Many legacies take the form of nonprofit businesses, which like any enterprise must be run in a business-like way. To me, whether the form of an enterprise is for profit or nonprofit – simply two different ways to structure a legal business entity engendering a much longer discussion — the business-like way to run them is with both head and heart.
Just as medicine is often as much an art as a science (unfortunately these days often way too controlled by accounting principles …), it seems there is a tremendous imbalance between head and heart. And when heart loses out, so do we all.
In a recent article on the Planned Giving Design Center’s blog there was a discussion about the impact President Obama’s Tax Plan would have on the cost of charitable giving for wealthy donors. Coming from the “head” view, the article made a lot of valid points, calculating the amount of tax benefit that might be lost and suggesting that this would dissuade wealthy donors from supporting charitable causes. If that is truly the case, it is a cause for great sorrow to me.
One commenter to the article made an extremely valuable observation. Fred Matthews heads Sound Development Strategies in Seattle, WA, a consulting organization that assists mid-size nonprofits. His lovely observation in the discussion bears repeating, so I quote it in full here:
This discussion is a classic example of the difference between fundraising and philanthropy. Fundraising is a set of techniques and processes we use to implement philanthropy. Philanthropy is about creating change in our communities, our society and our world on behalf of those who are vulnerable and do not have the advantages many of us do.
When we start to confuse fundraising–and its associated tax benefits–with philanthropy, and do not focus first and foremost on the case for support of our nonprofit organizations (the change for the better in the lives of those less fortunate who share our planet) and donative intent, we have seriously lost our professional way.
Thanks again Fred.
Fundraising and Philanthropy. Head and Heart. Both are important.
Where is head and heart out of balance in your work in the world? Would you like to put more heart into it? Profit is important, let’s be clear – enterprises with no money, whether a family or a company – can’t do much good in the world. But how can revenue generation be better tied to the heart?
To me, the answer lies in holding the strong intention to do good work in the world with an underlying motivation to add value wherever possible. What does that look like in what you do day to day? How would you incorporate it into your legacy project?