Links to Helpful Resources
We hope you find the following list of resources useful. As the links below are not meant to be exhaustive, we welcome your suggestions.
The Alliance for Nonprofit Management is a network of leading, nonprofit technical support professionals. The Alliance's Cultural Competency Initiative helps nonprofits advance diversity through board and staff appointments, policies and programs. http://www.allianceonline.org/cci.ipage
The Center for Effective Philanthropy seeks to improve philanthropic effectiveness through research, conferences and foundation assessment activities. Its recent report, What's Race Got to Do With It? Effectiveness in Numbers, highlights research findings on the racial and ethnic diversity of foundation boards. http://www.effectivephilanthropy.org
The Community Leadership Project is a joint effort underwritten with $8 million from The David and Lucile Packard, James Irvine, and William and Flora Hewlett foundations to strengthen grassroots organizations that serve low-income people and communities of color. These three California foundations have long traditions of supporting diverse and low-income communities and, despite the impact of the current economic downturn on their assets, believe that such grantmaking remains critical to their missions. The Community Leadership Project targets small and midsize organizations in three geographic areas: the Greater San Francisco Bay Area, Central Coast and San Joaquin Valley. The foundations selected the three geographic areas for this grantmaking based on interviews with a diverse group of leaders across the state, an analysis of demographic shifts and poverty rates, and the geographic priorities of each foundation. Click here to link to the Project Web site.
The Council on Foundations provides a comprehensive list of resources that address an array of diversity issues ranging from grant making to board representation to workplace diversity.
http://www.cof.org
The Forum of Regional Associations of Grantmakers' Racial, Ethnic and Tribal Knowledge Center shares information, profiles, tools, community-based giving models and resources to support racial, ethnic and tribal philanthropy. The Forum has recently produced new reports on racial, ethnic and tribal giving. http://www.givingforum.org
The Foundation Center has recently published a Bibliography of Resources Related to Diversity Within the Philanthropic and Nonprofit Sectors. http://foundationcenter.org/
The Foundation Coalition, a group of leading California philanthropies, released its Strengthening Nonprofit Minority Leadership and Capacity of Minority-Led and Other Grassroots Community-Based Organizations report outlining their five-month planning process and the initial grantmaking activities comprising their collective pledge to increase diversity funding in that state by some $30 million during the coming 2-3 year period.
Funders for Lesbian and Gay Issues advocates for increased support of LGBT issues within organized philanthropy. Read their recent reports, A Global Gaze: Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender and Intersex Grantmaking in the Global South and East and Building Communities: Autonomous Lesbian, Gay Transgender and Queer People of Color Organizations in the U.S. for valuable insights.
GrantCraft (in partnership with the Philanthropic Initiative for Racial Equity) has recently developed a Guide to Grant Making with a Racial Equity Lens. http://www.grantcraft.org/
Grantmakers for Effective Organizations' Is Grantmaking Getting Smarter? is their second comprehensive study of the attitudes and practices of staffed U.S. foundations. Among the findings with direct implications for diversity advocates, foundations that appoint staff and board members with nonprofit experience were reported to be significantly more likely to engage in grantee-friendly practices.
The Joint Affinity Groups (JAG) represent a broad range of professional diversity networks in philanthropy. The JAG website includes important information, references to field activities and links to member organizations. http://www.jointaffinitygroups.org
The National Committee on Responsive Philanthropy promotes independent sector accountability to the public interest and social justice philanthropy. Its recently released report, Strengthening Democracy, Increasing Opportunities and available here, documents how foundation-supported policy advocacy has benefited New Mexico's overall economy and suggests that, particularly in these difficult economic times, foundations should support advocacy, organizing and civic engagement to address social issues. Other publications that focus on the challenges facing rural and minority communities in seeking private foundation support are available at http://www.ncrp.org.
New York City Collaborative for Fairness and Equity in Philanthropy just released their Statement of Principles to encourage leading New York area foundations to increase their attention to diversity concerns in their grantmaking, appointments, reporting and other key activities.
The Philanthropic Initiative for Racial Equity provides a range of resources that deal with philanthropy, racial equality and diversity issues. http://www.racialequity.org
Rockefeller Philanthropy Advisors' just published report, Diversity and Inclusion: Lessons from the Field, is the second of a three-part series from Rockefeller Philanthropy Advisors, spotlighting the experiences of CEOs and trustees from several of the nation's large and small foundations and corporate grantmaking programs. Its earlier published report and summary, Philanthropy in a Changing Society: Achieving Effectiveness through Diversity offers a thorough overview of how philanthropy's approach to diversity has evolved over time and describes the major strategies that have been piloted. Read the report summary here. http://rockpa.org/ .