501derful.org
Albert
Einstein said ‘The most powerful force in the Universe is compound
interest’. To that I say ‘the most powerful force in philanthropy is
compound interests.’ The ability to bring people together based on a
common interest and to make an impact is, in my opinion, the most
important skill for a philanthropy to develop and hone. Superficially
this flies in the face of the idea of the one man non profit. If real
ultimate power comes from compounding the interests across as wide an
area as possible then how effective can a hyper local one man non
profit be?
The short answer is not very. HOWEVER it is my opinion that the
large nationwide organizations should pay attention to this micro
trend and formulate a strategy to attract and support these
entrepreneurial philanthropists to further large scale medical and
epidemiological research.
Nationwide organizations can leverage their fund raising vendors
(Convio, E-Tapestry)for a system to enable one-off events. Beyond the
fund raising appropriations there are legal concerns as well. Branding,
trademarks, and a host of other technical concerns may stymie
entrepreneurial philanthropists from engaging large organizations, and
so they create their own.
As much as we would like to dismiss this trend it is building in
momentum and volume. The next iteration of philanthropy will be to
empower volunteers and donors to create something that they could
intrinsically call their own. The association or agency that can make
that process as user friendly for the constituent will continue to grow
in importance and ability to move mission.
