Trends In Philanthropy: Ireland

The Community Foundation for Ireland have released a report “Philanthropy, the views of those who advise the rich“.  This is Ireland’s first ever survey of professional advisors focusing specifically on philanthropy.

A must read for all fundraisers in the Irish market. Some of the key findings that struck, and shocked me a bit, were the facts that:

1. many advisors are still unsure how to deal with philanthropy and are uncomfortable raising the topic
2. many advisors are unclear about the philanthropy vehicles available for would-be philanthropists

Real Impact

I spoke some time ago about The Suddes Group’s thinking that we should call our organisations For Impact as opposed to Non Profit (read the article I wrote called Bad Launguage here). So I was interested to read earlier this week on the AFP Blog a piece by Enid Ablowitz talking about the same topic.

Ablowitz remarks that:

They used to be called charities………Now, some are suggesting calling them public-benefit corporations or public-benefit enterprises.

What I found really interesting was this:

(they) employ more than 9 million people and have a volunteer, unpaid workforce equivalent to nearly 14 million more

Albowitz asks:

What if they no longer existed? What would happen if people stopped giving and the nonprofit, non-government organizations were not able to do what they do?

What impact might that have on communities, society, or even global viability? How do these organizations affect our lives?

Imagine if government taxation was the only source of funding and there were no volunteers

Really great questions.

In a time when we are reading articles about how a recession is going to affect fundraising we need to remind ourselves and then our donors of the impact we have. We need to demonstrate our value and really make an impact

Read the full Ablowitz article here

Funding Point

Funding Point

www.fundingpoint.ie is up and running.

The site contains details about hundreds of funding schemes from government grants to trusts and corporate grants, including all the info you need to make the application.

Sounds great. And it is.

What annoyed me a bit was the fact that on the flier and any other information I saw about it thwere was nothing that said I had to pay for the service!!

I dont really mind, but it was being promoted as being funded by the Vodafone Foundation so it seemed like it was going to be a great portal of resources that we could all access, but you have to pay for it.

I will probably subscribe, but if anyone from the Wheel or Vodafone is reading, please make it a bit clearer on future communications that there is a fee.

Lead Trusts

This is a great post on  Understanding Charitable Lead Trusts from the onPhilanthropy Blog. Click here to read the article

I really wish we had a better system for this kind of thing over here.

The Rich List – part two

I wrote earlier about the Sunday Times Rich list which is being printed this Sunday. Last weekend, they published an article called Out of the City, into Africa as rich list at last start giving, .

Similar to the ITV show it was very interesting, especially their commentary on the approach the rich are taking to giving.  It stated that they are bypassing established charities and in some cases are giving directly to the governments in the countries they want to operate in.

These are very successful (understatement) business people so it shouldn’t come as a surprise that they look on their giving as investments and they want to make sure they get the best return on their investments, (does it bring you back to my bad language post? maybe this is the place for that new language?)

I was fascinated to read about Christopher Hohn:

a City hedge fund manager, who has given £235.8m in humanitarian aid. The figure is more than twice his remaining fortune of £110m, giving him the highest ever Giving List score of 214%. (Source. The Sunday Times)

There was a quote that I really liked in the article from Andrew Carnegie, a 19th-century steel magnate, which states that a “man who dies rich dies disgraced”. It seems like this years Rich List are living by that motto.

So buy the Rich List this Sunday, but be warned if you think you can write your major gift hit list from it…perhaps you are picking it up for the wrong reason!

You can read the entire article here

Here is a link to the Sunday Times Rich List 2008

The Rich List

The Sunday Times Rich List is being published this weekend and in the past week, for the first time that I can recall, there has been a lot of talk about how the Rich List are giving.

During the week there was a show on ITV, hosted by Duncan Bannatyne, called Giving it Away, Britain’s Rich List, you can (until the end of May) watch the show here. In the show Bannatyne asks Britain’s super-rich (you need to be worth 80 million pounds to make the list, that’s 10million more than last year) if they are giving away as much as they could, or should. He explores not just what they give but also how they give.

“I believe that giving the money you make away is the best reason for making it in the first place and that we rich in Britain don’t do enough yet,” Duncan Bannatyne

During the show he meets a who’s who of Britain’s richest business people (they answer the phone to him!) and talks to them about their giving habits, is even brave enough to challenge them and tries to persuade them to give more.  I found it interesting in the interview with John Madejski when he (Madejski) stated that he got 15-20 asks a day in the post.

Who is sending those letters!? Do they really expect a response or a massive cheque? I hope not, and not because I think Madejski is unlikely to give, but who is going to donate at this level from an unsolicited letter?

By the end of the show (don’t read this bit if you plan on watching it) Bannatyne declares that he intends to set up a foundation to give away his money. He states that

you know that means I’m not going to die the richest man in the graveyard

I disagree, I think it will make him the richest.