Failure Reports: A how to guide

Posted on May 5, 2016 by Ashley Good

This document, developed by Fail Forward, is intended to support organizations who are interested in documenting and learning from their failures, and using the process as a launch point for organizational change. It is largely based on the process developed by Engineers Without Borders Canada (EWB), an organization which has been publishing its Failure Reports publicly since 2008… Read More

The family foundation life cycle and the role of consultants

Posted on January 20, 2016 by Mary Phillips, Susan Schwartz, Suzanna Stribling

Family foundations come with a unique set of dynamics, like their dedication to preserving a legacy and to sharing decision-making among family members. These dynamics are often a significant influence on a foundation's governance and operations, and they can also extend to how family foundations' experiences with consultants differ from those of other foundations or nonprofits… Read More

Collaborating Across Power Differences

Posted on January 14, 2016 by Miki Kashtan

Power dynamics can really get in the way when you are trying to build a healthy, strong organization. If family foundations and their grantee partners don’t see eye to eye, or if junior members of the family pose challenges to their board leaders or elders, the back-and-forth struggle isn’t just uncomfortable; it can undermine the organizational stability and compromise impact… Read More

Better Together: Realizing the Promise of Collaboration in Family Philanthropy

Posted on November 6, 2015 by Michael Moody

Unique challenges arise, and unique opportunities open up, when family donors get involved in collaborative work in philanthropy. This report explores those special challenges and opportunities, and offers a set of recommendations for how to realize the promise of working better together. The insights here are based primarily on in-depth dialogues about family philanthropy collaboration that occurred during the third… Read More

Risk in Philanthropy: A Framework for Evaluation

Posted on June 29, 2015 by Open Road Alliance

To help both grantmakers and NGOs better identify, assess, mitigate, and plan for risk in their portfolios, Open Road Alliance offers this framework for evaluating risk. This brief framework is designed to provide grantmakers and NGOs with tools to conceptualize and describe risk and its implications within the scope of their philanthropic work… Read More

Ten ways philanthropic families work with community foundations

Posted on June 11, 2015 by Audrey Jacobs, David O. Barrett, Elizabeth Sullivan, Lauren Amos, Mark Neithercut, Rob MacPherson

This special webinar as we count and describe the many ways that philanthropic families work with the more than 800 community foundations spread across North America. From partnering for impact to serving as a training ground for younger family members, community foundations and families have been partners since the very first community foundations were founded just over a century ago… Read More

Peer Skill Share program (Pierce Family Foundation)

Posted on July 29, 2014 by Pierce Family Foundation

The Peer Skill Share program is designed to invest in the professional skills of nonprofit employees, building their individual capacity and by extension, the capacity of their organizations. The Pierce Family Foundation arranges for nonprofit employees to help each other via “skill share” sessions, where grantees can get one-on-one advice from peers on specific needs they identify. Since there is… Read More