Think Giving to Groups That Support Nonprofits Is a Waste? You’re Wrong.

Tim Foley for The Chronicle

America’s nonprofits are the envy of the world for their strength and diversity. Yet as these organizations grow in scale and complexity — and as the problems they seek to solve become more urgent — the nonprofit world lacks sufficient investment in research, training, and other tools to help them grow stronger.

“Like a body without a backbone, a sector without a strong infrastructure will crumble,” wrote Cynthia Gibson, a philanthropic adviser and former Carnegie Corporation program officer, in a 2008 special issue of the Nonprofit Quarterly dedicated to infrastructure. Eight years later, with the level of investment in infrastructure essentially flat, we — along with more than 20 other nonprofit leaders — are issuing a renewed call for foundations to invest in strengthening how charitable organizations work.

We need the data systems and technology platforms that fuel communication and learning. We need training programs that support the growth of staff and volunteers. We need research to understand what works and what doesn’t. We need organizations devoted to building a more diverse nonprofit work force, especially at the leadership level. We need advocacy for policies that support our work and help us reach new levels of excellence.

Without greater investment in all those areas, nonprofits and grant makers won’t be as nimble and effective as they need to be to tackle challenges like curbing climate change, fighting poverty, curing diseases, and dealing with national and international disasters.

To be sure, foundations and other donors have given money to some efforts that bolster nonprofits. But the money does not match the scale of the challenges ahead. That’s why the organizations we lead, GuideStar and the Center for Effective Philanthropy, joined an effort unveiled in May to formally call on foundations to dedicate at least 1 percent of their grant-making budgets to work that strengthens the entire nonprofit world.

The groups joining with us represent a diverse coalition that includes the Council on Foundations, BoardSource, Foundation Center, VolunteerMatch, and 18 other organizations.

All of us are very grateful to the handful of grant makers that have made significant investments in “infrastructure” organizations.

But as Lindsay Louie, a program officer at the William and Flora Hewlett Foundation, noted last year (citing Foundation Center data): “Philanthropy is growing, but infrastructure funding isn’t keeping pace.” (Disclosure: Hewlett has supported both our organizations and one of us, Jacob Harold, used to work there.)

That needs to change. As our coalition argues in a letter sent to all U.S. foundations making more than $2.5 million in grants annually, “civil society needs infrastructure to ensure that nonprofits and foundations can act with integrity and impact.”

Furthermore, “we waste hundreds of millions of dollars in a fundraising process that is full of duplication and confusion,” the letter states. “Nonprofits struggle to find the right staff with the right skills. The power imbalance between foundations and nonprofits dampens the honest conversations that are so critical to any partnership. Too often nonprofit leaders do not reflect the diversity of the communities they serve. Too few organizations admit failure; and, thus, few learn from it.”

None of our organizations focus on every one of those issues, but collectively we’re working on all of them. And while nonprofits have done much good, we believe they can do much better. Simply importing frameworks from business or government doesn’t work. We need people waking up every morning focused on the unique challenges facing nonprofits and grant makers.

We are not the first to call for this kind of support. A group of foundation presidents made a similar plea to their colleagues more than a decade ago. Why hasn’t more progress been made? We don’t know — but we do know foundations often hesitate to fund infrastructure organizations because they see such grants as coming at the expense of the “core work” of their programs. Indeed, we have heard that case made since our letter was released.

That’s a false choice. Take the contributions of VolunteerMatch, which has connected more than 10 million individuals to volunteering opportunities, providing nonprofits with crucial resources to help them achieve their goals. Or BoardSource, which has helped thousands of organizations improve their governance. These groups provide resources and insight that nonprofits need and can’t find elsewhere.

We have come together not to make the case for specific, individual organizations, but rather to seek a stronger network of organizations that, working individually and collectively, can help bolster the nonprofit world. We don’t speak for anyone but ourselves. But we know many people at groups across the country would agree on the need to put more dollars into institutions that can exponentially increase the effectiveness of the charitable groups Americans count on.

Ultimately, each foundation will make its own choices about what strategies to fund. Some will support campaigns to promote greater racial equity in philanthropy. Others will focus on efforts to strengthen nonprofit governance. Still others will fund organizations that advocate for greater general operating support.

We’re not just calling on grant makers to do more. Those of us who lead organizations that focus on improving nonprofits can do a better job assessing and improving our own performance. We know we need to collaborate more than we have in the past. While we reject Dan Pallotta’s recent call in the Harvard Business Review for organizations like ours to merge into a single entity — such centralization could stifle innovation and silence marginalized voices — we do know there are opportunities for us to work together more productively. We pledge to seek them out.

We’re asking foundations to support those organizations focused on multiplying the good that nonprofits do for our communities. An investment in the right infrastructure is an investment in impact.

Jacob Harold is the CEO of GuideStar. Phil Buchanan is the president of the Center for Effective Philanthropy.