Another charity ranking system is out, this time in Canada: the MoneySense Charity 100 (not currently available online but the 2010 version is here).
It takes a very small sample of 100 out of the more than 85,000 charities in Canada and attempts to take the dozens of factors that affect fundraising costs and compact them down into one all-encompassing, objective letter grade.
As AFP has said many times, such rankings are arbitrary, biased and in the end, tell a donor nothing about how good a charity is at fulfilling its mission or how effective it is.
Fundraising cost is an important issue, but a ranking system like the MoneySense Charity 100 does nothing to identify charities that are really good at fundraising or making change in our society. It contributes nothing to public understanding about what it takes to keep the show on the road, or what it takes to achieve impact.
The Canadian Broadcasting Company has also entered the fray with a recent article on fundraising costs.
Fundraising cost is a powerful and emotional issue for most donors, but it’s also very complicated. A responsible commentator tries to achieve a balanced tone – we all know that public education about costs is badly needed.
The CBC article is especially frustrating because it doesn’t attempt to explain why the organization’s fundraising costs are increasing and barely touches on why its priorities might be shifting. It simply implies that funding for research is dropping because of increases in fundraising activities without exploring the strategy behind any changes.
Even more telling are the hundreds of comments, many of which indicate the high degree of cynicism and lack of understanding the public has about the issue.
We will continue to come out strongly on this issue because being quiet or waiting to speak to donors in small groups isn’t going to work. Many people have already made up their mind about fundraising cost, and we’re not going to change them without being heard.
Have an idea about how best to respond to these types of article? Love to hear from you?
About Me
- Andrew Watt, FInstF
- I’m Andrew Watt, president and CEO of the Association of Fundraising Professionals. We're calling this the AFP Blog, because although I’m posting, it’s really your thoughts, your views that we'll be posting, as much as mine —it's about the AFP community and the fundraising profession. I want to keep you up to date with what’s happening at AFP, but I really want to hear from you. So e-mail me and post here with your comments, questions, concerns, feedback, and items you think I should be covering.
Sites and Blogs I Like
- The Agitator (Philanthropic Blog)
- Latest from Alliance (Global Philanthropy Blog)
- ASAE & The Center for Association Leadership
- ASHOKA
- Association of Fundraising Professionals
- The Center on Philanthropy
- CIVICUS: World Alliance for Citizen Participation
- The Economist
- GreatNonProfits
- McKinsey Quarterly
- Showcase of Fundraising Innovation and Inspiration (SOFII)
- Stanford Social Innovation Review
- TED
- Urban Institute - Center on Nonprofits and Philanthropy
Blog Archive
Subscribe To
Posts
Followers
1 comment:
I don't have a suggestion in regards to how to respond directly to those articles, but I think we need to place responsability on the people operating those websites and publishing the articles. When my company developed our charity directory site we made sure to avoid showing those misleading metrics on a per-charity basis. It was important for us not to encourage donors to think in terms of percentages going to programing vs administration. Instead we found another way of publishing those ratios by showing them at a sub-sector basis only.
I also imagine that organizations like yours could be more aggressive about educating donors on the costs of administration and the costs of fundraising. It's tricky though, because while you/we would be addressing the concerns of critics, you/we would possibly be alarming other donors that were not even thinking about these ratios.
Post a Comment