Sean Stannard-Stockton initiated an interesting conversation on his blog Tactical Philanthropy (later picked up by the Chronicle of Philanthropy’s Give and Take blog) about the difference between “giving” and “investing” as a mental model for philanthropy. He notices a shift occurring in the way donors conceptualize their giving from a ’spending’ category to an ‘investment’ [...]
Posts Tagged as ‘philanthropy’
August 19, 2008
Betterplace.org – reducing philanthropic barriers?
One of the questions that the wave of new philanthropic marketplace tools is how to control quality and ensure donor confidence in the organizations in which they invest. While people tend to be comfortable with brand-name humanitarian organizations like CARE acting as stewards of their donations, its less clear how your average individual donor becomes [...]
July 22, 2008
Who will take on donor education?
Sean Stannard-Stockton at Tactical Philanthropy has had a couple interesting posts in the last few weeks about the “low hanging fruit” in improving philanthropy. The argument is basically while there are big challenges and debates to be had (such as the questions of metrics, which we tend to come around to here on DGW quite [...]
July 21, 2008
Do good geezers
Nick Kristoff’s op-ed yesterday was all about the “encore career,” a growing phenomenon in which retiring baby boomers devote themselves to some philanthropic cause.
The interesting thing about the phenomenon is the increased recognition of these activities as actual vocations, as important to the participants as their former professional careers. Indeed, he notes that for many, [...]
July 1, 2008
Question of the week: Should nonprofit salaries for middle and upper management mirror those in the for-profit sector?
The Chronicle of Philanthropy’s “Give and Take” blog picked up today on a debate about compensation in the nonprofit sector. The Charlotte Observer recently reported that the president of United Way for the Central Carolinas received a $1.2 million salary and compensation package for the 2007 Fiscal year, including $822,000 in retirement benefits.
While the benefits [...]
June 29, 2008
Integration: the next philanthropic frontier?
In a really interesting article in the NYTimes on June 26, Heather Timmons profiles the Children’s Investment Fund (T.C.I.) hedge fund and its non-profit twin, the Children’s Investment Fund Foundation. The fund and the foundation are run by Christopher Cooper-Hohn and his wife, Jamie, respectively, and have grown into one of the largest, best performing [...]

