Nonprofit Literature Blog

Crowdfunding for Filmmakers

Crowdfunding has been around since 1990, but only recently has the power of online platforms and social
media really unleashed its potential for film financing. By launching a campaign using a crowdfunding platform such as Indiegogo or Kickstarter, an independent filmmaker can go directly to the crowd to get funding for their projects, who can help you get your film made with just a click of the mouse.

Writer and filmmaker John T. Trigonis, who has used crowdfunding and social networking campaigns to finance his own short films, provides a how-to manual on doing so titled Crowdfunding for Filmmakers: the Way to a Successful Film Campaign (Michael Wiese Productions, 2013). He outlines the basics of crowdfunding, and explains how to choose your platform, home in on your target audience, personalize your campaign, and effectively engage the community. Trigonis also offers advanced tips for raising larger amounts and studies of successful film crowdfunding efforts.

One nice touch is his use of the principles of Taoism (“the way”) to describe how to get the most out of crowdfunding, explaining that if campaigner remains to true to the basic elements of fundraising—pitch, perks, and promotion—and enhances them with a fourth P—personalization—the chances of achieving one’s crowdfunding goal increases significantly.

Here are some summary points from the book:

• Transparency is important in campaigns, so keep supporters informed of your behind-the-scenes progress.
• Instead of focusing on the ask, explore how you can evoke a response to your work.
• Think of donations as an opportunity to build relationships, rather than just a monetary benefit.
• If you want to raise substantial funds on crowdfunding platforms, you need to have “a gimmick, friends, patience, fun, and most importantly, guts."

Foundation Center libraries also hold other books on film financing and crowdfunding. Here’s a sample of recent publications you'll find here:

• The Everything Guide to Crowdfunding: Learn How to Use Social media for Small-Business Funding by Thomas Elliott Young (Adams Media, 2013)
• The Crowdfunding Bible: How to Raise Money for Any Startup, Video Game, or Project by Scott Steinberg (read.me, 2012)
• Documentary Fundraising Guide: Lessons From a Filmmaker: Simple Steps to Get Cash Flowing For Your Film by Faith Fuller (Desktop Documentaries, 2012)
• The Art of Film Funding: Alternative Financing Concepts 2nd ed. by Carole Lee Dean (Michael Wiese Productions, 2012)

And lastly, don't forget about GrantSpace's list of funding resources for film/videomakers!

--Rob Bruno
Catalog/Reference Librarian
The Foundation Center

Stanford Social Innovation Review Celebrates Its 10th Anniversary

In the Spring of 2003, the Stanford Social Innovation Review published its inaugural issue. To celebrate its 10th anniversary, their Spring 2013 issue includes essays from the world’s leading thinkers and practitioners on how the field of social innovation has evolved and what challenges remain ahead. Here are some abstracts from the Catalog of Nonprofit Literature to get you started. I've provided links to full-text below where available; to read the other articles, visit the Foundation Center and ask for the printed issue.

"The Nonprofits of 2025" by Helmut K. Anheier (p. 18-20)
The author reviews past and current trends in the nonprofit sector to determine what its future might look like, and comes up with four possible scenarios. The New Public Management (NPM) scenario envisions a sector that becomes a private extension agent of a contract regime run by government; the civic scenario sees nonprofits as primarily detecting and correcting social ills before they become "social problems"; the accountability scenario views them as watchdogs to keep the state and market in check; and the innovation scenario predicts that they will attract venture capital and become the "search engine" for social problem solving.

"Listening to Those Who Matter Most, the Beneficiaries" by Fay Twersky, Phil Buchanan, and Valerie Threlfall (p. 40-45)
This article explains the value of listening to those who benefit from social programs, since they often provide a unique insight into a program's effectiveness. The authors discuss how this feedback can be used and look at initiatives around the globe, focusing on patient feedback in health care programs and student feedback in educational programs. They also discuss the challenges to this work, such as the cost and difficulty of getting responses.

"High Stakes Donor Collaborations" by Willa Seldon, Thomas J. Tierney, and Gihani Fernando (p. 46-51)
This article identifies and examines collaborative efforts in philanthropy that have been created in order to tackle large scale social problems. The authors discuss their effectiveness through their ability to access expertise, create system-level change, and aggregate capital. They also share pragmatic insights into what makes collaboratives work.

"Assessing Advocacy" by Ivan Barkhorn, Nathan Huttner, and Jason Blau (p. 58-64)
Provides a framework for grantmakers to plan, monitor, and evaluate advocacy investments. This framework enables funders to evaluate projects for nine conditions, from the presence of effective champions to favorable timing. Article can also be used by organizers of advocacy campaigns to determine the best approaches and develop effective strategies.

"Improving Household Balance Sheets" by Jack McCarthy (73-74)
Discusses the reasoning behind and details of the Citi Foundation's Financial Capability Innovation Fund, which was set up to support new, innovative financial education and training programs. Lists grantees and describes their projects around the U.S.

--Rob Bruno
Catalog/Reference Librarian
The Foundation Center

 

 

Three New Fundraising Books

We're only a few months into 2013, but a considerable number a fundraising-related books have already hit the market. The Foundation Center has recently acquired some of these titles that may help with your development efforts.

The first, Leading the Fundraising Charge: the Role of the Nonprofit Executive (Wiley, 2013) looks at leadership roles in nonprofit development; in Prerequisites for Fundraising Success (Saad & Shaw, 2013) two fundraising consultants tell you what you need in place at your nonprofit so fundraising can be successful; and The PayPal Official Insider Guide to Online Fundraising (PayPal, 2013) provides a comprehensive instruction manual on how to set up your nonprofit to get donations using the popular online transaction system. I'll point out some highlights of each here.

Karla A. Williams tells us in the preface of Leading the Fundraising Charge that her textbook is "the first of its kind to link the role of the organizational leader with the role of the fundraising leader." The book is structured around central concepts in leadership, philanthropy, development, relationships and solicitation and uses them to explain and delineate leadership roles in fundraising at a typical nonprofit. For example, in a section on teamwork Williams states the importance of all staff in the fundraising scheme, from the Executive Director to volunteers. "When executive directors are part of the development team, they give fundraising the leadership the community expects from a charity of choice." Volunteers, on the other hand, are essential because they "give fundraising the grassroots value that keeps commercialization from taking over."

Prerequisites for Fundraising Success is more of a handbook, and boils down effective fundraising to 18 elements that need to be present in order for it to occur. Leadership is emphasized here as well, as one prerequisite is to "achieve full commitment from the board of directors, CEO, executive director or president, and top fundraising staff." Each element is concisely presented and includes step-by-step guidelines on how to meet it, and also includes benchmarking checklists. In the chapter about approaching donors the authors provide a list of steps on how to use your data management system to coordinate solicitation strategies, offer suggestions on how to conduct the actual conversation/ask, and include a checklist to see if your strategy is on the right path.

The final book focuses on one specific aspect of fundraising: online fundraising through web sites, mobile applications, and social media using PayPal. While the Insider Guide to Online Fundraising obviously explains how to use the PayPal service for donations, it also assists you in developing operations for online fundraising (including legal guidance) and  a ten-step social media strategy. One feature is a simple list of must-haves for an effective nonprofit website. These include a "moving story with a dramatic photo of someone you've helped" a "big, easy-to-donate button, ideally on the same spot on every page of your website" and "a list of your board members."

So whether you need help getting started with online fundraising, want to improve your development efforts, or are an executive who needs to brush up on fundraising, visit the library to peruse these and other related materials. Click on the title links in the lead paragraph to obtain Call Number information and library holdings. Or, browse the Catalog of Nonprofit Literature for other fundraising books and articles published this year.

--Rob Bruno
Catalog/Reference Librarian
The Foundation Center

Philanthropy Blueprint for 2013

Spring is right around the corner, but it's not too late to share Lucy Bernholz's look back at 2012 and her predictions for 2013 in Philanthropy and the Social Economy: Blueprint 2013 which is now published by GrantCraft. This year, she uses the term "social economy" to call more attention to the landscape shift she introduced a few years ago. In this post I'll highlight her takes on developments in data sharing last year (where the Foundation Center played a key role) and list a few of her predictions for the coming year.

A Look Back at Big Data

In the section Foundations Go Big on Data Bernholz tells us that more than a dozen meaningful efforts at sharing philanthropic data took flight in 2012. Three of them involved the Foundation Center. The first was the Reporting Commitment, which is a commitment by 15 of the nation's largest foundations to open up, or share, their commonly-coded grants. She calls this a "breakthrough in gathering grants data."

The second is the Center's relaunch of IssueLab, which uses Creative Commons licensing to organize and share research funded and conducted by foundations and nonprofits.

Lastly, she notes that the Foundation Center is among many other major data providers (including GuideStar, MicroEdge, TechSoupGlobal, and the World Bank Institute) that are collaborating to link and connect their data so donors and doers can make better sense of philanthropic opportunities.

Predictions for 2013

What will this year bring? Here are five predictions (from a total of 12) for 2013. In particular, Bernholz thinks that 2013 will see state legislatures and courts play key roles on nonprofit disclosure, social businesses and taxes. 

• Congress will change the rules on tax deductions: this will happen in the first half of the year, with Congress setting lower limits for charitable deductions for the wealthiest donors.
• Crowdfunding will go mainstream: she points out that Hurricane Sandy demonstrated the power of crowdfunding, as neighbors applied it as well as "crowdfinding" tools to assist hard hit neighborhoods.
• Technology-enabled civic engagement will grow: she says the aim of organizations like CodeForAmerica is to make "public service sexy again."
• Charitable organizations will fail in greater numbers, and we might have accurate data on this (two predictions in one): financial pressures of the last four years will take their toll on nonprofits. She states that charities providing "lifeline" services are facing increased demand, but more than half of them had fewer than three months cash on hand.
• Asian philanthropists will grow in prominence and visibility in 2013: Wealthy Asians will continue to become global players in philanthropy, but in their own ways, mostly staying outside the bounds of the Giving Pledge and other western efforts.

Other sections in Blueprint 2013 include her Buzzword Watch (MOOCs, anyone?) and Wildcards, or "predictable unpredictables." Bernholz also examines her previous forecasts, and examines the future of the social economy, where alternative corporate forms and pro-social investments are creating a "fundamentally different set of systems for using private resources for public good."

You can download Blueprint 2013 free charge here, or visit a Foundation Center library to view a print copy. You may also want to follow Lucy Bernholz on Twitter.

--Rob Bruno
Catalog/Reference Librarian
Foundation Center--New York

The Philanthropy Hall of Fame

The Winter 2013 issue of Philanthropy magazine features the article "American History's Greatest Philanthropists" where the editors announced the inaugural class of the  Philanthropy Hall of Fame.  While inclusion into the Baseball Hall of Fame can be determined by statistical analysis, like the number of home runs or strikeouts, it's much harder to define greatness in philanthropy. What is more important, the size of the gift, its percentage of net worth, or the return on charitable dollar?  Also, is effectiveness determined by the number of people served, or the years of lasting influence?

To make their task easier, the editors only took into account accomplishments attained within the individuals own lifetime, thus excluding living donors as their work is not yet finished. They also focused on philathropy conducted with one's own money rather than institutional giving. The end result is a list of close to sixty great American philanthropists, from founding funders like Benjamin Franklin through recent figures like John T. Walton. To give you an idea of what's included I've linked to five HOF profiles below, with a snippet from each biography.  Online entries also includes bibliographies for further reading.

Benjamin Franklin (1706 - 1790)
Throughout his life, but most notably while living in Philadelphia, Franklin led a number of private, voluntary initiatives to enhance civil society. “It is prodigious the quantity of good that may be done by one man, if he will make a business of it,” he once observed. Historian Edmund Morgan suggested he “was behind virtually every scheme that made [Philadelphia] an attractive place to live.”

Andrew Carnegie (1835 - 1919)
Carnegie may be the most influential philanthropist in American history. The scale of his giving is almost without peer: adjusted for inflation, his donations exceed those of virtually everyone else in the nation’s history. He built some 2,800 lending libraries around the globe, founded what became one of the world’s great research universities, endowed one of the nation’s most significant grantmakers, and established charitable organizations that are still active nearly a century after his death.

John D. Rockefeller Sr. (1839 – 1937)
After starting life in humble circumstances, Rockefeller came to dominate the burgeoning petroleum industry by the time he was 40 years old. He became the richest man of his time, and indeed has a good claim to perhaps being the richest self-made man who ever lived.

He was equally distinguished as a philanthropist. Within his lifetime, Rockefeller helped launch the field of biomedical research and revolutionized medical training in the United States, championed the cause of public sanitation, vigorously promoted the cause of education nationwide, without distinction of sex, race, or creed, and created the University of Chicago, virtually from scratch, and within a decade turned it into one of the world’s leading universities.

Mary Elizabeth Garrett (1853 - 1915)
Garrett ranks among the nation’s most significant benefactors of higher education for women. Born in 1853 to wealth and privilege, Garrett was the third child (and only daughter) of railroad tycoon John Work Garrett, the president of the Baltimore & Ohio Railroad. Mary Garrett’s inheritance would make her one of the wealthiest women in the United States, but it was her business savvy and shrewd philanthropy that helped her to achieve some of the greatest social improvements of her generation.

Oseola McCarty (1908 - 1999)
When she retired in 1995, her hands painfully swollen with arthritis, this washerwoman who had been paid in little piles of coins and dollar bills her entire life had $280,000 in the bank.

Even more startling: she decided to give most of it away—not as a bequest, but immediately.

Setting aside just enough to live on, McCarty donated $150,000 to the University of Southern Mississippi to fund scholarships for worthy but needy students seeking the education she never had. When they found out what she had done, over 600 men and women in Hattiesburg and beyond made donations that more than tripled her original endowment. Today, the university presents several full-tuition McCarty scholarships every year.

You may also be interested in reading my previous post from March 2012 on The History of Philanthropy in the U.S.

 --Rob Bruno
Catalog/Reference Librarian
The Foundation Center--New York

UnderDeveloped: A National Study of Challenges Facing Nonprofit Fundraising

A new national study, a joint project of CompassPoint and the Evelyn and Walter Haas, Jr. Fund, reveals that many nonprofits are stuck in a vicious cycle that threatens their ability to raise the resources they need to succeed.  The study found high levels of turnover and lengthy vacancies in development director positions throughout the sector. More significantly, the study reveals deeper issues that contribute to instability in the development director role, including a lack of basic fundraising systems and inadequate attention to fund development among key board and staff leaders.

The report, UnderDeveloped: A National Study of Challenges Facing Nonprofit Fundraising, is organized around three main challenges and concludes with a set of recommendations to jumpstart a national conversation about how we can all help nonprofits take their fund development to the next level.  Key findings include:

REVOLVING DOOR: Instability in the Development Director Role

Organizations are struggling with high turnover and long vacancies in the development director position. Executive directors at organizations where the development director position was vacant said the positions had been open for an average of 6 months. Almost half (46%) reported vacancies even longer than that.  Half of development directors (50%) said they expect to leave their current jobs in two years or less; and the rate was even higher for smaller organizations.

HELP WANTED: An Inadequate and Uneven Talent Pool

Organizations aren’t finding enough qualified candidates for development director jobs. Executives also report performance problems and a lack of basic fundraising skills among key development staff.   Asked about the last time they tried to hire a new development director, more than half of executives (53%) said the search produced an insufficient number of candidates with the right mix of skills and experience.

IT’S ABOUT MORE THAN ONE PERSON: Lacking the Conditions for Fundraising Success

Beyond creating a development director position and hiring someone who is qualified for the job, organizations and their leaders need to build the capacity, the systems, and the culture to support fundraising success. The findings indicate that many nonprofits aren’t doing this.  Significant numbers of development directors questioned the effectiveness of their organizations’ fundraising efforts.

BREAKING THE CYCLE: CALLS to ACTION

UnderDeveloped includes a set of urgent calls to action for the nonprofit executives, funders, and sector leaders to address the challenges detailed in the report. CompassPoint and Haas, Jr. Fund  hope that the study becomes the spark for a national conversation about how to create thriving nonprofits that are able to raise the funds they need year in and year out to build and grow their programs.

Download - The full report including key findings and calls to action.

Join the National Conversation - For more information about UnderDeveloped and to sign up for the National Conversation about the Calls to Action, contact Marla Cornelius, CompassPoint, at 415.541.9000 x315 or marlac@compasspoint.org.

This post was written by Sarah Jo Neubauer, Training Coordinator, Foundation Center--San Francisco and originally appeared on their blog.

New BoardSource Books: Board Chairs and Dashboards

BoardSource, the "premier voice of nonprofit governance," has recently published new editions of its Board Chair Handbook and Nonprofit Dashboard. I'll discuss highlights here and link to additional print and online resources. Both books are available at Foundation Center libraries.

The third edition of the Board Chair Handbook by Mindy Werthheimer is intended for current or prospective board chairs interested in carrying out their duties more effectively. The first part of the book explains how the chair can build his/her individual capacity by taking inventory of knowledge and skills, applying them to the board chair role, and creating one's own "personal support system." Succeeding chapters discuss how the chair can optimize the board's work, and also delve into future considerations such as succession planning and leaving a legacy.

One interesting new feature is the appendix "Collective Inquiry: Creating a Learning Community." This section outlines a leadership development model for using this handbook to create a peer-to-peer learning community of board chairs, complete with sample agendas and questions.

Here are some more similar, recommended governance publications published by BoardSource and available at the Foundation Center:

• Board Fundamentals: Understanding Roles in Nonprofit Governance
• Govern More, Manage Less: Harnessing the Power of Your Nonprofit Board
• The Nonprofit Board Answer Book: A Practical Guide for Board Members and Chief Executives

In the second edition of The Nonprofit Dashboard: Using Metrics to Drive Mission Success, Lawrence Butler explains how to create and use dashboards to keep tabs on the overall health of a nonprofit.

What are dashboards? Simply put, they are "user friendly tools for displaying performance measures." Butler discusses the dashboard's role in a nonprofit's planning and evaluation, suggests metrics to use in them, and explains how to design one.

As dashboards are largely visual tools, I found it helpful that he included numerous color figures that can aid the reader in creating an effective, easy-to-read dashboard layout. One excellent example is a sample Monthly Status Report for an art museum that clearly displays data trends for budget, income, visitors, and public support.

Butler also shares some web sites that help with dashboard development and program evaluation:

• Excel Dashboards at Chandoo.org: tutorials, templates, and examples.
• Data-to-Dashboard: blogs, visualizations, and software.
• Theory of Change: helps in the design and evaluation of social change initiatives.

For more resources, check out GrantSpace's Knowledge Base Articles on boards and program evaluation.

--Rob Bruno
Catalog/Reference Librarian
Foundation Center--NY

Using Pro Bono to Build Capacity

On Wednesday, January 9th, Aaron Hurst, founder and president of Taproot Foundation, will discuss highlights from Taproot’s new book, Powered by Pro Bono: The Nonprofit’s Step-by-Step Guide To Scoping, Securing, Managing, Scaling Pro Bono Resources (Jossey-Bass, 2012) in the New York Office's Training Annex (register here). This new resource for the nonprofit community enables nonprofits to plan for and turn on their pro bono potential and ultimately increase organizational capacity.  In this post I will highlight some aspects of the book, which is available at all five Foundation Center offices.

The Taproot Foundation defines pro bono as "free, donated professional services (marketing, legal guidance, human resources, technology, etc.) to a nonprofit to further their mission." They break down the process of finding, hiring, and using these consultants into four stages. Stage One, Scope Projects, explains how to build your team and write a scope statement. Stage Two, Secure Resources, explains  where to find consultants and how to deliver a proposal for services. Stage Three, Manage Projects, takes the reader through six key management phases of pro bono work and Stage Four, Scale Projects, suggests ways to build capacity and become "powered by pro bono."

What nonprofit needs are met through pro bono? The Scope Projects section outlines some of them, including the "need to build stronger relationships with ... donors and maintaining those relationships over time." To meet this need, consultants can help your organization implement a donor database, create a donor relations strategy, or even provide a fundraising coach.  Another need, "to raise the visibility of ... services in the community" can be met by getting your volunteer professionals to create a PR plan, optimize your search engine, or plan and produce special events.

Highlights also include the Five Attributes of a "Powered by Pro Bono" Organization (p. 152), which is followed by a step-by-step scaling process with the final goal of increasing capacity. The appendix is quite thorough, and includes job posting templates, a sample liability waiver, applications for pro bono services, and post-project surveys.

Other recommend books held by Foundation Center libraries on this topic include:

• Good Counsel: Meeting the Legal Needs of Nonprofits by Rosenthal, Lesley. Includes advice for those seeking paid or pro bono legal representation.
• The Power of Bro Bono: 40 Stories About Design for the Public Good by Architects and Their Clients by Cary, John (ed.). With descriptions and photographs of pro bono architecture projects around the U.S.

For staff advice and the latest Internet resources read GrantSpace's Knowledge Base Articles on consultants, especially "Where can I find "pro bono" tax or legal assistance for my nonprofit?"

--Rob Bruno
Catalog/Reference Librarian
Foundation Center--New York

Nonprofit Almanac: Sector Trends and Statistics

Since 1997, the Urban Institute's Nonprofit Almanac has been collecting data from various government and nonprofit sources to provide "the most comprehensive statistical picture of the nonprofit sector available." The 2012 edition now provides information about how the nonprofit sector was affected by the Great Recession. In the foreword, Robert Reischauer, President Emeritus of the Institute, states that "while the data reveal that the ... sector continued to grow [during this period of slow economic growth], adding jobs while business and government shed them, growth has been uneven."

The Almanac also highlights trends between 2008-2010 that revealed a decline in individuals making contributions and bequests, as well as a decline in interest in dividend income. Data also showed an increasing gap between nonprofit income and expenditures, and found that the "growth of the sector is being financed largely by borrowing or drawing down of reserves, trends that are likely to weaken affected parts of the sector over the long haul."

These trends, as well as many others, are discussed in the book's five chapters: The Nonprofit Sector and Its Place in the National Economy, Wage and Employment Trends, Trends in Private Giving and Volunteering, Financial Trends, and The Size, Scope and Finances of Public Charities.  Below I've selected some statistical items from each section to give you an idea of what's available. You may also want to view the graphical highlights of each chapter provided by the Urban Institute.

The Nonprofit Sector and Its Place in the National Economy

• There is about 1 nonprofit for every 175 Americans.
• In 2010, nonprofits contributed $804.8 billion to the gross domestic product (GDP); this equates to 5.5 percent of GDP.
• In 2010, the nonprofit sector employed 13.7 million people.

Wage and Employment Trends

• In 1998 nonprofit employees made up 8.8 percent of nonfarm workforce; in 2010 it was 10.6 percent.
• Health care and social assistance account for 56.1 percent of nonprofit wages.
• Utilities have the largest average annual compensation per employee, at $88,830; that subsector also accounts for the highest growth rate in wages and employment.
• Educational services has the highest annual growth rate of average annual compensation.

Trends in Private Giving and Volunteering

• Private giving reached an estimated $290.89 billion in 2010, but when looked at in constant dollars, actually dropped 11 percent from 2007 when private giving reached its historical peak at $310.57 billion.
• Foundation assets plummeted 17 percent from 2007 to 2008; in 2008, however, foundation giving reached an all-time high of $46.8 billion, largely fueled by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation.
• Volunteers spent 14.9 billion hours volunteering in 2010, largely for religious and educational institutions.

 Financial Trends

• Nonprofit revenue was $1.16 trillion in 2010.
• After the recession, asset income was the hardest hit revenue source, declining 13 percent in 2008, 5 percent in 2009, and over 7 percent in 2010.
• Nonprofits have had a surplus of funds two times in the past 10 years and have run deficits in eight years.
• More than half of consumption expenditures in 2010 were in health care; another 16 percent in education, and 10 percent in social services.

 The Size, Scope and Finances of Public Charities

• In 2010, nearly 1.6 million nonprofits were registered with the IRS.
• Sixty-three percent of public charities were founded in the past 20 years.
• Human services nonprofits account for one-third of public charities; education accounts for one-fifth and is the second-largest subsector.
• California has the most public charities (42,479) while Wyoming has the fewest (1,077). However, less populated states like Wyoming have the highest nonprofit density per person.

For more statistical information on nonprofit organizations, search the Catalog of Nonprofit Literature using subject heading "nonprofit organizations--statistics".  I also recommend you browse through GrantSpace's Knowledge Base Articles on statistics. For more big picture views of the nonprofit sector, check out America's Nonprofit Sector: A Primer, and The State of Nonprofit America. I discussed them both in a previous posting.

 -Rob Bruno   
Catalog/Reference Librarian
The Foundation Center--NY

"Off the Shelf" Book Reviews

Philanthropy News Digest (PND), a daily news service of the Foundation Center, is a compendium, in digest form, of philanthropy-related articles and features culled from print and electronic media outlets nationwide. In PND's Off the Shelf  feature, you'll find reviews of books on a variety of topics ranging from international philanthropy to nonprofit management. Here are excerpts from five reviews published in the second half of 2012.

The Last Hunger Season: A Year in an African Farm Community on the Brink of Change
Roger Thurow (New York, New York: PublicAffairs, 2012)

"As Thurow tells it, Andrew Youn, One Acre's co-founder and executive director, believes East Africa's food insecurity problem is primarily economic rather than agricultural, and he has come up with an innovative business model to address the high rates of malnutrition, depleted soils, lack of access to information, and crop price fluctuations that are characteristic of the region." Read more...

Changing Business From the Inside Out: A Treehugger's Guide to Working in Corporations
Timothy J. Mohin (San Francisco, California: Berrett-Koehler, 2012)

"...corporate responsibility programs aren't making the world any worse, and, at their best, they may be contributing to change within corporate cultures and doing some good. But whether multinational corporations can actually drive greater social change than the activists, nongovernmental organizations, and governments that have been pushing them to adopt a responsibility agenda for decades remains to be seen." Read more...

Charity Case: How the Nonprofit Community Can Stand Up for Itself and Change the World
Dan Pallotta (San Francisco, California: Jossey-Bass, 2012)

"Pallotta argues that executive compensation and overhead expenses cannot be considered in isolation when gauging an organization's effectiveness or efficiency. On the contrary, embracing the tools of capitalism (competitive salaries, advertising, lobbying, etc.) may be the best way for charities to maximize their donations and ultimately deliver superior services and programs." Read more...

A Memoir of the Ford Foundation: The Early Years
Evelyn C. Walsh, Verne S. Atwater (New York, NY: Vantage Press, 2012)

"Less a comprehensive history of the Ford Foundation than an impressionistic behind-the-scenes account of what it was like to work at the foundation as it rose to international prominence, 'A Memoir of the Ford Foundation: The Early Years' is a splendid addition to the growing literature about twentieth-century philanthropy and ably demonstrates that philanthropy, while an inherently personal endeavor, has the potential to exceed even our grandest expectations." Read more...  

The Art of Being Unreasonable: Lessons in Unconventional Thinking
Eli Broad (Hoboken, NJ: John Wiley & Sons, 2012)

"Broad credits his parents, who owned a five-and-dime and were always generous with their time and the resources they had, with teaching him the importance of giving back. Following their example, he and [his wife] Edythe have adopted a hands-on approach to their philanthropy, which Broad believes is a 'more meaningful way to give back.' The Broads are actively involved in the work of their foundations and are famous for asking three questions before making a philanthropic investment: Will the grant make a difference in twenty years? Will the project happen without our support? And are the right people in place to make it happen?" Read more...

You can read highlights of reviews from the first half of 2012 here. For all Off the Shelf reviews, click here.

--Rob Bruno
Catalog/Reference Librarian
The Foundation Center--NY