Upselling; donor ideas-foundation solutions through an informed, engaged community

Scribe: Dirk Beveridge, 4^th Generation Systems

Facilitator: Nancy Jones, The Miami Foundation

Knight President and CEO Alberto Ibargüen asked at this morning’s plenary: “What can we do to get donor advised funds focused on community engagement?”

The group agreed that this is why we gathered for this session. What can we do tomorrow when we leave Miami to make a difference in our projects and in our community?

• Utilize existing donors to leverage new dollars
• Give donors a common definition of community engagement
• Provide hard data to back up our opinion
• Connecting civic leadership to community problem solving
• Build ownership of solutions
• Let them know what is at stake if you’re community is not engaged
• Create a frame by which donors see information as a key to community engagement, the context by which to talk about investing, supporting, sharing information – that this can lead to community engagement
• Sell the interconnectivity of the issues – can we have a wiki for each city?

Three reasons why we need to help donors understand:

• Meaningful – this work is meaningful for our communities and our countries
• Moment – this is your moment to tell your story
• Difference – our donors want to make a difference, community foundations can show them the way

Why the pursuit of information-based initiatives is important:

• More information leads to better decisions
• Voter turnout increase – potential
• Fills the void of absent voices in the information arena
• Information provides access
• Provide the information and the tools to react to the information
• Have the ability to provide in-depth information and context

What’s the vision that community foundations can present to get our donors to act differently? This value proposition has to be data-driven. It needs to:

• Get people’s attention
• Get people thinking
• Create dialogue
• Move people to action

Defining the vision is important because it provides:

• Focus
• Direction
• Meaning and context
• Vivid image
• Standard of excellence
• Desired destination

Information is the currency of a democracy. – Thomas Jefferson

What are our visions for your information-based program/initiative?

When a community foundation can concisely explain its vision for this or any initiative, it will be easier to bring along other funders and donors. Community foundations need to think about who their audience is and what messages will resonate with them.

• Without good information people will disengage from our communities
• Adds value to the life of the community

o How do we structure the information sharing – are we shaping it for our purposes?

§ We can’t share information and take sides at the same time

• ‘Building democracy’ is a good explainer for ‘building community’ – people more readily understand what a democracy is. Democracy is a more powerful word.
• Democracy requires engagement and engagement requires information
• Information is an equalizer – voice based on knowledge
• Information allows people to be personally connected
• Information allows us to see what is possible

Why is this the right moment to tell the story of an informed and engaged community?

• Media has shown people the power of their own voices
• The Internet has taken the power of mainstream media and given it to the people
• Community foundations have to take more ownership of the information
• The climate (governments toppling in the Middle East) tells us that change is possible. If community foundations exhibit leadership, we can grow in assets
• If community foundations do this well, we can be looked to by other national funders as an information distribution source

What are the profiles of the individuals who have the willingness to finance a community information project:

The group discussed what the profile of a potential donor to an information needs project might look like. There were a number of similarities between what a donor to an information needs project looks like compared to a donor to any other community initiative.

Someone who:

• Runs for office/existing civic leader
• Trusts the community foundation already
• Is risk tolerant
• Understands the impact of collaboration
• Can engage their peers
• Already does more than give money on an issue
• See the link of information to their personal cause
• Progressive
• Interested in systemic change
• Values collaboration
• Interested in bigger picture
• Political donor – either to campaigns or issues
• Comfortable with personal/public voice
• Openness to new media
• Genuine care of community
• Interest in equality and justice
• Understands how information plays out in a business environment

What are the next action steps that each wants to do after the Media Learning Seminar:

The group discussed the applicability of the session this afternoon in the context of how it applies to all the work that we do as a community foundation.  The following action steps were each presented by individuals in the session. There was consensus among the group that even as we think about how information needs play a part in our program work, we can take the same lessons and apply them to all the work that we do.

• Review effectiveness of key initiatives’ visions
• Develop vision for foundation
• Research and develop a model of the current data availability and landscape
• Project to our donors our information and ideas