Northern California Grantmakers

NCG member Pam David of the Walter & Elise Haas Fund was recently featured in Blue Avocado and if you haven’t read the interview/article, you should.

Pam offers insights on the field, compares government transparency to what she sees in Philanthropy, gives her thoughts on Philanthropy’s role in community change and what she thinks Philanthropy should be doing.

Here are some of the highlights.

On what she’s learned about philanthropy since coming to it from government:

“When I first came to work in philanthropy my first impressions were “No accountability, no urgency.” Particularly compared to the multiple layers of public oversight and transparency in my old job…What I’ve found in this arena is that there is tremendous accountability to the trustees, and rightly so, but the only external accountability is what you yourself bring to the table.”

Comparing accountability in government and philanthropy:

“When a nonprofit drug abuse clinic imploded, my colleagues in the public health department had to somehow maintain those services…A key underlying difference is that local government has real responsibilities for the community; its failure to act responsibly and timely has real-life impact.

In most of philanthropy we aren’t responsible in the same way. So, for example, even if a foundation had a grant to that same childcare center, it wouldn’t necessarily feel responsible for making sure those parents had a place to take their kids the next day. It’s not that philanthropy should be the same as local government. I get that we play different roles. But philanthropy definitely has things to learn from its public sector counterpart.”

On taking risks:

“Part of my old job was running a community development loan fund, and I learned the importance of balancing risk in a portfolio. If every business we made loans to was successful, then we knew we weren’t reaching the people who most needed our community development money, that we probably weren’t making loans to all of the right people.

From what I’ve seen, most foundations don’t usually look at risk in balancing their grants portfolios. As a sector, we are more risk averse than our governmental counterparts, and yet have less reason for being so.”

On philanthropy’s ability to drive community change:

“…I wouldn’t be here if I thought philanthropy couldn’t do a thing. Philanthropy is critical in supporting community change, social change. But…I don’t see philanthropy as the driver of change. I see philanthropic resources — both intellectual and financial — as incredibly important, but when we forget we’re the flea, not the elephant, philanthropy can make tremendous miscalculations.”

On what philanthropy should be doing:

“First, if we’re serious about community change, we can’t do it without the community…

Second, we need to have effective relationships with government, particularly on the local level…

And, yes, part of our role should be R&D: supporting innovation when it really adds value, helping make good work great, investing in leadership and strengthening organizational infrastructure…”

Read Blue Avocado’s full interview/article with NCG member Pam David online.

Is it Thursday already?

Not that I’m complaining. It’s been a little quiet here on the blogging front because I’ve been in the throes of putting together our Fall All Member Newsletter. Members, check your inbox for the email announcing the newsletter, or read it online (login required).

But back to Thursday. It’s once again that day of the week where we try to share some Twitter love and highlight some of the organizations and individuals we’re following on Twitter.

And you can always follow NCG on twitter at twitter.com/NorCalGrant.

Here’s Who We’re Following on Twitter

CEP_CambSanFran
The Center for Effective Philanthropy, a.k.a. CEP_CambSanFran, is committed to helping grantmakers better “define, assess and improve their effectiveness and impact.” To that end, they use their twitter feed to posit questions and share research on effective grantmaking.

For example:

RT @edwarmi Would love to see a critique like this of standardized measures of non-profit performance – any takers? http://bit.ly/csL9QT

Report Watch: recent research echos what CEP’s data has found to be true: foundation communications is not easy. http://bit.ly/cQIQC7

chickeneggpics
chickeneggpics is the twitter handle of NCG member Chicken & Egg Pictures, “a hybrid film fund and non-profit production company dedicated to supporting women filmmakers who are as passionate about the craft of storytelling as they are about the social justice, environmental and human rights issues they’re embracing, translating and exploring on film.”

Chicken & Egg Pictures uses twitter to share news about their grantees and announce information about their grantmaing. Here’s a sample of some recent tweets:

Chicken & Egg’s WHICH CAME FIRST FUND, a fund dedicated to supporting environmentally-focused stories, is open to… http://fb.me/Ae4H6Fdt

Chicken & Egg grantee Lynn Hershman Leeson will premiere her film, !Women Art Revolution – A Secret History,” at… http://fb.me/C3UJoyW8

familygiving
The National Center for Family Philanthropy uses their twitter feed to share philanthropic news pertaining to family grantmakers, their programming, and information relevant to the wider philanthropic audience.

Here are some of their recent tweets:

NCFP Teleconference Sept. 16 – Funding Volunteer Capacity to Create Change http://conta.cc/al256K

More on deciphering donor intent: What Would Grandpa Want: http://bit.ly/arxPfC & In Loving Memory: Legacy Grantmaking http://bit.ly/cU7l7C

jacobcharold
NCG member and Program Officer at The William & Flora Hewlett Foundation Jacob Harold explains that on his twitter feed he’s expressing his own opinions on philanthropy, climate change, strategy, economics and not those of the foundation.

Either way, we’re glad he’s adding his voice to online conversations.

Here are some of Jacob’s musings via twitter:

It’s not that our planet is fragile; it’s that we’re fragile because we count on it acting a certain way.

Strange that this article doesn’t mention @Philanthropedia, @GiveWell, @RootCause, @GreatNonprofits: http://bit.ly/aZKbmf

Birth of another online giving platform: http://giveloop.com/tour. Some good innovations; but the market’s so crowded already.

Have any Twitter recommendations for us? Let us know who you think we should be following.

As the NCG staff member who manages our Twitter feed, I also follow the conversations that develop in the Twitterverse (sigh, yes, I said it).

One of the conversations I follow is the #csr thread. For those of you new to Twitter lingo, the hashtag (#) is a way to mark your tweet so that if a reader wants to search for information on a particular subject they simply search for its hashtag.

In the case of corporate social responsibility, that hashtag is #csr.

It was one week ago that the #csr thread was a-buzz regarding a Wall Street Journal article entitled “The Case Against Corporate Social Responsibility,” written by associate professor of strategy at the University of Michigan Dr. Aneel Karnani.

And when I mean, a-buzz, I mean the link to this article was being re-tweeted like wildfire. In a 12-hour period I saw almost 30 tweets on the article, which is unusual for a conversation hashtag (in my own experience). I mean, sure when there’s a popular article or report it will get several tweets, but 30 in 12 hours, that’s a lot.

And that was just the tip of the iceberg.

By the 24-hour mark the number of tweets had risen to approximately 90.

Here’s a sampling:

1:09 am davidcoethica: The Case Against Corporate Social Responsibility – http://3bl.me/gwnnb4 #csr

4:00 am waynenorman: “It’s the regulations, stupid.” RT @davidcoethica The case against #CSR – http://3bl.me/gwnnb4

11:49 am ebharrison: Is corporate social responsibility fundamentally flawed? That case leads WSJ special section today http://bit.ly/9OSDC7 #CSR #envirocomm

2:55 pm GreenSolitaire: Wow the #wsj about 5 years behind on #csr and corporate #sustainability http://bit.ly/9wvYSx still arguing the business v moral case.

5:42 pm elainecohen: New on the #CSR Reporting blog: my response to #wsj case against #CSR http://bit.ly/dwvaOc

7:26 pm OKL: A Zinger: CSR Now Seen As ?Potentially Dangerous? http://bit.ly/9JuFMa In response to WSJ’s :http://bit.ly/conoVC #CSR

Them’s Fightin’ Words

As you can see it didn’t take long for CSR advocates and practitioners to begin responding with counter arguments.

In fact there were a few articles, blog posts and 260 comments on the WSJ article itself, all taking the case against CSR to task.

In his response published in The Chronicle of Philanthropy, Scott Henderson Managing Principal of CauseShift argued that Dr. Karnani’s argument “expose[s] the futility of an ideological debate pitting the free market against the common good as if they were wholly separate entities.”

Scott continues:

This is not a hypothetical conversation. The world is full of real problems that threaten the corporate sector.

We face unconventional threats and irregular enemies, and we spend enormous sums at home and abroad for a semblance of security in which to conduct business…Dr. Karnani’s argument relies on an obsolete framework that assumes the free market requires managers to maximize profit and create enduring value for shareholders regardless of the corporation’s social impact. While this has defined the debate for the previous century, it will not and cannot define the future because of one undeniable fact: profit and shareholder value are not created in a vacuum.

Beyond Business founder and blogger Elaine Cohen took issue with what she called Dr. Karnani’s “short-term vision.”

“Many generally believe that shareholders want to maximize SHORT-TERM profit at almost any expense (though there is a growing body of evidence that this is not the case) whilst CSR is by definition focused longer-term. Yes, there is an element of sacrificing short-term profit for greater long term profit, which continues to be in shareholder real interests. Talk to Ray Anderson of Interface, Stuart Rose of Marks and Spencer, Jeff Immelt of GE and many others, and they confirm that CSR-type activities repay themselves many times over. How can a professor of STRATEGY be so hooked in the short-term vision box?

And Cause Capitalism blogger Olivia Khalili countered that maximizing shareholders profits isn’t the only consideration a business has.

“This argument is untenable because in reality businesses are judged by more than shareholders–namely consumers. And increasingly, consumers are choosing not to support companies that exploit the environment, employees, suppliers–even customers’ own health.”

Olivia’s point reminds me why I was even following this entire online conversation: Firms of Endearment.

Two years ago Firms of Endearment co-author Raj Sisodia spoke at NCG’s Corporate Philanthropy Institute. The book (one I enjoyed and I’m not usually a non-fiction reader) gave several examples of businesses who were making profit and ensuring all stakeholders were satisfied (customers, employees, shareholders and communities they existed in).

Making Business Better

Exploring the nuances of the debate, looking at both where the article brings up issues that both “rankle, and others that well underline today’s complex market,” is In Good Company blogger Aman Singh.

Aman reached out to several CSR professionals, such as Dave Stangis, Campbell Soup’s vice president for CSR, to get their opinion.

‘Via email, Stangis acknowledged that he agreed with Karnani about aligning business with social value but saw why he had managed to rankle many.

“Corporate Social Responsibility isn’t about giving money away and adopting the latest cause of activists. CSR and sustainability are approaches to business operation and execution that build employee engagement, improve environmental performance, create positive social impacts, enable operational efficiency, reduce cost, foster innovation, strengthen relationships with customers and consumers and ultimately… create business advantage.” ‘

Aman’s blog post looks at several of the points made in Dr. Karnani’s article. In fact, if you’re looking for a place to start after reading “The Case Against Coporate Social Responsibility, I’d start there.

Is It A Zero Sum Game?

So, do businesses have to choose between profits and CSR? Can they have their cake and eat it too? It’s a provocative debate to say the least.

And one I’ll continue to follow it online.

Read “The Case Against Corporate Social Responsibility” online.

Read Scott Henderson’s Chronicle of Philanthropy article “In a Connected Society, Corporations Must Focus on the Social Good.”

Read Elaine Cohen’s blog post response to the WSJ article online.

Read Olivia Khalili’s blog post response to the WSJ article online.

Read Aman Singh’s blog post response to the WSJ article online.