Last time I looked at Rata I did a wee chart to look at count and averages (note – the numbers are different as I have realigned the data in my database to reflect funders’ financial years).  So, again using the magic of Pivot Tables, let’s have another look.  In blue are the numbers of applications approved.  And in pink are the average grants given (in thousands).

This is showing what the data hinted at a year ago: yes, that things have changed.  Fewer organisations are getting funded.  Those getting money are getting larger on average amounts.   Rata looks to be funding fewer groups in Arts and Heritage, Education, Social Services, Sport and Young People.   And, except in sport, the average grant is up a bit.  The list of those who are declined is not provided, so it’s uncertain as to whether this is driven by groups not applying, or groups being declined. 

But, just between you and me, the biggest change is yet to come.  You may recall that board appointments are made by Government, and you also may recall that we had an election last year.  A very wise gentleman once told me that the most effective Community Trust Boards were those with a mix of both opposition and government appointees.  I guess we will see the impact of this in a year or two – it will be interesting to keep an eye on funding to the various sporting codes (especially cricket!).

I do think it’s important for us to understand the funding ecosystem, as the allocation decisions are made on our community’s behalf.  And, with many of New Zealand’s over 100k NFPs crying out for more cash, it’s fairly important that we, as a community, keep a vigilant eye on where our money goes – and what’s achieved from that spend. 

Love to talk with you if you think this is at all interesting. Check out my website www.delfi.co.nz.

 Last Saturday’s Press had a full page ad telling us that the Christchurch Airport Community Fund, run by the Christchurch International Airport Ltd (CIAL) had given away $45k in the past year to some 23 organisations.

Now, good on them.  They have used the dollars that go into a collection box at the airport, and an unspecified supplement that to create the fund.  They did not have to do this.  But before we cover them in glory, can we just have a wee think about the cost to serve of this money.

This equates to almost $2k per organisation.  Now I guess for some, that’s a lot of money.  But for most, it’s diddily squat: perhaps a small contribution to someone’s salary.  And then let’s consider the costs of applying for the grant.  I don’t know how many were turned down, but let’s say it took some 6 hours to fill in the (admittedly very simple) application form, and get it vetted by others in the organisation.   Let’s say it costs around $25 / hour for that person’s time (and yes, even volunteers have an opportunity cost of their time: US research suggests $24.14 / hour).  That’s a total cost of $150. 

Then the application form is received and read by someone at the funder.  Let’s say it takes about 2 hours to read the application, make sure that the organisation is a goodie, fills in any gaps in the application and complete packs to those who make decisions (I am totally guessing at their process by the way).  And corporate people are paid more than community so let’s put a fully costed per hour cost of $75 – a total cost of $150.

And if we assume that 75% of applications are funded, then that’s a total cost of $9,300.

A committee considers the proposal.  So let’s say two two hour meetings (and one hour each of prep) per year of six people, total cost of $2,700.

And there is the obligation.  In the 2017 annual report (page 42 and 43 dedicated to the fund, which last financial year seemed to give away $53k to 37 groups) it talks of hosting 12 schools it had given $1k each to for an end of year concert.  Not quite sure how much it costs to rent a bus, but let’s say $200 – plus the lost learning time for the grateful kids (and another set of RAMS for the long suffering teachers).  Let’s assume for each “lucky” recipient that the obligation cost is around $200.  That makes compliance cost of $4,600.

We then have marketing costs.  Full page ad in the Mainland section of The Press: $16k.  Preparation of said ad… let’s guess at $4k to have a round number. 

That means this process has cost around $36,000, for a $45,000 grant pool, meaning a total benefit to the community of $9,000.  You will have your views, but I’m thinking it’s not the most productive use of those dollars.

Now, CIAL is actually 75% owned by CCC with the balance by the NZ Government.  How’s this for a wacky idea: let’s collaborate.  The Community fund can hand over their money to the grants programme at CCC.  They have the staff in place to manage that, and certainly have an issue of demand heavily over supply.  And sure as eggs that the vast majority of the groups applying here also apply to CCC.  This could be done at NO marginal cost.  And the recipients of the funds could easily be identified so CIAL can get the photo ops they want.

CIAL are no alone in this: we have Z with their Good in the Hood where groups effectively get around $1k each.  We have Grace removers who recently did an online popularity contest to dish out $2k each to six charities out of 12 finalists.  All of these will provide great photo ops, and enable the business to launder themselves with the virtues of the Not for Profits. 

But let’s be honest.  These small dollops of cash will really make very little difference to the NFP receiving the funds.   Because of course everyone wants their funds to be used for assets, or specific programmes, rather than the things that are boring but necessary to get the funds in the first place, such as admin salaries.  $45k is the cost of one school counsellor (part time).  It’s rounding.   And the irony of the headline “small change makes a big difference” may have been lost on them.

Corporates: I love that you want to do stuff.  But please: I know you all have re-engineered your own processes to get lowest cost service provision.   You have optimised your supply chain to ensure its operating as efficiently as possible.  Can you please take that thinking into your Corporate Responsibility Team?  Can you please treat NFPs as a valued community partner rather than a photo op for your annual review, some sort of power kick, or a tick box for your Employee Value Proposition.

Love to talk with you if you think this is at all interesting. Check out my website www.delfi.co.nz.

Sport has received some 31% of that money with rounding to other organisations.  So which codes are getting that money?  If we look at all money given in 2016 and 2017 Football got a decent whack, followed by cricket.  What is most interesting is the amount going into horse racing: if I look at the grants its driven by grants given to trotting clubs.  This rise in grants to the racing industry from ARCS has swollen over the last two years: in 2014 the industry received $81k from this organisation, last year it was $200k.

However, these figures pale with the amount given to Mainland Football of over $630k in the past four years.  They were followed by grants to Cashmere Technical who received over $100k of grant money per annum over the last three years.

Anyway – all this is slightly interesting, and can raise eyebrows if one considers issues like ethics of grants, social and gender equity, middle class capture etc.  And there is whole issue of the lack of transparency of this rescue operation which I raised in my previous blog.  But these sorts of questions are above my pay grade.  However, I reckon that ARCS can do a bit more for less.

Given it’s a “For Purpose” gaming organisation, then why should it not provide all of the funds for the CWCART.  In CWCART’s 2016 accounts, they passed some $5.3m to Garden City Helicopters (down from $6m in 2015).  They could have funded all of this from their gaming operation, but instead chose to give $4.2m in both years, leaving a deficit which was funded from corporate sponsorship and fundraising.  Fund raising raised some $1.76m in 2016, down from $1.8m in 2015.   Operating costs relating to CWCART was $731k in 2016 (down from $834k in 2015).

If all the support for the rescue helicopter operation came from the underlying gaming trust, then could ALL of those operating costs disappear?  Probably not, but let’s be conservative and say $400k of those costs would disappear if ARCS covered all Garden City Helicopter’s needs. 

Now let’s look at the ARCS’s financials.  They run the gaming machine operation, and the grant distribution around that.  Page 4 of their accounts shows total operating costs of $2.5m.  The top cost is depreciation, but if we take that, then we have operating costs of $1.4m, and half of this is salaries.   Let’s say the grants process costs $510k - $3m of non helicopter grants * $0.17 (the cost per grant as per my earlier work).  If this was whipped out, then the cumulative cost saving from both CWCART and ARCS = $0.9m.

That all sounds interesting, but ARCS generated over $8m in total for 2017.  $8m less the $5.3m needed for operating the helicopters leaves some $2.7m.  How does that get distributed?

Well, in my world funders collaborate.  That $2.7m (which would actually become $3.6m because those whipped out operating costs become money which can go back to the community) could go to someone who does this already and who has a similar philosophy.  NZCT looks like a prime candidate as they have a heavy sports skew too.  Of course NZCT’s costs would go up (probably incrementally as they will already be funding many of these groups) and quite probably NFPs costs could reduce … so for the sake of argument let’s balance those off to zero.

So all very simple, the business case is clear with an incremental $900k of community funding, and it’s quite doable. But it won’t happen.  There is no tension to change the status quo.  ARCS are returning money to the community according to set guidelines.  Air Rescue is a heart string operation which attracts attention and money.  And they do cute money boxes.  No-one else seems to be taking an ecosystem view of this space, and that’s what is quite frustrating. 

Love to talk with you if you think this is at all interesting. Check out my website www.delfi.co.nz.

Postscript: the dog came up with a sterling idea while we were walking.  Let’s let CWCART keep Westpac’s $500k annual sponsorship (BTW that means my $3.6m becomes $4.1m as above).  I reckon Westpac has some systems thinking people who understand the concept of cost to serve… so if they chose to they could leverage that sponsorship and effect some positive ecosystem change.  Now, that would be quite cool.

In case you missed it, the Social Enterprise World Forum is coming to Christchurch.  This will put some focus on social enterprises.

So what is one?  

 Well, according to a bit of a guru in this space, MJ Kaplan (and who I looked for guidance when developing up a Social Enterprise fund), it’s three things according to an article in Flint and Steel 2014:

• Intent.  Social enterprises exist to address social and/ or environmental problems
  
• Business Models. These ventures employ business models, skills and tools to develop products and services that are traded in the market place
  
• Profits. Ownership is structured to assure that profits are reinvested to advance the core social / environmental mission and grow the enterprise sustainably.
  

Now, I have been thinking about this stuff for a couple of years now, but was still somewhat dumbstruck a few months ago when, while making a serious amount of scones I realised that indeed, I was the Chair of a $30k per annum social enterprise. I was trying to convince someone to take over my role (mission accomplished) and as part of selling the role I realised that our school PTA actually ticks all the boxes here. 

• Intent.  We exist to form a village to help raise our kids, and to provide extra cash on top of government funds.
  
• Business Models.  We implement business models by marketing and merchandising uniforms, supplying school lunches, and entertainment opportunities for the school community.
  
• Profits.  All our profits go back to the school to provide items not provided by existing government funding.
  

Wow.  So suddenly I was not just a bored housewife: rather I am part of a growing and rather fab social movement. 

There are a whole bunch of organisations which, on the face of it, tick those boxes but may not self identify as social enterprises.

• Early child education centres exist to ensure that every pre-schooler has a good start in life and earn funding from trading (government contracts and parental fees).
  
• Many sports clubs actually make more money from trading over the bar than they do from subs.I guess that the intent is to form communities.
  
• Churches can trade eternal salvation for a tithe, with the intent of community building and charitable purpose of religion.Others, such as the Seventh Day Adventists have a specific trading arm through Sanitarium, drive profits through a rather large $200m business.
  
• Private schools trade education for parental fees, with the charitable purpose of education and I guess, community building.
  
• Maori charities drive profits back into their beneficiaries.Ngai Tahu is of course the stand out here.
  
• Private Hospitals, such as St Georges, run as incorporated societies, and drive income via trading, government contracts.St George’s objectives (from their website) state: To apply any profits accruing from the activities or work of the Society to the furtherance of its charitable objectives, especially the altruistic nursing of the sick or for such other purposes which accord with its charitable objectives
  
• Gaming trusts.Tricky this one.I postulated that perhaps gaming trusts could be considered as social enterprises, since around 40% of their income (after payouts, before costs) goes to Not for Profit.Whether the social cost is worth the economic benefit is a discussion for another day.
  

We are going to see a lot this week about the new and emerging social enterprises.  And yes, we are seeing more here particularly around “for purpose” businesses as people re-evaluate business orthodoxy around trickle down.  However, in the hype let’s remember that it’s not new.  Kilmarnock, which you will hear a lot about at the conference, is 60 years old. 

I also think that more effort needs to go into measuring the impact of the various organisations.  Many social enterprises have quite a bit of hype, but often propose some sorts of simplistic solutions to complicated social issues.  And perhaps that’s a gap that could do with some support: working with those enterprises and independent researchers to ensure that strong auditable metrics are a key part of the social enterprise proposition – making sure they hype and the good that we think we are doing matches the reality of the issues that are being solved.

We don’t have to be one of the cool kids to be a participant at the Social Enterprise table.  I guess it’s incumbent on all of us, both those in the tent and those who don’t know where the camp ground is, to include, and not go down the usual track of putting language and process around some concepts that in actual fact are fairly old.

Love to talk with you if you think this is at all interesting. Check out my website www.delfi.co.nz.

It’s that time of year, and my children are at a life stage where education options loom up.  I was chatting with a fellow parent on the sideline of some sports event recently, and he made me think a bit with his statement about private schools: “Well, they really are businesses”. 

But actually, they are charities.  This made me wonder what actual charitable purposes they purport to fulfil.

The Charities Act is based on legal precedents with an Act passed in England in 1601.  At that time of course, Queen Elizabeth 1 was on the throne.  My knowledge of that era is coloured by Phillipa Gregory, but it strikes me that culturally, we have changed our belief sets quite a bit – I’m not sure Catholics are quite the worry they once were, most the witches were dealt with at the time, and rich white men no longer are in charge of everything (well…).  However, the current Charities Act 2005 is heavily based on case law dating from 1601.  The 2005 Act stated that “charitable purpose” must fall under one or more categories.

• The relief of poverty.
• The advancement of education.
• The advancement of religion.
• Other purposes beneficial to the community.
  

Now, many of these provisions, under a modern first world country, are probably a bit redundant.  Education is widely provided by the government, as is poverty relief, health services.  We can argue over the execution, but no one is suggesting we remove any of the above from state mandate.  Religion?  Well, the growing group of New Zealander’s stating no religion is growing.  In the 2013 census, almost 42% of us said we had no religion, up from 34.9% in 2006. 

This then got me thinking what it did mean to be a New Zealander: what are our core values.   I think it’s about equity, respect and creativity.  My forebears came to this country to start a new life without the shackles of European social structures.  Respect comes to respect of our planet and of each other.  New Zealand has a narrative around number 8 wire which I think is pretty cool.  We will all have a different take on this of course, but would be interesting for us as New Zealanders to have a yarn about this.

If you follow the news you will have seen that the Charities Registration Board has upheld an earlier decision to remove Family First from the Charities register as they felt it did not have charitable purpose. They considered that “Family First has a purpose to promote its own particular views about marriage and the traditional family that cannot be determined to be for the public benefit in a way previously accepted as charitable.”

Now, the Board made the initial decision to remove the above organisation from the register in 2013.  It was challenged, but the decision upheld 2017.  There will be numerous lawyers over this, and at least one economist report.  How much to deregister this one organisation?  I would hate to think. 

You may also remember the kerfuffle almost a year ago when over 100,000 New Zealanders called for a deregistration of Destiny Church.  This was not backed by Charity Services as there seemed “insufficient evidence” to warrant an investigation.  The charitable purpose of this organisation, from the Charities Office website, is religion.  Which is entirely valid, so yes, like it or not, under our current rules it’s a charity.

Religion is an interesting charitable purpose.  The NZ Herald has done an interesting piece of analysis which shows where atheists live… and it’s all in those wealthier suburbs.  So is there a link between poverty and religion?  Does religion (through tithing) actually drive poverty?  This Samoan chap certainly thinks so.  I can’t find much in the way of academic studies on this sadly.

If we look at private schools, their charitable purpose is education.  Which is all well and good, and entirely consistent with legal purpose.  But unlike 400 years ago, in New Zealand we have universal education for all children.  In 2017 does education need to be a charitable purpose?  Further, one of the elements of Charitable purpose is around public benefit.  The benefit must be for the public, or a sufficient section of the public.  And halfway down the page it states “unjustifiable fees that exclude many people would not be acceptable”.  Hmmm.

If we use my Kiwi values as a surrogate for charitable purpose, for the sake of argument, then how many registered charities fit where New Zealand is as a nation? And if we use 400 year old legislation to define what is important to a modern first world economy today, how can we make sure we get the best possible charities sector and services sector which meets the needs of our increasingly diverse communities? 

Love to talk with you if you think this is at all interesting. Check out my website www.delfi.co.nz.

Apologies to those new readers of my blog. My last blog on Invisible Women which, by my standards, went viral, has attracted a few new people who may not be so keen on this stuff. So I’ll try not to take the smaller readership personally, and completely understand if you just quietly drop me. I actually write about some fairly niche stuff in the grant making ecosystem, so back to this.

Wellington funders got together a while ago and have now produced a report on the grant making space in their city. Heralded on Radio NZ as something done “for the first time” – a claim that I let go after kicking the dog and knocking back a bottle of chardonnay – nevertheless, it’s an interesting look at the grant ecosystem in Wellington.

Below is a comparison with Wellington, Canterbury and Otago – the South Island data you can find on my website. I confess to being a bit surprised by the similarities in the results given my rather dubious categorisation methodology, and the (likely) well-debated methodology of the Wellington work.

There are some clear similarities, with Sport again getting the largest slice of funds. Arts and Culture is interesting: whether this is driven by CNZ’s grants into the capital city (which will, of course, have national bodies) I don’t know. 

Of course, there are numerous issues in the above comparison.

• Classification. One of the issues identified in the Wellington study was a consistent and meaningful classification system. They adopted a standard classification system, but when I looked at this I felt it did not represent the richness of grant making. When I did the Canterbury and Otago work, I did sort of make it up into something that, as a user, was meaningful to me. This included classification by sports code. It's likely that there will be differences in classifications.
• Missing data. My data missed some of the smaller district councils, as getting good data out of them is a challenging task - although they are not perhaps material in any case. And Lotteries, of course, are missing from the Wellington data: in both South Island regions Lotteries make up about 10% of the grants into the area.  Lotteries grants tend to go on the community side of things. And of course, we have to remember that grant income makes up only a percentage of total income for NFPs. Income will include taxpayer funded contracts, self-generated funds, individual giving and fundraisers.
• Effect of gaming trusts. Within the Wellington data is information on NZ Racing Board, Lion Foundation and NZCT. There are another five or so gaming trusts which operate in the region whose data is not within the dataset. Further, when I did research on Otago and Canterbury I ignored NZ Racing Board. Although they are a large operator, they do not give grants out to general organisations. They are counted within the Wellington data, so will skew the sport number accordingly.
• Region.  As the capital, Wellington data could possibly be skewed by national organisations based in the city. This happens quite often: Canterbury funders will give funding to the likes of Royal NZ ballet to give performances within the region. 

It is great that this analysis is happening, and awesome that they have published. However, the devil is in the detail: NFP groups will want to see which funders will fund organisations or specific costs in their sphere. Sports codes may want to see who is sucking up all this sport funding.  Struggling art organisations might want to see who's getting it all.  Funds that go to schools, and may be tagged as education – are often used for things like sports.  And the headline that funds are not getting to those most in need ignores the rather huge role that government contracts play in that space. 

The Wellington decline information is quite interesting, in that they have actually looked into the issue, identifying some 32% of requests as declined. As a grant maker, a decline can be a bit angst ridden and of course high cost. Real time information about this would help decision makers understand other organisations’ concerns.

And as an aside talked about on the wireless during the interview was a concern about a lack of special interest groups applying for funding. Looking at the Wellington data, one could make some assumptions around this. However, I see that most NFPs deal with everyone. A cancer charity works with anyone with cancer. A school educates those who are enrolled. A sports club caters to members. A community group caters to those who live within the community. So to put in some sorts of percentage on special interest has the potential to result in some fairly silly outcomes, with even more replication for a sector with over 27,000 charities.

So where to from here. While the Wellington report talks of this as an interim report designed to encourage funders to share their data, and ends on a desire for funders to pitch in on this, I see that Central Government has to come to the party. They fund themselves, they oversee many other grantmakers, they regulate gaming trusts, and they monitor charities and societies. Funders are, by and large, disparate, regionally focussed, small (within the national context) and I hate to say, see themselves as central to the ecosystem rather than as an enabler. So, while I hope for their sake that they will be able to pull something off, I think that some sort of information solution where Central Government is a key stakeholder (not necessarily project owner) is the best way forward. Looking forward to the DIA’s Community Engagement Feedback due in September to see if there is more on this.

And one more thing. I confess to being a big fan of the 80/20 rule: putting 20% of the effort in to yield 80% of the result (good thing I am not a brain surgeon). My point is that we don’t need to design a perfect platform up front. Something now is better than an almost perfect solution in five years’ time. Be good to get started.

Love to talk with you if you think this is at all interesting. Check out my website www.delfi.co.nz.

I went to a women’s networking thing a few weeks ago.  Six speakers, some fabulous ideas, and good wine and food.  But... it struck me there is a big elephant in the room which we don’t talk about enough.  The C word.

The C word.  Yes, throws many of us on the corporate slag heap, unable to deliver quite the career potential we had.  Puts us waging an invisible sister to sister battle, unseen by many, but oh so passive aggressive.

Of course, I am talking about children.  

Now, my corporate career pretty much finished on or about 1 March 2004.  Nine months later the baby pops out.  I had this grand vision of having nannies and au pairs, while I could continue to have what I deemed a successful career.  However, number one, a return from parental leave, and the side-lining to a “project role” was followed by number two, a move, and then number 3. 

During this time, I went on a work retreat to some fabulous location.  The purpose was to develop team skills, strategic planning blah blah blah.  We had an inspirational after dinner speaker who had done some marvellous things and was a real success in his field.  But I discovered two things about myself on this trip.

Firstly, I didn’t really want to be away from my children and husband, making small talk with colleagues who, under normal circumstances, I wouldn’t socialise with.  The whole exercise seemed a bit pointless, and the co-ordination required for me to attend this three day event was a logistic challenge.  My career was no longer mine: we had to make joint decisions about work.  From Me to We. 

Secondly, I thought the inspirational speaker was a selfish jerk who did what he wanted to do without much thought for his long suffering wife and children.   Long periods away from home, many missed family occasions.  “Success” seems to be a fairly one dimensional measure, and I rethought what success meant to me.

So, while everyone makes different decisions, as a family we felt it best that they have a parent who is there after school, able to talk when the taciturn one wants to, able to be vented to after a day of challenge, coach their sports team or reading group, chauffeur them and their mates, and help nurture them into amazing human beings.

Parenthood in a corporate sense seems to focus on the baby stage: covering off parental leave and ensuring jobs are still available.  However, as those babies grow into children, and then teenagers, we have the challenge of 12 weeks of school holidays, and a school day of 9 till 3, along with all the demands (and rewards) of community involvement.  Public dialogue drives me a bit batty, with continued discussion about why there are no women in senior roles on boards / in management.  It’s really quite obvious (to me anyway..): the C word.  Many of the women I went to university with are in the same situation as me, and deal with this by making things work as well as we can.  But careerwise: we are out of the game, we are invisible, and we can’t get back in.

And yet we hear, constantly, about the skill gap, which justifies the immigration numbers.  In fact, I heard some words yesterday which made me shake my head: “those who want work are in work”.  Another employer was moaning about how they had to settle for two people job sharing a role, like that was a bad thing.  How about the nature of work changes to make this more accessible for working parents?  Surely employers don’t need to “own” people through employer / employee relationships.  Can projects be done in ten week chunks?

But very few employers offer the flexibility that we need, so we go and create our own niches where we can balance all the elements in our lives.  Talents and experience are enormous, social conscious is usually pretty high, but skills, by and large, are wasted.  We are labelled as Liam’s mum, a school mum.   No longer an individual in our own right. 

Now, this is really a first world problem.  And I could be perceived as a grumpy middle class housewife, and perhaps my corporate career would have petered out if we had chosen not to have kids, or if we had backed my career and not my partner’s.  But here’s my challenge.  As a parent of three girls, how do I counsel them on managing career?  Encourage them into traditional female roles?  Those roles are really flexible.  Choose a partner with a flexible career?  Volunteer myself to be there for their kids? 

Yes, I feel like a total gender traitor writing this: but under current conditions we simply can’t have it all.  The “have it all” narrative is where women must get educated to support themselves well, travel the world, get a great job, pay off debt, find the right man, afford a mortgage and deposit, squeeze out kids, all before the age of 34 when our fertility (apparently?) falls off a cliff.  No. 

Those people I see as successful are those amazing people who manage all the facets of life: they have found something they love to do, they contribute to the community, and they are doing a great job of the juggle.  So, while we may not be headlining conferences, on the rich list, or engaged in discussion of the issue, we are doing what we can to raise great humans, and make some impact on the lives of those around us.  You may be invisible to many, but I see you.

Love to talk with you if you think this is at all interesting. Check out my website www.delfi.co.nz

I went to a lunch (and a discussion) on the grant making ecosystem yesterday.  They are being held across the country by Minister Ngaro and the Department of Internal Affairs.  Canterbury’s was the first where it was co-hosted by another funder: in this case, Rata Foundation.  Kudos to Rata for being part of the discussion.  From Delfi’s 2014 grant data, those two organisations make up around 30% of the money going into the region. 

But missing… gaming trusts, and the Council.  It’s difficult to have a discussion about the whole ecosystem if those who are part of it don’t see it as important.

Here were a few things I found interesting.  Firstly, most of the tables identified that “Relationships” with funders were desirable.  I kept quiet: frankly I do what I can to avoid said relationships: every conversation about the grants process puts cost onto the charity I do things for, and cost onto the grant maker.   

I was seated next to a woman I admire a lot.  Her job is to find grants to fund a fabulous charity.  She sources money from over fifty grant makers every year.  50 funders.  Ferreting all these obscure sources of money to keep an essential underfunded service helping families.  This is a similar figure for many of the larger charities.  What value does a relationship with a grant maker add to the organisation?  Does it ensure funding will continue?  Well, no.  Those decisions are generally not within staff discretion.  And just because the grant is a high amount for a specific grant maker doesn’t mean it’s a significant amount for the charity.  What purpose do relationships serve?  If its transactional (how do I fill this form in) then fine.  And if both parties get something out of this, then fine.  But if cost is forced onto the charity because the grant maker thinks it’s the right thing to do, then perhaps no. Or perhaps if the grant makers share the job of strategic partnering the it could make some sense.

Secondly, information.  We talked a bit about this, but I guess it’s difficult to understand what could be if the information was available.  Benchmarking, across sector, region, within code.  Sliced data: there is so much rich information available if only there was a model to support its creation.  We talked about reasons for declines, and all the costs replicated in many NGOs on understanding who gives to who.

Thirdly, I think we should take process away from the discussion.  What is the purpose of community grants?  To fund organisations which service the community (dur).  And what is the purpose of those organisations?  Well, to serve the community I guess (again, dur).  So, rather than a grant maker centric model we have now, how can we create a community centric one.  One where communities get to decide which groups actually deliver worthwhile stuff within their communities.  I pitched this idea to my table: comment from one was “What say we don’t get supported”.  Well, that’s sort of the point.  If you are not actually delivering worthwhile stuff, then perhaps it’s time to do something else.   Our communities deserve a strong NFP sector, and healthy constructive critique beyond brand and into substantive delivery, is one way to help achieve this.

The new reporting standards help identify this, with the development of the Performance Report.  These can provide some great reading (for charities anyway), and staff should totally be aware of what they do and how that impacts what is achieved by the group. 

Part of the challenge is having the discussion challenging status quo at the right level.  We can see many organisations (by no means limited to NFP) where the needs of the staff are put before the needs of customers. 

So lunch?  Was it worth it?  Yep.  A great appetiser to an exciting and potentially disruptive future, and refreshing to feel the discussion and engagement is being held.  However, hard to have substantive discussion and development of concepts in such environments.  However, I am heartened that the Minister “gets it”, having had considerable experience with the sector, and he can certainly see some of the challenges and opportunities.  Feedback will be communicated by September (hopefully sooner), and then we will see if we have a chance for something more substantive than the appetiser enjoyed yesterday.  And, from Delfi’s point of view, it would be amazing to contribute to a better, stronger ecosystem which really delivers strong communities.

Love to talk with you if you think this is at all interesting. Check out my website www.delfi.co.nz.

Super excited to be having a lunch shortly.  The occasion is a Community Engagement Workshop, where we are invited along to look at “…make it easier to register as a charity or access grant funding”.  They want to know what works, and opportunities to make processes easier and less of a demand on time.

I am really hoping that we move beyond the standard stuff: online, multi year funding etc etc.  It would be quite marvellous to address some of the big issues across the funding ecosystem.
So in the interests of putting my thoughts onto the interweb, here’s what I want to talk about.

I question to view of making it easier to register.  Actually – no.  The last thing we need more charities.  Right now we have about one charity for every 166 New Zealanders.  The usual narrative around this is how generous New Zealanders as a nation are, but actually – not sure that’s the case.  How many charities have been formed because of the way grant makers demand their accounts be presented?  How many volunteer hours are churned up in governance of very small groups which achieve very little?  And what sort of back office costs could be saved if we could rationalise and co-operate. 

Let’s look at Health charities.  There are 2000 of these.  How many have cancer in their name?  I don’t know, but surely the task they are doing is the same?  Support, lobbying and awareness?  How about social services?  Again, almost 2,000 charities in this space?  How many of these have relief of poverty as their charitable purpose?

While thinking of social services, why are they asking for grants at all?  As a society we don’t really talk about why these organisations who generally have government contracts are only funded to 80%.  Should it be 100%?  Should grant makers just work with these organisations on trying new stuff?  In Canterbury in 2014, grant makers gave social services $7.6m. If we extrapolate this up nationally, that’s around $76m put into social services by grant makers.

And seeing I have gone there, then why is the Canterbury community raising money for a helipad at the hospital?  Core DHB function?  Library?  Surely a council obligation.  Same with the ambulance – other emergency services are 100% funded, so why not ambos? Air rescue is interesting again, with some funded by government to 80% operating cost, others to 30% of their operating cost.  Why? 

Let’s look at grants processes and time liberation.  Now, I have a paid gig doing grant applications.  Nice people.  Rubbish role.  I call myself something that doesn’t sound like Funding so I can get money to make sure I am paid.  I photocopy reams of paper, find something to wrap a request around, and send it off into the wind to hear about six weeks to six months later.  I fill in forms to show that yes, indeed, we spend that grant on that stuff.  It’s a paper shuffling, box ticking role.  And frankly, the DIA application process is the best I have found (so far).  

But how can we reinvent the whole grant making process to cut my job from the books, reduce the cost burden from the grant maker, focus on outcomes for the community not spending cash, and get more funds through to those who do actually make a difference.   Imagine a world with a transparent grant system, open data on approvals – and declines.  A world where organisations are judged and funded on the outcomes they achieve for the community, rather than the “heart wrench” of the charity’s brand, or the “fingers crossed” nature of income generation.  A place where charities are not beholden to the crumbs from the corporate table.

I also think the grant makers could do with some better information, like benchmarking.  I have previously looked at regional funding differences, which show real data on what’s happening in Canterbury and Otago.  Is the ecosystem really demand driven?  Or driving by supply of funds?  We can also look within category, such as the Air Rescue example above, or at club level for football (some clubs get $400 per registered player – others ask for and receive none), or grants going into specific codes (from the Delfi 2014 data, Rugby Union gets $240 per registered player, Touch $15).  I touched on this stuff in my TedxCHCH talk in 2015 and received a wonderful supportive email from a woman who had been involved in a club for years.  “Those who provide grants need to get 100% smarter checking on accountability and sport needs to get off it's collective butt and do something for itself.”

There are a bunch of reasons we struggle to have these discussions.  Like it or not, there is a power relationship between grant makers and NFPs which reduces the ability for candid conversation.   There is little scale in both grant makers and NFPs, little tension for change, and besides, it’s probably not core business.  The people who are most involved with the process are the ones whose jobs are most likely at risk, which again, reduces objective thinking.  And lastly, do the gaming trusts actually see themselves as grant makers?  Last year they put over $340m into the community, so they certainly are.  Of the 86 members of Philanthropy NZ, around 0 gaming trusts are members.  And PNZ members include one licensing trust and four councils.  Given the importance of the gaming trust sector to the conversation (in Canterbury they were responsible for 51% of funds in 2014, and 29% in Otago) they need to be at the table.

It’s great DIA is showing leadership around this: now we need to leverage this opportunity and make sure that all arms of the organisation, grant making, regulatory and gambling compliance work together to make our ecosystem as healthy as it can be.  Here’s to great lunch.

Love to talk with you if you think this is at all interesting. Check out my website www.delfi.co.nz.

Some headlines last week have looked at kids in poverty who have been unable to access Saturday sport, almost a rite of a Kiwi childhood. Us parents spend hours driving kids to all parts of the region, encouraging our little darlings in their pursuits.

The press release seems to have been coordinated by Variety NZ. We’ll come back to that.

I reckon grant makers would have been a bit puzzled by reading the article. Grant request after grant request comes in talking the talk about enabling kids from poorer backgrounds with the same sporting opportunities as richer families. So why was this family left out?

The article looked at costs of subs, and found many to be around $150. So why are sports fees so high? I know when my husband ran a footie club we had junior fees pretty low, and there was a waiver if families could not afford it. Let’s face it – there are not a lot of expenses. Rate payers cough up for the grounds, parents are (generally) coaches, so all that’s needed is a bit of equipment and uniforms. And then there is the affiliation fee: that fee paid to the organising code. This overarching body is generally populated by people with a passion for the particular sport, and I reckon (based purely on personal experience) fail to take account that (usually) kids and parents want childhood to be full of many different experiences, be that sport, music, art and play.

I have written previously about football, where I suggested that money rolls up to the elite level. Indeed, our own team were recently asked to sell raffle tickets at $25 / book. The proceeds are going to “Canterbury United (the provincial team largely supported by grants), Women’s and Youth team (again - top level) and member clubs for their own use.” Looking through a few accounts, I see little evidence of “trickle down”: in fact it seems to be simply a player tax for the elite players placed on all players.

Now, I happen to believe that users should pay something: that if you financially commit to something then that provides some certainty that you will in fact show up. But at the end of the day, sport is a hobby, so why should everyone else subsidise the best players to participate in their hobby?

Leeston Rugby Club’s accounts can be found on the Societies office website. These show that the club is fairly small. They don’t get a lot of grants, but don’t really need them. Subs are fairly low as well: $80 for junior players. And in response to the article they stated on their Facebook page that “As a Club we do not turn away any players and we have policies in place to assist with financial issues. We are a Community Club and as such we support the community and all those in it.” Quite frankly, I reckon these guys have been painted unfairly in this article.

Variety is interesting however. Check out their annual accounts. They state that they helped 2,680 kids, and gave away $2.18m – an average then of $813 per child. They earned just over $3m last financial year, spent $1.3m on operating costs, and gave away just over $2m to their beneficiaries. There is no evidence provided that what they do makes a difference to lives of the kids.

I hate to say this, but am feeling a bit discomforted by the poverty porn element to this. Good on them for trying to do something to alleviate poverty in New Zealand. The idea that kids in New Zealand go without stuff goes against the grain. However, there are so many many many organisations set up to help such families. If you want an awesome view at this, check out Dame Diane Robertson’s TedX Chch talk where she presented the findings of the 100 Families programme. The outtake of this study for me was the sheer complexity of service agency relationships for those in poverty. The more I look at this stuff, the more I am not convinced that this organisation will help families break out of the poverty cycle. Families are where kids are raised: enabling the family with the cash and the skills they need to raise successful kids should be the main focus, and this is what I love about the new Social Investment thinking of Government. Fewer charities doing more with stronger relationships is, I dearly hope, a way to break intergenerational poverty and behaviours.

I confess I went into this blog thinking that sport was to blame for not doing what they say they do. However, I think there has been an unfair beat up by Variety to drive donations. And looking at subsequent articles, and the comments, they have achieved success in terms of new kids sponsored. So those donors will now feel they are making a difference, but actually – I think they have been played. 

To answer the question I posed myself: unlike summer holidays at the beach, Saturday sport can still be a rite for Kiwi kids.

Love to talk with you if you think this is at all interesting.