Forum Bits 
The newsletter of the regional association network
 
August 21, 2015    
In This Issue
New Feature: Edit Your RA's Profile
Don't Forget About Conference Resources
New Webinar Series on Nonprofit Financial Management
Looking for Program Ideas?
Resources from Recent Programming
Recent RA Releases
From Get on the Map to Regional Giving Reports
Reminder: Webinar Series on Philanthropy Consulting
Forum Network in the News
RA Blogging Highlights
Upcoming Events
Forum Office Contacts
Save The Date
FOTH 2016

Forum Resource Spotlight
Quovo Logo
 
Quovo provides endowments, foundations, and advisors with an elegant web dashboard that aggregates their investment accounts - across custodians, portfolios, and managers - and generates a suite of tracking and interactive analysis modules on top of the data. 

RA members are eligible for a 20% discount on new accounts.

Forum Office Contacts
 
Have a question for the 
Forum Office?
 
 
Be Sure to Read

Engage
  

This is guide from The Rockefeller Foundation and Monitor Institute aims to strengthen the capacity of grantmakers to support and leverage networks in service of their social impact goals.

Reports from the Field

Adventures in Giving (The Philanthropic Initiative, Greater Kansas City Community Foundation, Community Foundation of Sarasota County, and Boston Foundation)



Top 10 Association Management & Operations Resources










Top 10 Philanthropy Resources










Newsletter Archive

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New Feature: Edit Your RA's Profile Online & Add New Staff
Designated regional association staff members can now edit their organizational profiles, including adding and removing staff, directly through the Forum's website. Help us keep your record up-to-date so that we can serve you better!

At least one staff member at each regional association has been given an "Administrative Contact" role for the Forum's website (each RA can have up to 2 administrative contacts). These users will see an Edit option next to the name of their organization on their My Account page and through the Member Directory. The Edit option will take administrative contacts to a page where they can update organizational information such as mission, staff size, addresses, and social media accounts. By clicking on the Connections tab at the top of the page, the administrative contact can add and remove staff, update titles, and assign additional roles.

If you have questions about how to best use this new feature or assign the administrative contacts for your RA, please contact Val Rozansky or Courtney Moore.

Don't Forget About Conference Resources
If you haven't logged in to see the materials from this year's sessions, you can access these materials and more on the conference page.

Photos from the conference are also available here and don't forget to check out #ForumCon15 for the all the selfies and conversations from the week.

Reflections from Attendees
Session Resources
Have additional materials to share? Please send them to Courtney Moore for inclusion on the Forum's site.

New Webinar Series on Nonprofit Financial Management
The Wallace Foundation
The Wallace Foundation is sponsoring a series of two webinars for regional associations and your members. Please consider sharing with your networks.

The Skills to Pay the Bills: Boosting Nonprofits' Financial Management
Wednesday, Sept. 23rd, 2-3pm ET
 
Where can nonprofits get free, trustworthy, hands-on tools and guides about financial management? StrongNonprofits.org--a web-based toolkit of free resources is designed to help nonprofits understand and manage their financial health. Regional associations, their funder members and other partners who work with nonprofits are invited to explore and freely use this website. Join us for a guided tour of the website, learn about its key tools and guides and hear about a training evaluation that informed the creation of the site. 

 
Building a Program-Based Budget, and Other Secrets to Successful Financial Management
Tuesday, Nov. 3rd, 2-3pm ET     
 
Do you know the real cost to your nonprofit of running each individual program? Developing an accurate budget can help you better understand your program's true costs. This webinar will demonstrate a free, newly developed planning tool designed to assist nonprofits with aligning budget line items for restricted (and unrestricted) revenue sources. 

Participants will receive a free copy of the tool for use in their own organizations, as well as a virtual tour of StrongNonprofits.org- a free, web-based financial management toolkit and an introduction to some of its other top tools, such as:
  • A cash flow projection template
  • A guide to budget development
  • A tool for making decisions on new funding opportunities
  • A webinar to help board members understand their financial responsibilities
This hands-on training is sponsored by The Wallace Foundation and will be provided by Hilda Polanco, CEO and Founder, and John Summers, Director, of Fiscal Management Associates.

Looking for Program Ideas?
Have you searched the Grantmaker Education Programming Directory? This searchable database of regional associations' "best" grantmaker education programs, favorite speakers, and planning tools, was developed by and for regional associations to help them more effectively and efficiently meet their members' diverse educational needs. It is easy to search and filter to help you find your next great event. 

What was your regional association's best program of the second quarter? Have you added it to the directory?

Submitting a program is easy through our web form.

If you have any questions about the directory, please feel free to contact Dan Brady.

Resources from Recent Programming
Past Events
Public Policy Round Robin
August 11, 2015

This month's call featured David Thompson with the National Council of Nonprofits who talked about the Department of Labor proposal that makes more nonprofit employees eligible for overtime compensation.


Recent RA Releases
Case Study- Education Funders Research Initiative Education Funders Research Initiative: A Case Study on Moving Philosophically Diverse Funders to Common Priorities
Produced by an external researcher for Philanthropy New York, this case study documents the formation, challenges and ultimate success of the Education Funders Research Initiative - an unusual collaboration that brought together funders with very different approaches to education reform, and differing views on controversial topics such as testing and accountability, charter schools and the Common Core.

From Get on the Map to Regional Giving Reports
Get on the Map Campaign
What if we could develop a model for scaling the collection and analysis of regional data, so that any regional association that wants to produce an annual giving report has a cost-effective mechanism for doing so? Representatives from more than a dozen regional associations have been working with Foundation Center over the past six months to develop such a model. It leverages the data collected through the Get on the Map campaign, feeding it into regionally-focused databases that can be used to generate annual giving reports.

Join our Foundation Center colleagues for a webinar to discuss this approach to regional giving reports, including ideas for operationalizing the model in 2016 on Tuesday, September 15 at 3 pm ET.


Reminder: Webinar Series Opportunity on Philanthropy Consulting

NNCG logo

Please consider sharing this opportunity with your members.

 

Based on the groundbreaking Spring issue of The Foundation Review, the first edition dedicated to the practice of philanthropy consulting, the National Network of Consultants to Grantmakers (NNCG) is presenting a series of seven webinars that will dive deeper into many of the publication's article topics. Remaining webinars include:

This series is co-sponsored by the Council on Foundations, the Forum of Regional Associations of Grantmakers, The Foundation Center, Learn Philanthropy, Northern California Grantmakers, and The Foundation Review.

 

NNCG members can register at no cost and non-NNCG members can receive a multi-webinar discount. 

 

Forum Network in the News
Recent media mentions of regional associations around the country:

Colorado Association of Funders: Denver Grant Maker Narrows Focus to the Arts - Just the Arts (quotes Executive Director, Joanne Kelley)

Donors Forum: Collaborating for greater good (Letter to the Editor from President and CEO, Eric Weinheimer)

Gateway Center for Giving: A Year After Police Shooting, St. Louis Offers Lessons in Rebuilding (quotes President, Deb Dubin)

Wisconsin Philanthropy Network: Connecting to Philanthropy: The need for advancing diversity, equity and inclusion (written by Research and Operations Analyst, Caty Bulgrin and Intern, Josh Freda)

Highlights from RA Blogging

Upcoming Events
Calendar of Events
FOR REGIONAL ASSOCIATIONS

Tuesday, September 8, 2-3 pm ETPublic Policy Round Robin. Conference Call.

Tuesday, September 15, 3-4 pm ET: From Get on the Map to Regional Giving Reports. Webinar.
 
FOR REGIONAL ASSOCIATIONS & YOUR MEMBERS  (Upcoming 90 Days) See Full Listing

Wednesday, September 9, 1-3 pm ET: Tri-State Community Foundation Partnership Webinar Series: ABC Lite. Webinar. Indiana Philanthropy Alliance, Council of Michigan Foundations, Philanthropy Ohio.  

Friday, September 11, 1-2 pm ET: The Victories of the Paid Leave Movement - Will Legislative Wins Reach the Low Wage Workforce? Webinar. Workforce Matters and Grantmakers Income Security Taskforce

September 16-18, 2015: Philanthropy Forward '15. Cincinnati, OH. Philanthropy Ohio.

Monday, September 21, 20152015 Corporate Philanthropy Institute | Authenticity. San Francisco, CA. Northern California Grantmakers.

Wednesday, September 23, 2-3 pm ET: The Skills to Pay the Bills: Boosting Nonprofits' Financial Management. Webinar. Sponsored by The Wallace Foundation

October 7-9, 2015. Philanthropy West Virginia Annual Conference | Launching Solutions in the Mountain State. Davis, WV. Philanthropy West Virginia.

Thursday, October 8, 2015San Diego Grantmakers 2015 Annual Conference. La Jolla, CA. San Diego Grantmakers.

Wednesday, October 21, 1-3 pm ETTri-State Community Foundation Partnership Webinar Series: Making a Software Change. Webinar. Indiana Philanthropy Alliance, Council of Michigan Foundations, Philanthropy Ohio.

October 22-24, 20152015 Philanthropy Southwest Annual Conference. Santa Fe, NM. Philanthropy Southwest.

October 25-27, 2015NY Funders Fall Conference | 2020: Moving Forward Together for Greater ImpactSyracuse, NY. NY Funders Alliance.

October 28-29, 20152015 MCF Annual Conference | Impact by Design. St. Paul, MN. Minnesota Council on Foundations.

Tuesday, November 3, 2-3 pm ET: Building a Program-Based Budget, and Other Secrets to Successful Financial Management. Webinar. Sponsored by The Wallace Foundation

November 3-4, 2015: GCYF 2015 Annual Meeting. Washington, DC. Grantmakers for Children, Youth & Families.

November 8-10, 2015: CMF 43rd Annual Conference. Kalamazoo, MI. Council of Michigan Foundations.

November 11-13, 2015: SECF's 46th Annual Meeting. Asheville, NC. Southeastern Council of Foundations.

Wednesday, November 11, 1-3 pm ET: Tri-State Community Foundation Partnership Webinar Series: Starting a Gift Annuity Program. Webinar. Indiana Philanthropy Alliance, Council of Michigan Foundations, Philanthropy Ohio.

Thursday, November 19, 2015: 2015 Viewpoints - Statewide Conference on Philanthropy. Oshkosh, WI. Wisconsin Philanthropy Network.

Forum Office Contacts
OfficeDan Brady, Communications Manager (202-521-9161)
  • Contact Dan with questions about the Knowledgebase, content management, listservs, social networking, and online content strategy.
Courtney Moore, Member Services and Operations Manager (202-888-7428)
  • Contact Courtney for general information about Forum membership and services, regional association contact information, conference and teleconference logistics, member surveys, and orientation for new regional association staff. Courtney is also the main contact for regional association staff updates.
Mary O'Neill, Interim Director (202-457-8784)
  • Contact Mary with questions about grantmaker education, public policy, organizational partnerships, and special projects such as the Essential Skills and Strategies for New Grantmakers.
Val Rozansky, Director of Knowledge Services (202-888-7430)
  • Contact Val with questions about the Forum's Knowledge Management Initiative, KM system partnerships, membership databases, and all issues relating to technology and electronic communications. 
Erin Skene-Pratt, Director of PolicyWorks for Philanthropy (517-402-2440)
  • Contact Erin with questions about the Forum's public policy work including protecting the charitable deduction, building capacity of regional associations to engage in policy, and the PolicyWorks for Philanthropy initiative.
Courtney Moore, Member Services and Operations ManagerForum Logo
Forum of Regional Associations of Grantmakers
202-888-7428|[email protected]