding of Philanthropy
April 26, 2011 – 8:26 am
A lot of effort has gone into rebranding philanthropy from “giving away money” to “making a social investment”. While the shift has supporters and detractors, I think the most useful and interesting way to think about the underlying motives for the shift is as an attempt to move philanthropy from the “should” category (you “should” […]
What Can Junk Food Teach Philanthropy?
April 13, 2011 – 10:22 am
Recently I came across a fascinating article about an effort to brand baby carrots as “junk food”. From Fast Company Magazine: “Bolthouse Farms sells nearly a billion pounds of carrots a year… The company has been around for nearly a century now, but it boomed in the 1990s, with a breakthrough product… baby carrots were […]
Speed-Freak Grantmaking at Council on Foundations Conference
February 6, 2011 – 9:21 pm
So the Speed-Freak Philanthropy post and the profile of the Energy Foundation’s 27 day grant cycle on their $110 million annual budget spurred a lot of interest. The Energy Foundation has received a bunch of emails asking for more information about their approach, including from two of the country’s largest foundations. In addition, the Council […]
Speaking at New Profit’s Gathering of Leaders
February 2, 2011 – 9:29 am
Next week I’ll be in Miami speaking at New Profit’s Gathering of Leaders. While I’ve often focused on New Profit’s “investing in nonprofits” approach to grantmaking, they also have an “Action Tank” that works to strengthen the ecosystem for social entrepreneurs and the environment in which nonprofit capital markets are being created. In 2007, New […]
Bill Gates’ Annual Letter & Brilliant Video
February 1, 2011 – 9:41 am
In the wealth management business, many money managers write quarterly or annual letters to their investors. Far from simple boilerplate memos, these letters are read closely by investors and seen as important sources of knowledge. Philanthropy has a little bit of this dynamic, but not much. For the most part, foundation annual reports are ignored […]
