Funding Resource for NGOs from Women Thrive Worldwide

A wonderful new funding resource for women-centered groups and organisations:

Women Thrive Worldwide is proud to announce the release of its Fundraising Guide for Women’s Community-Based Organizations. 

We frequently notice that local organizations have difficulty navigating the often complex world of international assistance and fundraising. This guide was written to help bridge that gap.

Outlining the basic concepts of professional fundraising, the guide seeks to assist our community partners through a collaborative process to increase access to effective resources. From practical advice based on years of experience in professional fundraising in the United States to detailed instructions on how to write grant proposals, budgets and reports, the principles and methods we introduce are applicable globally and can be tailored to local environments.

To download the free guide see http://bit.ly/bHSAxG.

Report on International Funding in 2009

I came across a report by Philanthropia Inc. on patterns in international funding for NGOs in the last year. Philanthropia specialises in international fundraising and philanthropy, advising nonprofit organisations in their fundraising efforts.

This report surveyed a small sample of NGOs around the world. It mentioned something that I have heard before that for many nonprofits, most of their funding - in this case 37% - comes from private donations (see below). Foundations provide 19%, government agencies 18% and corporations 13%.



Although it is important that nonprofits generate income of their own through services rendered and products sold, this only accounted for 8% of overall funding. This makes some sense, because ideally the organisation needs to focus on implementing their mission and the services or products provided are typically offered to the beneficiaries free of charge or at a highly subsidised cost.

For those organisations that received international funding (73% of respondents), most of the money came from foreign government agencies (see below).



For 70% of the nonprofits, the economic recession affected their operations, via loss of donors; having to devote more time and staff to fundraising; embarking on new fundraising initiatives; and letting go of some staff.

Notwithstanding, many organisations were optimistic that it would be easier to get international funding in 2010.

Funding Nonprofits

There has to be a better way! I'm writing a funding proposal and have been trying to write this proposal for the last month. I don't think I have it in me anymore to spend days on what will turn out to be yet another unsuccessful proposal. I have decided that next year, I will turn to more innovative ways of raising money for the nonprofit organisation, which I run.

There will be less time chained to my desk slaving away on yet another proposal! There will be more out-of-the-box thinking on how to generate revenue! There has to be a better way!

Grant Opportunity: Women in Technology

Apply for the Systers' Pass it On grant to support programmes that encourage women in computing. The Systers is an initiative of the Anita Borg Institute for Women & Technology and is a fantastic online resource, which provides a support and resource network for technical women.

(© Maciej Dakowicz)

PulseWire has a great article on 10 Ways to Give to Women and Girls, which neatly highlights ways to support work towards women's issues.

The article starts off with an unsettling reality: that although investing in women has been widely acknowledged as an effective way to address many global problems, social initiatives that focus on women actually receive less than 7% of all philanthropic funding worldwide. It is particularly worse for start-up and grassroots organisations who work very closely with their local communities and who are not on the radar of many big funders.

Another sad reality (not really discussed here) is that many social initiatives struggle to implement a huge mission and are not adept or have the time and resources to publicise their work. So, they continue to work under challenging circumstances and continue to experience difficulties in raising the requisite funding.

PulseWire's suggestions for supporting women's work includes:

• Align your checkbook to your inner compass: Think about the problems that you are most passionate about and identify and support organisations that are doing work that speaks to your heart
• Get to the grassroots: Look for organisations that work closely with local communities, who are not necessarily the high-powered NGOs that companies are clamouring to fund, and explore how you can help their work
• Give directly: Bypass intermediary charities that allocate your donations to a number of projects. Instead get to know individuals or organisations on a personal level and identify what type of help you can offer, e.g. a women's shelter that needs old clothes and books.
• Aggregate your giving power: Form a 'giving circle' with some friends, colleagues or family members and pool your resources together
• Give multi-year: Make a pledge to donate a certain amount every year for the next 3 years. These types of long-term support are often more helpful that one-off donations.
• Be a bridge: If you can link other donors and volunteers to your favourite cause, then by all means DO IT!!!!!

Nonprofits: Business Plans Versus Grant Proposals

This post by Patrick O'Heffernan, Are you a business plan or grant proposal social entrepreneur?, on the Social Edge blog comes at a handy time when I've been wrestling with writing a business plan for my nonprofit.

When it was first suggested to me that I write a business plan (about 2 years before I would actually set-up the organisation), it seemed that its purpose would primarily be to determine the feasibility of the world-be organisation. Fair enough. My friends sent me templates and I picked the simplest looking one and started work. Only it was much harder than I had hoped. Along the way, I dropped it meaning to continue with it at some point.

Anyway, fast-forward a couple of years and the nonprofit had started operations. Again I was advised to develop a plan, which which both help map-out the organisation's plan of action, and serve as a fund-raising tool. Fair enough, I thought again.

However, working on it has not been easy, however I have a semblance of a sort-of -ish plan. But, this was not the NGO school I came from. In my previous work experience, our source of funding came primarily from grants, which we got after slaving over proposals or completing often complex and multi-layered application processes. This is what I am used to and was expecting. The notion of asking companies to invest in your idea is a novel one; though perhaps one can think of grants as a form of investment in an approach or person who is going to address a social need.

I have experienced life in the nonprofit during an economic downturn before and it definitely wasn't fun to wake-up each day not knowing if this was the day your position would be axed as part of cost-reduction tactics. I remember feeling that it was crazy that our ability to do our work (not to mention our livelihood!) was dependent on whether we were given money or not, and I vowed that if I remained in the nonprofit world, I would find a better way of doing things.

Maybe that is the opportunity presented by this option to go a more business and bottomline-oriented route.

Patrick O' Heffernan highlights some advantages to starting a business to accomplish social goals:

• Quicker and sometimes easier to get investment capital
• As long as there's a market need for your products and you're well-priced, your revenues and profits will keep you in business regardless of the latest fads among donors
• You are responsible for your income and you decide what needs to be done to keep it flowing, i.e. no being at a donor's mercy
• Flexibility, because market changes and competition (and not grant agreements nor program officers' requests) drives your business decisions

Competitions/Funding Opportunities

Apply and share:

Vodafone Challenge - Deadline Feb. 2
The Vodafone Americas Foundation is pleased to announce the launch of its Wireless Innovation Challenge, a new competition that seeks to identify and fund the best innovations using wireless related technology to address critical social issues around the world. Three winners will be awarded prizes of $300,000, $200,000 and $100,000 for unique, late-stage wireless innovations that offer the best potential for creating social change in the areas of education, health, economic development, the environment and access to communication. For more information and to submit, visit: http://challenge.vodafone-us.com/

Intel's Inspire Empower Challenge - Deadline Feb. 17
Intel's INSPIRE•EMPOWER Challenge is looking for ideas from individuals, developers, organizations, and the public at large for using technology to address a global issue in the areas of education, health care, economic development, and the environment. Winners will get $100,000 USD to get their idea off the ground!
For more information, visit: http://ga0.org/ct/A1_e8YS1ET2C/