(by 9 people)
Starting with Basic Preparation
We are all affected by the society around us. Many of us are concerned about the rapid downward spiral in the society and world. Social change can be good or bad, helpful or harmful. Either way, the effects are felt by everyone, some more than others.
Smaller non profit and activist groups are very passionate, have enormous commitment and do great work. They are critical to the success and application of social change, they can build communities, and are flexible enough to address needs exactly where they are the greatest.
Funding, however, is perhaps the greatest challenge of all.
This page is to give an overview of the basic preparation any group needs to do for fund raising and grant writing.
This preparation will assist you in planning your needs, discovering opportunities, and making the most of your resources for long term viability.Where an example is needed, I use my experience with Neighborworks Community Garage (link below).
First, Your Ideals are Critical
The focus and Foundation of your Cause
Altruism isn't dead, not in America and not elsewhere. However, altruism is never 'pure' and folks, if they are to part with their hard earned money, need to have a compelling reason to cooperate and finance you.Your cause must be clear and focused.
Every day lots of programs come and go: drug rehab programs, child welfare programs, emergency housing programs, and so forth.
The newer ones really struggle, usually always because they have difficulty getting funding. All too often they don't survive.
Established non-profits do everything possible to keep the funding they are getting.
The competition for that money is fierce.
Without a ruthless evaluation of your foundational ideas, without an extremely tight focus, you'll never get anywhere.
You must be able to clearly speak about your purposes and your ideals.
Resources
Great resources for further information
- Social Policy & Philosophy Center
- Reference materials, classes, instruction & essays
- Social
- The Community Organizing Toolbox
- Offers the funders perspective... very helpful
- The Citizens Handbook
- Community Organizing
- COMM-ORG
- Connecting Theorists and Activists
Second, Do Your Research
Community Assessment
There are a few things that any major donor will definitely need to see. By doing your research, you will have the documentation required to make a compelling argument for your funds.1. What is the need in the community for the service(s) you are providing?
2. Who else is addressing that need? Are you duplicating services with other more established groups, or are you the leader of the pack?
3. Is the need growing or lessening?
In other words, you must be able to prove that your organization needs to exist!
Once this community assessment is done, it needs to be updated with available information annually.
Social Change
Issues, focus, information
The Tipping Point: How Little Things Can Make a Big Difference
Amazon Price: $8.99 (as of 07/20/2008)
Good to Great and the Social Sectors: A Monograph to Accompany Good to Great
Amazon Price: $9.56 (as of 07/20/2008)
Real Change: From the World That Fails to the World That Works
Amazon Price: $18.45 (as of 07/20/2008)
What Hath God Wrought: The Transformation of America, 1815-1848 (Oxford History of the United States)
Amazon Price: $23.10 (as of 07/20/2008)
Influencer: The Power to Change Anything
Amazon Price: $16.47 (as of 07/20/2008)
Critical Thinking
Trains of thought that examine societies, foundational understandings, potentialities
- SP&P 15:1 (Winter 1998) -- Virtue and Vice
- Social Philosophy: Virtue and Vice In recent years, moral philosophers have shown a
renewed interest in an approach to ethics which takes
virtues rather than duty or obligations to be the key
organizing concept. - BBC NEWS
- The richest 2% of adults in the world own more than half of all household wealth, a new study by the UN finds.
What should be in your Community Assessment?
Credible documentation and figures.
The community assessment research is a critical document that you will use again and again. The more thorough it is, the more useful it will be.Document the general demographics in your area of service, and then break those figures down farther until you are able to give a specific figure of individuals you anticipate will need your service.
This doesn't need to be long, but you want to have available statistics, any surveys conducted by the community at large or by area specialists, state or local government research into the needs, and if applicable, economic data that affects your target group of clients.
Community Partnerships
non-duplication of effort
A very important consideration of foundations and funding sources is whether there is a duplication of services.If your plan, for example, is to provide clothing to the poor, you had best be knowledgeable about other groups in the area that also provide clothing to the poor. These groups have sought funding as you will be seeking funding, and if it can be shown by your competitors that their work is adequately meeting the need in the area already, you will not receive funds for your program.
In such a case, your group may need to narrow its focus, by providing something that competing organizations do not provide, but is needed by the same clientele.
When you can partner with other groups to serve the same clientele with different programs, you have an opportunity to build community partnerships that are very important to philanthropic organizations today.
Be sure your community assessment includes potential or current partnerships available to your group.
Your Mission Statement
Clarity of purpose and mission
You MUST be able to state to potential donors and funders WHY your group needs to exist. It is not sufficient to assume that everyone has noticed the needs that you have, or that everyone thinks your solutions are the best ones.Your research should have been able to document, both statistically and through other research, that a specific NEED actually exists, and that it is not being met effectively in other ways.
It must be able to prove that the difference your group will make with its various programs will be a positive difference.
Your mission statement is NOT a statement of your programs!
A mission statement is more along the lines of:
"Single mothers are not able to hold jobs because of a lack of transportation. Our intention is to develop programs to assist these women to access reliable and safe transportation. With reliable and safe transportation, the economic situation of these very poor families will improve and the mothers will be more able to support their children without public assistance."
Your projects would then be, perhaps:
1. Provide donated cars to the moms.
2. Increase available public transportation.
3. Develop ride-sharing programs.
4. Create car-sharing programs.
The projects are NOT a mission statement. They are projects.
Community Garage
Foundation Information
The Foundation Center's Guide to Proposal Writing
Amazon Price: (as of 07/20/2008)
Foundations of Astronomy (with AceAstronomy, Virtual Astronomy Labs Printed Access Card)
Amazon Price: $116.76 (as of 07/20/2008)
The Foundations of Modern Science in the Middle Ages:Their Religious, Institutional and Intellectual Contexts
Amazon Price: $22.61 (as of 07/20/2008)
Articulate Your Projects
Brainstorm a good range to begin with.
Your final roster of projects will be the various different areas for which you will seek financial support.The Big Three Rs:
The projects must be realistic, reliable, and able to be replicated among the population you are serving.
Realistic:
1. Can it be actually done?
2. Is it within the capabilities/skills of most of your clientele to make use of your service?
3. Is it likely to get community support?
4. What is (are)the downside(s)?
5. What is the hierarchy of problems can you expect?
6. What are your liabilities?
7. Is it subject to regulations?
8. What exact regulations or laws apply?
9. What processes are necessary to implement follow through and documentation for?
10. What is the end product? What do you define as a successful interaction with a client?
Reliable:
1. Can most of your target clientele actually benefit your project?
2. What impediments may there be for certain clients?
3. What is the list of probable impediments?
4. Which clients are most likely to suffer these impediments?
5. Can you accommodate those impediments and how?
6. What liabilities might you encounter in providing the service?
7. What restrictions or requirements does government place on your activities?
8. In what ways might those requirements or restrictions create difficulties or challenges?
9. How can you anticipate/protect/accomodate those requirements?
10. What further support will your assisted clients need in the future to continue to succeed?
Replication:
1. What segments/demographics/neighborhoods are in your area of influence?
2. Can each of those areas access your service with the same ease?
3. Does any one of those groups require additional efforts to access your service?
4. What are those extra assistance needs?
5. Can those additional needs be met without draining the rest of your program resources?
6. Can your programs be used by many other community groups? Which ones?
7. Can other community groups contribute in whole or in part to pay for services you provide their clients?
Articulate Your Different Projects
This is an IMPORTANT selection!
Since your grants, fundraising and community donation efforts will be for VERY SPECIFIC things, it is important to lay out, exactly, the different projects you have brainstormed according to the three Rs above.
Do your documentation for each different project, as if it were an entire product of its own.
The different projects may well feed into each other, be a necessary support for one another, and yet, they must all be separated as much as possible.
Neighborworks Community Garage projects articulated into several different ones as follows:
1. Basic driving skills (signs, laws, etc.)
2. Basic car maintenance education
3. Donated car program- obtaining suitable cars
4. Donated auto repair program- repairing received cars
5. Specific car maintenance and training with recipients
6. 1 year maintenance of donated and given vehicles
7. Monitoring client's minimum legal requirements for owning a vehicle (insurance, proper plates, etc.)
Do your documentation for each different project, as if it were an entire product of its own.
The different projects may well feed into each other, be a necessary support for one another, and yet, they must all be separated as much as possible.
Neighborworks Community Garage projects articulated into several different ones as follows:
1. Basic driving skills (signs, laws, etc.)
2. Basic car maintenance education
3. Donated car program- obtaining suitable cars
4. Donated auto repair program- repairing received cars
5. Specific car maintenance and training with recipients
6. 1 year maintenance of donated and given vehicles
7. Monitoring client's minimum legal requirements for owning a vehicle (insurance, proper plates, etc.)
Internal Resources
Staffing, Volunteers, Needed Skillset & Capacity
It is also necessary to prove, with proper documentation, the internal resources of your group.
This will take the form of resumes, volunteer resources, equipment, tools, and plant capacity to deliver your service.
For example, it is best if you have:
1. The history of your organization
2. Biographical sketches of board members
3. Resumes of staff & volunteers
4. History of service delivery to date
5. Support letters from community partners
6. Any newspaper articles or press releases
7. Endorsements, awards, acknowledgements
8. Description of premises/plant/capacity
9. Annual budget
The point is to be able to prove, as needed, the competence of your staff, volunteers and other resources for properly and responsibly delivering the projects you offer.
This will take the form of resumes, volunteer resources, equipment, tools, and plant capacity to deliver your service.
For example, it is best if you have:
1. The history of your organization
2. Biographical sketches of board members
3. Resumes of staff & volunteers
4. History of service delivery to date
5. Support letters from community partners
6. Any newspaper articles or press releases
7. Endorsements, awards, acknowledgements
8. Description of premises/plant/capacity
9. Annual budget
The point is to be able to prove, as needed, the competence of your staff, volunteers and other resources for properly and responsibly delivering the projects you offer.
Assembly Required: State Your Case!
Your 'Master Document'
Your Master 'Case Statement'
Assembling all the information you have gathered so far, you will have, in effect, a master business plan.
This master statement will be your primary document that you will use to:
Draw information from for specific requests
Use as background information to see progress or discover unanticipated difficulties
Use as supporting documentation in writing grants
Preparing websites, brochures, mailings, press releases, articles & other promotional materials.
Assembling all the information you have gathered so far, you will have, in effect, a master business plan.
This master statement will be your primary document that you will use to:
Draw information from for specific requests
Use as background information to see progress or discover unanticipated difficulties
Use as supporting documentation in writing grants
Preparing websites, brochures, mailings, press releases, articles & other promotional materials.
Uses of your Case Statement
How you will use this document in the future
The Case Statement as developed above is a critical piece for the management, growth and direction of your group.
Here's why:
Here's why:
- Makes fundraising easier
- Solidifies the staff, volunteers and donors and gets everyone on the same page
- Improves your ability to manage your non profit group
- Is a critical reference point when the unexpected happens
- Gives you a 'word resource' for use when you (or someone else) are writing, promoting or doing public speaking about your projects or non-profit
- Provides an easy way to help break down tasks, job descriptions and small but important opportunities
- Enables you to see specific ways you can diversify your income
- Lays out a whole series of potential supporters or areas of partnership
These are your BASICS
This prepares you for your fundraising activities
I have laid out, the best I can, the very most basic preparations that you need to make in order to be ready for your fundraising activities.
I am working on additional pages about grant writing, project development principles, budgeting, promotional activities and project delivery.
If you have any questions that you would like me to address to make this or the other pages more useful, I have provided a guestbook for you to leave your comments, suggestions and questions on.
I am working on additional pages about grant writing, project development principles, budgeting, promotional activities and project delivery.
If you have any questions that you would like me to address to make this or the other pages more useful, I have provided a guestbook for you to leave your comments, suggestions and questions on.
In the meantime: One of my favorite Agents of Change
Take a look at this man!
I have found this person to be an extraordinary inspiration for all my activist, social change and charitable interests.He may inspire you, too!
-
Andrew Vachss
-
Andrew Vachss is not especially well known, in the celebrity sense. Yet he is an important, influential and even heroic man in the best sense of the word. Some know him as a top-notch crime writer, others as a lawyer, others as someone who works with...
Topics to Come in Fundraising for Social Change
A Squid-book by Margaret Schaut
All the text in this page is copyright protected.
The list below are topics I will be covering in future pages.
If you want to add a topic that you feel should be here, please feel free to do so.
#1
Fundraising by Mail
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#2
Creating a Budget
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#3
Board of Directors
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#4
Strategizing Fundraising Options
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#5
Fundraising by Event
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#6
Pledges
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#7
Retail Product/Fee for Service
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#8
Large Gifts Campaigns
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#9
Local Grants
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#10
Foundation Grants
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#11
Capital Campaigns
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#12
Internet
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All feedback is welcome, and I will use it to improve the remaining pages on Fundraising for Social Change.
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SamVan
Great job. I am working on a series of lenses about Hair Loss Products. Feel free to check it out. Posted July 17, 2008 |
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rayadams
Nice lens. Very informative and interesting. Currently I am working on a series of lenses Posted July 16, 2008 |
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Stephene
Very good lens. I am going to add to my favorites and 5 stars. Posted March 20, 2008 |
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Stephene
Very good lens. I am going to add to my favorites and 5 stars. Posted March 20, 2008 |
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Stephene
Very good lens. I am going to add to my favorites and 5 stars. Posted March 20, 2008 |
