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May 26

CICF commits to not returning to ‘business as usual’ after COVID-19

By Sponsor Insight

By Brian Payne, president/CEO, and Gregory F. Hahn, chair, Central Indiana Community Foundation

One year ago, you heard us pledge our commitment to this community. Central Indiana Community Foundation, The Indianapolis Foundation, Hamilton County Community Foundation, and Women’s Fund of Central Indiana came together and pledged to mobilize people, ideas and investments to make this a community where all individuals have the equitable opportunity to reach their full potential—no matter place, race or identity. That is our mission. And it has never been more critical than right now.

The uncertainty and vulnerability that has weighed on all of us for weeks have been an everyday reality for many residents, neighborhoods and communities in Central Indiana for generations.
We recognize the uniquely destructive impact that the COVID-19 pandemic is having on residents already made vulnerable by business as usual in an unfair and unjust system. We refuse to return to business as usual after this moment has passed.

As we all work to find a way to navigate this health and economic crisis, we are making another commitment:

  • To every family impacted by the loss of jobs and income, we are with you.
  • To small business owners and gig-workers navigating an uncertain future, we are with you.
  • To artists and performing arts organizations who have canceled exhibits and performances, we are with you.
  • To organizations reinventing themselves to accommodate a new reality, we are with you.
  • To students whose educations have been interrupted and those robbed of the safe haven and meals that school provides, we are with you.
  • To senior citizens and those with disabilities who are now feeling even more isolated, we are with you.
  • To our neighbors living without shelter or struggling to meet their basic needs, we are with you.
  • To the workers on the frontline taking risks to keep us fed, healthy and safe, we are with you.
  • To the immigrants and refugees separated from lifesaving resources by a language barrier or their undocumented status, we are with you.
  • To the Black and brown families devastated by disproportionate access to quality health care and a corresponding increase in illness and death, we are with you.
  • And to everyone grieving, we are with you.

The neighborhoods hit hardest by this pandemic are the very ones where we’ve worked with CICF Community Ambassadors to build meaningful relationships through listening and learning.

We are committed to continuing this work — especially in our communities of color who have been historically ignored. We will continue to invest in their futures because they are our future. We will hold to our mission of equity and continue our work to dismantle systemic racism, remove the barriers separating opportunity from so many of our neighbors, and create our Inclusive City and region. We will give residents the support they say they need. We will continue to fight for you and lead with you. Now and when the COVID-19 headlines have passed.

There are ways that every one of us can help our neighbors during this difficult time. Check on your neighbors — especially if they are seniors. Leave a note in the mailbox with a way to reach you. Before you take a trip to the grocery store or pharmacy, ask if your neighbor needs anything. Check the credibility of information and resources before sharing. (CICF is curating a list of resources available on our website at cicf.org) Our community’s not-for-profits need support now more than ever. Give to them if you can. Find ways to stay connected with loved ones.

Take care of yourself. Be safe. Be kind.

And remember that we are community. We are in this together. And we are with you.

May 18

Nonprofits rush to take advantage of PPP lifeline

By Feature, Governance

By Lynn Sygiel, editor, Charitable Advisors

Cindy Booth advocates for Marion County’s abused and/or neglected children through her work at Child Advocates.

Rosalyn Demares promotes state artists through Indiana Artisan.

Rachel Sahaidachny invests time and energy helping writers tell their stories at the Indiana Writers Center (IWC).
Julia Whitehead champions Kurt Vonnegut’s legacy at the museum and library that bear his name.

What these four nonprofit leaders have in common is that they applied for Small Business Administration’s (SBA) Paycheck Protection Program loans. As of May 8, Indiana SBA-approved lenders helped complete 71,614 loans, totaling more than $9.66 billion, according to SBA.

What is not clear, however, is how many of these loans were approved for nonprofits.

Laura Schafsnitz, public affairs specialist at the Indiana District Office of the SBA, said that its priority is still processing funds, and has not yet differentiated between the two eligible groups – nonprofits and small business.

United Way of Central Indiana and the Arts Council of Indianapolis found some answers through a survey of local nonprofits concerning the status of PPP applications.

Denise Luster, UWCI’s vice president of impact research and analytics, said it reached out to 118 nonprofits in six counties ranging from grassroots organizations to those with multi-million dollar budgets. The target audience was the human services sector, but it reached beyond United Way’s network of accredited partners.

Of the 118 respondents, 85 applied (72 percent) for a PPP loan. By the end of April when the responses were tallied, 68 nonprofits had received approval, and 17 had not yet received word. Of the 68 approved, 50 had funds in their bank accounts. The average amount applied for was $352,872. The April 30 report does not reflect second round of PPP loans application, which opened just three days prior.

Ernest Disney-Britton, the Arts Council of Indianapolis’ vice president of community impact, shared similar data.

“I can tell you that of the 76 organizations that responded to our survey, 84 percent said they had applied for the Paycheck Protection Program,” he said. “One mid-sized organization indicated that it had received $85,000 and another mentioned it received $329,000.”

Unlike the first round of the PPP program in which funds were depleted quickly, round two still has money to give out, according to Schafsnitz.

The PPP program was not without its well-publicized wrinkles and that’s among the reasons why early in the state’s shelter-in-place order, some nonprofit leaders tried to provide support for local nonprofits. The Arts Council, for example, convenes weekly sessions that include at least 90 CEOs and executive directors. United Way and the Immigrant Welcome Center do the same. In its latest Community Connect report, 53 agencies participated in the Welcome Center’s Partner Power call. These have also been opportunities for nonprofit executives to share information and pose questions.

Child Advocates’ Executive Director Booth said she heard about the PPP through emails from the organization’s state office, national CASA and United Way. These emails shared the opportunity, what it means and what to consider.

But applying for a PPP loan was not for everyone. Booth shared a story about a colleague from southern Indiana who sought her out as sounding board, explaining her thought process and her reasons for her decision.

“I think for the smaller (organizations), sometimes it’s just even talking to somebody. ‘Am I on the right track? Does this sound right to you?’

“She really was being very thoughtful, but when she got to the ‘no,’ she was like, ‘I feel like I should be say, ‘yes.’ There’s money out there, I should be saying yes.’” That director ultimately decided not to apply,” said Booth.

The biggest question for Demares, a one-person staff, was: Is it truly a forgivable loan?” Indiana Artisans has two stores with 13 part-time employees, one in Carmel and one in the French Lick Resort. “We’ve never had any kind of loans, so this was new,” she said.

As information about the program evolved, some had concerns about the reality of forgiveness. PPP loans can qualify for forgiveness, but if not, the loan has a 1% interest rate over two years, with no payments due during the first six months.

Booth figured, while it could be viable, her concern was any negative implications. So with her CFO, she conferred with the agency’s auditor who encouraged her to apply. Booth also talked with her national and state CASA colleagues. This all happened, she said, within a number of hours. Booth said they learned early that you needed to start the process with your local bank. For Child Advocates that was Huntington Bank, and the nonprofit’s board treasurer is a bank employee who connected them the correct staff person at the bank.

All had been in regular contact with their boards or executive committees. Board members, they all agreed, provided helpful information and advice.

There was also information coming from those weekly calls, oftentimes from an expert on a particular topic. The three arts leaders — Demares, Sahaidachny and Whitehead — were regulars on the Arts Council calls.

Sahaidachny said those calls have been a godsend.

“I definitely have learned a lot. It certainly helps because it’s so hard to keep up with everything; to be able to get that recap every week has really helped me through the last two months,” she said.

“The Arts Council really spearheaded this effort of communication which has been amazing. (It is) important for the information, but also important to feel like you’re all in this together, sharing and helping each other and not feeling competitive,” said Whitehead.

After conversations with their bankers, all four had the documents ready when the loan program opened on April 3. For the Writers’ Center that was Regions, for Indiana Artisan it was Old National, Child Advocates banks with Huntington and the Vonnegut Library and Museum banks with National Bank of Indianapolis.

When the SBA launched the Paycheck Protection Program, there were high demands and technical glitches that stalled loan processing.

That wasn’t the case for Whitehead who said the Vonnegut Museum and Library’s CFO submitted its application the morning the program opened.

“We worked closely with our bank. National Bank of Indianapolis worked that entire weekend to process the loans,” she said.

Booth said it was a simple one-page application. “I think our CFO had her finger hovered over the send button as soon as Friday came,” said Booth.

While the two others were ready, they weren’t successful submitting electronically on the first day.

Demares wasn’t able to connect to Old National’s portal to upload any documents. But her banker emailed that evening to say that the portal was open and functioning, but her application would have to be redone. While she Demares did this immediately and successfully submitted it to the bank, it took until April 29 to receive approval from the SBA.

Sahaidachny had a similar experience. Her bank’s online portal kept crashing and freezing. She was finally able to complete the PPP submission the following Monday. Later that week, she received an email from her bank that the SBA had quit taking applications because the dollars had run out. Regions, however, continued to process applications to have ready in anticipation of a second round of funds. The fund was replenished and opened again on April 27. After lots of handwringing, on May 5 the Writers’ Center executive learned the money was deposited in its account.

Two of these nonprofits applied for loans of under $50,000, and two over, reflecting the sizes of their payrolls. In order to receive forgiveness, at least 75 percent must be applied for payroll costs, while the remainder can be used for mortgage interest, utilities and rent. The loan is intended to cover eight weeks of these expenses, and the borrower must then complete forgiveness application and submit to its lender. Ultimately, the bank is responsible for assessing forgiveness.

Booth said Child Advocates learned on April 16 that the organization had been approved, and Whitehead said it was April 7. The next step is applying for forgiveness. Each has a different eight-week period that beginning on the date the lender made the first disbursement of the PPP loan to the borrower.

“We didn’t expect funding as quickly as we did. That was a wonderful surprise,” said Whitehead. “We took the money and put it in a restricted account. We’re using it for payroll, but it’s sitting in a restricted account as we deplete the funds over the next couple of months. We did it for ease of accounting and also just to really highlight that those are special funds.”

All had positive experiences with the local bankers. None of the four knew of any nonprofits that applied that were denied.

“The bankers that I worked with were so responsive to my questions in the beginning of the application process. They really helped us understand what we needed to show and with their help we were able to put that together,” said Sahaidachny.

If there is a silver lining, each was able to keep staff and had the chance to reflect and plan for a different future – delivering services virtually or planning for the safe re-opening.

Whitehead said since the museum and library opened at its new location in November, it’s been a breakneck pace.

“The PPP allowed me to take a breath, and to talk with our staff about what was going well, and what was not going well. We had this wonderful clearing where we can reset. We opened in November and we were operating beyond our capability. This gave us a chance to stop and think, ‘OK what really makes sense. Shat changes do we need to make, so that we can comply with whatever the new normal will be.’”

May 04

Where have ergonomics gone?

By Sponsor Insight

By Cody Lents, change manager, Covi

The past few weeks have sent us disruption after disruption and change after change. Most of us have experienced a massive shift in incoming business, a migration of our workforces from the office to work from home, and an influx of administrative tasks and emails. Not only has the work force made a shift, so have students and teachers and now home is the classroom with e-learning.

As we continue work and classes in home spaces, it may be beneficial to remember the ergonomics and body posture in the office and classroom don’t always translate to the home work spaces.

To avoid discomfort in the upper and lower back and a pain in the neck adults and children alike should think about the following tips:

  • Eyes straight: If working from a laptop, elevate the device so that the screen allows your eyes to stay level (as opposed to looking downward…at your lap area). Keep shoulders back and down and top of the head towards the ceiling. This will avoid tension on the upper back (shoulder blade area) and the neck. You don’t have to purchase a fancy monitor or docking station to accomplish this. Be creative with a large, leather-bound book or riser from Amazon.
  • Elbows at 90-degrees: Try to keep your laptop or keyboard/mouse at a level where your arms can stay near a 90-degree angle to avoid tension in the shoulders and progress towards wrist pain. This also helps to keep your head level. If a laptop causes problems here, an external mouse and keyboard will go a long way to repositioning your hands, arms and shoulders. There are both wired and wireless options with plug-and-play simplicity that are inexpensive.
  • Feet on the floor: Keep your feet on the floor and leg space clear. This will help alleviate tension from the lower back.
  • Lumbar support: If you feel excess tension on your lower back, a lumbar support cushion or wearable strap will go a long way to relaxing the joints, muscles and disks that are hard at work supporting your new work-at-home habits.

A combination of these tips will help everyone stay focused, productive, and avoiding the chiropractor when the world swings back to normal.

Stay happy and healthy! We’re all in this together…

Here’s an additional resource: Ergonomics Recommendations for Remote Work
https://www.ehstoday.com/health/article/21127667/ergonomics-recommendations-for-remote-work

For nearly seven years, Cody Lents has been a changemaker at Covi. His pursuit of variety is relentless. From music to tech to business to his personal running routes, he’s comfortable with change. He seeks out growing companies and nonprofits because they evolve quickly, and they appreciate his adaptability. Cody works alongside visionary leaders, anticipating their needs and supporting their success. He’s a tireless advocate for his clients.

Apr 20

Help your team care for themselves and they will care for others

By Sponsor Insight

By Jodi Snell, vice president, Hedges

We work with some of Indy’s best at Hedges. Hard to believe, it has been five weeks since we all started working from home. While working remotely is not a completely new concept to our Hedges team, working from home 100% of the time while being surrounded by our loved ones is new to us.

Last week, we took the time to send out some extra communication via email to let Hedges employees know how much we value them. It was something we called Monday morning motivation. The response from our team told us that we were right on the money. They needed to be reminded that it’s okay to care for themselves during this time. As a result of this intentional communication, we received positive feedback from team members and learned that people felt relief, support, and gratitude for such open communication during this time.

We were inspired by how much this message meant to our team and during this time when collaboration and community mean so much, we wanted to give others permission to “borrow” our idea and hope that it can be a resource for those nonprofit leaders looking to communicate the value of self-care to their teams amidst COVID-19.

Here’s what we sent to Hedges employees

We have made it 4 weeks!! Thank you all for taking such good care of our clients. Each of you have gone above and beyond in so many ways. You have reflected the Hedges values repeatedly during this time and we appreciate you so much!

With that said, we wanted to touch base and make sure that you are caring for yourself as much as you are caring for our clients. Below are a few things that we want to reiterate and put out into the universe for each of you to read:

Let go of any guilt: We are so thankful to have a team of high achievers. That is what makes this transition to the full team working remote so easy for us. We know that you will take care of our clients and go above and beyond for them.

So…let go of the guilt about not being your most productive self right now or not getting in eight hours a day. We know you will take care of your clients and all client work will be completed. We aren’t counting hours and you shouldn’t either. Put that guilt on a boat and send it down the river!

Loved ones included: Dog barking? Cat walking across your keyboard? Kiddos popping in on a meeting? Partner walking in during a meeting? We are all in the same boat – all of us at Hedges and everyone else in the community. Try to remember those little windows into us as humans are okay – find the joy in those moments rather than worrying about them!

Give yourself a break: Hitting a wall? Can’t seem to finish that deliverable? Kiddos asking you to play? Want to have lunch with your loved ones? Feeling down? Need a nap? Have a desire to help and volunteer right now?

Give yourself permission to take a break. If you need to take part of a day away to just recharge during this time, please do so and don’t use your PTO. Consider it self-care and do it! You will be way more productive if you take a break and come back to your work. Please, please, please take the breaks you need to care for yourself right now.

You do you: Depending on your workload and the type of work you are trying to knock out you might need less or more face-to-face time with others. Please determine what you need each week and plan accordingly.

Need some heads down time or a break from Zoom? Let the team know, turn off Microsoft Team chat, and move unessential meetings to emails. Need a space to process and talk through a project with someone? Tap into someone on the team who has the space to do that with you! We all have different capacity levels each week, so let’s lean into that as a team.

It is our hope that these reminders will remove any stressors that you might be feeling related to work. In a time like this, we will each have good days and bad days. If you are feeling a certain way, someone else is probably feeling that way too. Check in on each other – take care of each other.

There are some videos about mental health related to identifying stress, your workspace, and practicing gratitude in First Person’s resource hub that might be helpful during this time. And, if you need additional supports or resources, please let us know.

With gratitude for all you do.

Focused on equity, justice, and serving others, Jodi Snell is leading the way to make Central Indiana a vibrant place to live and to strengthen the nonprofit sector. Jodi has worked and volunteered with an array of nonprofit organizations for more than 12 years providing leadership and strategy, serving on the front line of direct service, and leading fundraising efforts. Since 2014, Jodi has shared her valuable leadership skills as an essential thought partner and problem solver at Hedges. She leads the Hedges team and clients in a manner that transforms visions into impactful and measurable change.

Apr 20

O’Neill grad students put classroom lessons to work for communities

By Sponsor Insight, Uncategorized

By Leslie Wells, assistant director of communications, O’Neill School at IUPUI

As two teenage girls stood before the Batesville, Indiana, City Council, they waited to make their case for funding. The Batesville Mayor’s Youth Council had received $5,000 through the Indiana Housing and Community Development Authority’s (ICHDA) My Community, My Vision grant program (MCMV). If they couldn’t come up with another $7,000, they’d have to take their public art project back to the drawing board.

In the crowd at the council meeting was Stacy Robinson, a public affairs graduate student from the O’Neill School at IUPUI. She had been working with the Mayor’s Youth Council for months through her My Community, My Vision Fellowship at the O’Neill School. Her assignment: to help the teens develop a proposal that would bring national artist Kelsey Montague to Batesville to paint two interactive murals.

“The meeting actually was a little tense,” Robinson recalls. “Some of the city councilors didn’t like their idea.”

Former Indiana Lieutenant Governor Sue Ellspermann started MCMV in 2014 to bring development to Indiana communities and engage young people. Every year, youth-led organizations from across the state apply to the program. Each group selected receives a $5,000 grant toward a community development project. They are also paired with an O’Neill IUPUI graduate student who guides them through the process. As part of the fellowship, each grad student receives $10,000 over the course of two semesters.

“Community engagement is the lesson plan at O’Neill,” says Marshawn Wolley, O’Neill’s director of community engagement and strategic initiatives. “This is a great example of the innovative partnerships we try to develop in order to advance student learning and impact communities at the same time.”

Wolley and O’Neill Associate Professor Adam Eckerd helped create the partnership with ICHDA and bring the MCMV grant program fellowship to the school.

“Students come into an MPA program eager to foster policy change and make communities better, but they don’t often get the opportunity to see that change actually happen,” says Eckerd. “The My Community, My Vision program allows our grad students to get hands-on experience using what they’re learning to lead real positive change in Indiana communities, while also having an influence on high school students who will be future public leaders.”

That combination is why Robinson applied for the fellowship. She came to the O’Neill School because of its reputation in the nonprofit world. Yet experiences like this one help her learn how to apply her education to any sector.

“I liked the idea of learning more about how local government works while working with youth,” said Robinson. “They’re at an interesting time in their lives when they care so much about what’s happening around them, but they often aren’t given opportunities to make change happen.”

Once she was paired with the Mayor’s Youth Council, Robinson sat down with the teens to get a better understanding of what they wanted to do and why.

“They already had community surveys that told them there wasn’t a lot for young people to do,” she says. “They wanted to make Batesville feel like a more vibrant place that young people would want to come back to after graduation.”

Robinson taught the enthusiastic teens to think critically about how to turn their artistic dreams into reality. She worked with them on how to evaluate the project and get more feedback from their neighbors. That community buy-in, Robinson told them, was critical.

“If the community doesn’t like an idea selected by a small group of people, that’s not a good public art project,” she said. “You need to make sure the community is on board with it.”

Not only did the community support the project, but so did the city council. At the meeting, they agreed to cover the remaining costs and move the Youth Council’s plan from paper to paint. Since last summer, two murals now enhance downtown. The first is a tree swing painted on Miss Shannon’s Music Studio in the Batesville Shopping Village. The second, a butterfly mural, is on Hillrom’s Training Center on Walnut Street.

Kim Linkel, an advisor for the Youth Council, says Robinson’s guidance not only made the project better but also helped the teens develop leadership skills.

“Stacy always allowed them to drive the project,” Linkel says. “They’ve realized that they’re not just some club that doesn’t make an impact. They see that, even though they’re young, they can drive change in their community.”

Their newfound confidence came through in the City Council meeting. The teens presented a strong case and convinced councilors to provide additional funding to cover the remaining cost for the murals.

The My Community, My Vision partnership paid off for Batesville, its Mayor’s Youth Council members, and for Robinson.

“It was a really positive experience,” she says. “It was great to actually be able to put things into action that we learned in the classroom and I enjoyed working with the youth. They made me feel excited and hopeful about the future.”

To read the teens’ proposal, click here.

Leslie Wells joined the O’Neill School at IUPUI as its assistant director of communications in 2018. She previously spent more than a decade in broadcast news and three years as media relations manager at the Indiana Youth Institute.

Apr 13

How do women give of their time, talent, treasure and testimony?

By Sponsor Insight, Uncategorized

By Abby Rolland, communications project manager at the Lilly Family School of Philanthropy

For more than a decade, the Women’s Philanthropy Institute (WPI) has conducted research to answer this question. Known for its studies that specifically focus on gender and giving, the institute doesn’t just report on the findings, but incorporates practical perspectives and applications in every study it conducts.

When Jeannie Sager joined WPI as director early this year, she was especially drawn to WPI’s mission to curate and disseminate research.

“Sager will be a dynamic new director guiding the next phase of our Women’s Philanthropy Institute, which is helping to understand the full potential of women in philanthropy and the potential of women’s philanthropy to transform the world,” said Amir Pasic, Ph.D., the Eugene R. Tempel Dean of the school. “Her experience working with women philanthropists as donors and volunteers will further inform the institute’s work, and her strategic, creative leadership style will help launch a new decade of excellence for WPI.”  

An established leader in philanthropy and fundraising, Sager brings a wealth of expertise and more than 25 years of nonprofit leadership and development experience in a variety of fields, including higher education, independent schools and healthcare.

At the Indiana University Health Foundation, she was part of the leadership team that created a flagship statewide foundation from several disparate hospital foundations that collectively exceeded its first-year fundraising goal by more than 330%.

Sager also built a full-scale development program from the ground up at University High School of Indiana, raising over $30 million in private philanthropic support by establishing a major gifts program focused on annual gifts.

She believes nonprofits must form deeper relationships with donors by creating community, establishing personal connections with potential donors, encouraging longevity and donor education and inspiring deeper engagement. Nonprofit practitioners, she said, should incorporate easy-to-understand research findings into their daily work as they help donors — women and men — discover their passions and reasons for giving.

She recently shared two donor anecdotes from her firsthand experiences that illustrate how WPI research can be embedded into practitioners’ daily experiences and help inform donor strategy.

“I worked with a woman on her first ever “major” gift. It was the largest personal gift that she ever made. She was inspired to make this gift as an opportunity to give back to her department in honor of two physicians whom she felt invested in her at the beginning of her career. So, she wanted to create a staff education fund to help other team members have the opportunity for professional development to hopefully inspire them to choose that area of healthcare as their specialty. 

“She was very adamant about the idea of an endowment and having these funds available in perpetuity and not subject to budget constraints. Moreover, she was resolute about finding others to match her gift and to achieve a goal of $100,000. She was willing to personally solicit her network of colleagues, both retired and current employees, her family and grateful patients.”

APPLICATION: Consider the various ways that women donors engage with each other in giving.

  • Women also appear particularly interested and involved in collaborative giving, especially compared to men. The donor in the story personally solicited her own network for donations to the staff education fund, illustrating her desire to engage others and give collaboratively to set up the fund.

Leveraging and maximizing dollars for greater impact can be seen in the growth of giving circles. From 2007 to 2016, the number of giving circles tripled, with women making up the majority of members in 70% of giving circles. It’s estimated that giving circles have given as much as $1.29 billion since inception to 2016.

  • Women also report needing first-hand involvement to increase their motivations for giving. The donor above felt a strong connection to the department that she dedicated her career to, and wanted to help support other nurses and staff long-term.

According to the report “Where Do Men and Women Give?” female-deciding households are more likely to give to health (like the woman above), youth and family, and international causes. In couples when the wife is the sole decision-maker, the household is more likely to be motivated to give by believing that their gift will make a difference.

“When working in the independent school space, we often engaged in discussions with spouses or adult children about considering a gift to the school that honored and equaled the time and talent that their spouse or mother had invested in the school — imagine hundreds of hours serving as PTO president, working open houses, organizing fundraisers and working concession stands, etc.

“Reframing their spouse’s or mother’s time in terms of value helped elevate a major gift conversation.

“Women philanthropists tend to give more than money. In addition to being more likely to donate than men, they also are more likely to volunteer — and volunteer more hours on average — compared to men. In other words, women give of their time and talent, for example as PTO presidents, board members, and fundraising committee members, in addition to giving their treasure.” 

APPLICATION: When approaching a woman donor or those close to her, consider the time, talent, treasure, and testimony she has given your organization.

  • Women tend to engage philanthropically beyond giving money. Fundraisers should keep in mind that potential women donors may desire a deep and first-hand connection to the causes that they care about. Women donors may require a deeper level of engagement from the organizations to which they donate — from serving as a volunteer or a board member, to requesting frequent communication and updates about their donation.

Women’s monetary donations are important, but keep in mind the many other ways women show their generosity. They volunteer, and they use their networks and their voices to galvanize further support for causes they care about. In an estimate of informal giving over the last 10 years, 72% of Americans said they helped a stranger, and 42% said that they volunteered. Women are also more likely to volunteer than men. As a result, there’s large potential to engage potential donors, including the woman herself as well as her family members, by illustrating the impact that she’s had on the organization.

The bottom-line is as development professionals, think about the last few times that you interacted with women donors. If you can’t think of those interactions, why not? If you’re speaking to only men donors, who or where are the women in their lives that might be involved in those giving decisions? Why are they important to include? Take the time to analyze and evaluate your donor solicitations, and think of how including women will help your fundraising grow.

Abby Rolland serves as the communications project manager at the Lilly Family School of Philanthropy, and is also working towards a master’s degree in philanthropic studies. She holds a bachelor’s degree in history from Gettysburg College.

Mar 30

Feeling more secure about new retirement plan legislation

By Sponsor Insight

By Kevin Kidwell, vice president national tax-exempt sales, OneAmerica®

If you oversee or coordinate your employer-sponsored retirement plan or have a team that’s in charge, you’ve no doubt heard about the Setting Every Community Up for Retirement Enhancement (SECURE) Act. Passed by Congress and signed by the president on December 19, 2019, it’s a major bill that affects all Americans.

Like any complex piece of legislation, the SECURE Act impacts companies like OneAmerica®, who administer employer-sponsored retirement plans and are now carefully studying the implications. For our experienced professionals, evaluating and addressing the SECURE Act provisions with clients and financial professionals has been a labor of love ─ especially for our tax-exempt business, because, as our leadership has long said, “Tax exempt is in our DNA.”

This landmark legislation, five years in the making, provides the most significant changes to the retirement industry in more than a decade. In general, the most dramatic changes are to traditional 401(k) plans. However, because nonprofits and healthcare organizations, schools and government agencies are unique and complex, it’s equally important for those who represent tax exempt plans to make sure they remain compliant.

Our analysis uncovered three main takeaways that should fuel important discussions for nonprofits:

  1. We have time to sort it out. The IRS and U.S. Department of Labor have yet to provide key additional guidance, and until then “good faith compliance” is the requirement.
  2. It’s unlikely that the legislation will require you to overhaul your existing employer-sponsored plan. The SECURE Act provides more opportunities and options – such as potentially combining forces with fellow organizations – that could allow your organization to take advantage of scale.
  3. Most likely, the government isn’t done making what they see as improvements to the retirement plan landscape. (Note: Effective dates may also be impacted by the COVID-19 pandemic.)

The SECURE Act contains nearly 30 provisions designed to increase the availability and use of employer-sponsored retirement plans. They may or may not apply to every participant, company or plan.

Here are some areas the SECURE Act may affect:

Accessibility

  • Increases the automatic enrollment cap to 15% for safe harbor automatic enrollment plans. (A safe harbor is a provision in a law or regulation that affords protection from liability or penalty under specific situations, or if certain conditions are met.)
  • Creates opportunities for long-term (by necessity or choice) part-time workers to participate in 401(k) plans.
  • Contains additional provisions that make offering retirement plans more affordable for small businesses, including tax credits (up to $5,000) and elimination of outdated barriers to joining multiple employer plans (MEPs).

Lifetime income

  • While retirement plan sponsors are currently required to regularly notify participants of the value of their plan (including the balance), employers will need to also provide defined contribution participants with an estimate of the monthly income as if an annuity were purchased (even if no annuity option is available).
  • The act provides for a fiduciary safe harbor for selecting a lifetime income provider (usually an insurance company). While selecting a lifetime income option is a fiduciary responsibility, the act absolves the fiduciary of the liability should the provider’s financial condition deteriorate after selection.
  • If a plan-level decision is made to eliminate the lifetime income option, the plan must allow the participant to take an in-kind direct rollover of the option.

Longevity

  • The act removes the maximum age for traditional IRA contributions.
  • The act increases the age for the start of required mandatory distributions (RMD) from age 70.5 to age 72. Those participants between 70.5 and 72 must begin taking the RMD by April of the year following their voluntary exit from their employer or their termination of employment. (NOTE: Due to recently passed CARES Act related to the COVID-19 pandemic, the requirement for RMDs for those over 70-1/2 has been waived for 2020).

HERE ARE SOME FREQUENTLY ASKED QUESTIONS

Q: Are recordkeepers supposed to contact plan sponsors about optional provisions?
A: No. While the SECURE Act provides for increased access to retirement preparation, many of the provisions are optional. Plan sponsors are encouraged to reach out to their record-keeper to discuss the provisions and determine which may be appropriate for their plan.

Q: If an individual didn’t take the Required Minimum Distribution (=

Q: What are these MEPs (Multiple Employer Plans) and PEPs (Pooled Employer Plans) everyone is talking about?
A: The MEPs were available as an option before the SECURE Act. They are typically appealing to organizations where there was a nexus between otherwise unrelated employers and a “commonality of interest” such as an industry association. These opportunities are primarily steered toward 401(k) and while there are advantages, there are also disadvantages.
The SECURE Act created PEPs – Pooled Employer Plans, but that doesn’t apply for tax exempt or 457 government plans (457 is a type of nonqualified, tax advantaged deferred compensation retirement plan that is available for governmental and certain nongovernmental employers).

Q: What’s the post-death beneficiary rule?
A: This applies to retirement accounts where the participant dies and an heir or loved one is the recipient or beneficiary. The money can’t accrue indefinitely and the inheritor(s) is required to deplete that account by the end of the 10th year after the person’s passing, with exceptions provided for minor children of the deceased, disabled or chronically ill beneficiaries or beneficiaries no more than 10 years younger than the deceased. So, someone who inherits a retirement plan account in 2020 will have to have withdrawn it by 2030, noting the exceptions above.

Q: What about the new in-service distribution changes?
A: Section 457(b) government plans reduced the in-service distribution age to 59.5 from what was previously allowed at age 70.5.

Q: What about the penalties?
A: All retirement plans must file a Form 5500 for every year the plan holds assets. Failing to do that will result in penalties for late filing of IRS Form 5500. These fines increase from $25 a day to $250 a day, and the maximum penalty will rise from $15,000 to $150,000.

As the industry continues to comb through the new legislation and awaits required guidance in areas of the legislation that isn’t clear, OneAmerica continues to:

  • Solicit and analyze additional IRS and DOL guidance.
  • Educate plan sponsors on the SECURE Act and its provisions.
  • Engage and partner with plan sponsors to discuss decisions to be made regarding plan changes, including mandatory and optional provisions.

In Kevin Kidwell’s role as vice president of national tax-exempt sales, he works to provide ideas, knowledge, information – both technical and practical – in an effort to facilitate improved plan and participant outcomes. Kidwell has held various positions within the Retirement Services division since 1988. Beginning in 2000, his exclusive focus has been on healthcare and tax-exempt organizations.

Mar 23

Creating award-winning grant proposals: It takes a village

By Sponsor Insight

By Melanie Priest, senior consultant, Hedges

Like the proverb: “It takes a village to raise a child,” it also takes a village to develop competitive grant proposals. The more resources and team members you include when creating grant proposals, the more you will be able to paint a compelling picture of your organization and the project in which you are seeking funding.

With the increasingly competitive nature of foundation grants, best practices suggest including staff, participants, volunteers, community partners, and funders within your organization’s “village” to develop strong proposals. There are more than a million charitable organizations registered with the Internal Revenue Service in the United States (National Center for Charitable Statistics, 2019). Just like fundraising focused on individual donors, it is a competitive world when trying to secure foundation grants.

Your grant proposal may be developed by the best writer around, however it will fall short without preparation, planning, and input from all perspectives of the organization. It is essential to identify and utilize all contributors that comprise your village to set you up for optimal success.

Before creating the most competitive proposal, it is necessary to build your village by getting to know who the funders are in the area.

Find your funder community

Learning about who provides grants in your community is the first step in the grants process. Researching, identifying prospects, and cultivating relationships are key components needed when getting to know the local, regional, and national funding landscapes.

  • Research: There are various databases available to search for funding prospects. At Hedges, we have found that the Foundation Center’s online directory, https://fconline.foundationcenter.org/, is a robust and comprehensive tool providing information about grant funders through keyword and name searches. The directory is available through a paid subscription or for free at the Indianapolis Public Library’s Central Library.

    Additional free resources to conduct your searches include: the IRS informational tax return (also known as the 990) available on guidestar.org, topical list serves, Google searches, foundation websites and newsletters. Of course, word of mouth is also a valuable resource so asking your board of directors, community partners, volunteers, and staff to keep their eyes and ears open for grant opportunities is good practice.
  • Identifying prospects: Once you have identified potential grantors, you will need to narrow your list to only those that are the best match for your organization. Things to consider when identifying prospects include: the focus or purpose areas in which the funder has an interest; similar grants funded, range of grant awards amounts; geographic requirements. Linkages to executive and volunteer leadership are also important.

    Thorough research to determine a match with each prospect is imperative. Determining the priorities and interest areas of each foundation is important down to the keywords used. Even the difference between a food pantry and a food bank is notable as is the differences in college readiness and college-success programs. Without a strong match, there is less of a likelihood that your proposal will be funded.
  • Cultivating relationships: Similar to relationship building with your individual donors, cultivating relationships with foundation staff and board members is critical. This is particularly true with local foundations. Many foundations in Central Indiana encourage or require an in-person meeting, phone call, or other means of communication to share project ideas before an application can be submitted. When in doubt, take every opportunity to get to know funders whenever possible through invitations to coffee, onsite tours and other programming and fundraising events, and engaging funders through social media and other communications.

    Another way to cultivate funder relationships is through networking. Share names of foundation leadership, with your board, staff, and volunteers to determine if anyone has connections. Our clients are often able to get a foot in the door because of board affiliations. And as the relationship is developing, do not hesitate to seek advice from potential funders about the work your organization does. Through the grants process, they have a pulse on the community and what programs are successful. With further cultivation, these relationships then can lead to deeper involvement and increased financial support for the organization over time.

Now that you have identified grant funders, it is time to develop your proposal. Here are two tips you will want to consider when using your village for the most competitive proposal:

  1. Share your story

Most funders want to understand why there is a need for your project and organization and how your organization measures impact. Use available data to strengthen your grant proposals by illustrating the need and the expected results.

  • Community data sources: There are several online tools that provide demographics and statistics by census tract, neighborhood, city, county, region and state. SAVI is a project of The Indiana University Purdue University (IUPUI) Polis Center and is known as one of the first and largest community data-information systems in the country (www.savi.org, 2020). Additional data sources include the U.S. Census Bureau and Stats Indiana. Scholarly articles and studies on the specific issues that your organization addresses are also available through Google Scholar.
  • Measuring impact: To measure impact it is best to create a logic model. The logic model serves as a roadmap for your program and organization, including what resources you need to implement the program, the activities that will take place, the frequency of the activities and number of participants, and how the activities have impacted participants. A comprehensive overview of logic models is described in the W.K. Kellogg Foundation Logic Model Development Guide.

    Logic models serve as a foundation for strong impact measurement. By clearly defining the program’s short-, medium-, and long-term outcomes and associated activities, standardized evaluation tools can then be researched to ensure proper measurement of key outcomes. The data to be collected and measured can be captured through a variety of methods including surveys, focus groups, one-on-one interviews, intake forms and staff observations. A few years ago, one of our clients went through a process to develop a comprehensive research-based program logic model. As a result of the logic model and data collection, they were able to show program impact and were awarded a grant from a funder who had declined a grant proposal in the past because there wasn’t a way to show program impact.
  1. Prime your program experts

Tap into your organization’s program experts and make them an integral part of your grant proposal process. Their expertise and input will strengthen every component of your grant proposal. Key program experts include program and financial staff, program participants, community partners, and advocates.

  • Program staff: The program staff are working on the front lines and implementing programs and services. As logic models and proposals are developed be sure to include them in planning to ensure that the project created is feasible and realistic. A logic model can also serve as a strong training tool for new staff. And remember that front line staff can share stories and accomplishments that will help you, the grant writer, make an inspiring and compelling case for support.
  • Financial staff: Program and organizational budgets are another way to share your organization’s story, demonstrating how you plan to utilize the requested grant funds, and why a funder’s investment is important for program or project success. If you aren’t already, become good friends with your organization’s Chief Financial Officer, controller, bookkeeper or other staff that are responsible for the finances. Budgets and other financial statements are frequently required as attachments for grant proposals to show fiscal organizational health. Financial staff are the best resource in ensuring that the information shared with a funder is current and accurate.
  • Program participants: Don’t forget about the most important members of the village – the program participants. Those receiving services know their needs best and should have the opportunity to inform how the programs are designed and how impact is measured and described. Their input can be acquired through surveys, focus groups and interviews, which should be administered regularly.
  • Community partners: Funders are well-informed about nonprofit organizations in the community and want to know how you collaborate in ways that maximize your collective impact and avoid duplication of services. Consider community organizations as additional members of your village and be able to clearly articulate how you work together and what makes your organization distinctly unique from similar organizations in your field.

Rest assured that successful grant proposals are meant to be created collaboratively. In other words, it really does take a village. So, make sure to meet up with your village and create winning grant proposals that will bring more grant awards to your organization.

Melanie Priest is passionate about making Indianapolis a great place to live, having strong connections in the community and helping nonprofits share their stories of impact. For more than 20 years, Priest has worked closely with the Central Indiana philanthropic community to provide creative solutions to complex problems. As senior consultant, she has worked at Hedges since 2012 securing hundreds of grants for Indianapolis nonprofit organizations to ensure they are able to advance their missions.

Mar 09

Combatting early childhood education deserts

By Feature, Programming

By Lynn Sygiel, editor, Charitable Advisors

In Indiana, the month of March is filled with basketball, and if that madness doesn’t grab you, then just wait till May when the roar of the crowds turns into the roar of the engines. Hoosiers, like people all over the country, love a bit of competition. But not all of it takes place on the playing field, and not every competition ends up with someone holding a trophy.

That’s not to say there aren’t winners, especially in the world of nonprofits, which have adopted the concept as they attempt to expand their presence and draw attention to their work.

The Chicago-based MacArthur Foundation has an admirable mission: “To support creative people, effective institutions and influential networks and build a more just, verdant and peaceful world.” In order to discover those elements, the foundation launched a $100 million grant competition in 2016. It was looking for a single proposal to solve a critical problem affecting people, places or the planet. Called 100&Change, it was open to organizations working in any field of endeavor anywhere. After reviewing 1,904 proposals, it named its recipient in 2017 — Sesame Workshop and International Rescue Committee.

While competitions in general are not new, what is new is nonprofits turning to these challenges to drive innovation. Increasingly, they are discovering that many of the very best ideas lie outside their organizations.

This is true for Early Learning Indiana (ELI). Not only was its recent statewide Child Care Desert competition designed to spur innovation, but there was another motivation – it was a way to expand early learning seats in Indiana, said President and CEO Maureen Weber.

“As an organization, we are really focused on bringing together sort of a system of stakeholders to create accessible, high-quality early education opportunities. We absolutely know that we cannot do this on our own, not on our own in Central Indiana, and not on our own across the state. We needed a way of bringing others into the fold. We felt as though we were having conversations with the same sets of people,” said Weber, who has been in the role for two years.

The light bulb went on for ELI in 2014, when it changed its mission and name, its leadership team and board wanted to do more to expand access and quality early childhood education across the state. They knew that crucial brain development occurs during those early years and can provide a foundation for success in school and beyond. They also knew that early education could have a positive ripple effect that extends to their families, communities and the economy.

The mission gained steam in that same year, ELI approached Lilly Endowment and was awarded a $20 million grant to launch the Partnerships for Early Learners. The initiative was to increase access and quality of early childhood programming across Indiana. ELI now not only had a goal but the funding to pursue it. The next step was to invite potential partners to the table, discover what needs were out there and attempt to fill them.

Andrew Perrin, ELI’s board chair and PNC’s senior vice president and regional sales executive joined the board in 2014.

“My take was the headwinds to getting early childhood education to where it should be were so big that the status quo clearly wasn’t going to cut it. I welcomed any innovation in the space. So, the idea of having a competition, maybe there are other avenues to do it, but I loved the energy of something fresh,” said Perrin.

“I think what makes ELI uniquely positioned is at our core we are a provider of early childhood education. It gives us a level of expertise, as well as, appreciation for what the challenges are. I think that core helps inform our partnerships and advocacy for expanding both quality and accessibility.”

The Partnership for Early Learners initiative added a new role for ELI. It has received and granted over 55 grants to help other providers in the state build their capacity. Early in the effort, Weber said, providers needed funds to meet either licensing or quality requirements. Funds from the grant also helped 400 early childhood educators earn new degrees or credentials.

“Maybe they were lacking a scald valve on their sink or early learning curriculum. So, that was something we could help them invest in and then they could meet the standards and then they could serve children,” said Weber. “We had to get more creative in how we thought about the work, so that the amounts of the work got bigger as well because there were just bigger gaps to close.”

Lack of access, however, continues to prevent many Hoosier children from receiving the benefits of an enriching early learning experience. In 2018, in tandem with Indiana Business Research Center (IBRC), ELI studied access, capacity and need and found that in Indiana, 45.2 percent of children live in a child care desert. ELI defines child care deserts as places with no more than one child care seat for every three children. This study also helped illustrate and raise visibility.

“I think the research, especially in a fiscally conservative state like Indiana, built a business case for early childhood care and education. Anytime you can measure something, it gives people more assurance that this is an effort worth buying into and joining. So, I think what the desert study did was is say, ‘Hey, look, here is the gap,’” said Perrin.

When ELI launched its Child Care Deserts competition last summer, its goal was to address these critical care shortages around the state. Unlike many competitions, ELI offered webinars to ensure applicants understood the data to better incorporate it into proposals. Weber said ELI also shared with potential awardees what is a high-quality seat and the long-term impact of having those available.

“We started this effort by surveying the national landscape and getting a really good sense of what ‘good looks like,’” said Weber. “We wanted to bring those best practices as food for thought to the communities that were applying, while understanding unique community needs. So, part of our education process was to share some great things we’ve seen done across the country. But we also had to understand the unique needs of each community with whom we were working.”

“We spent a lot of time helping our audience prepare their applications, and so we hosted webinars, we had self-service data opportunities so they could know ‘Here’s what the state of the state in our community looks like,’ and had people on tap to sort of help walk through those questions as they had them,” said Weber. “The award itself had to go to a nonprofit, but we encouraged really diverse partnerships. That’s what we had in most places,” said Weber.

Having funding available and the Child Care Deserts study provided an opportunity to have a conversation with a business audience, too, said Weber.

Purposely, there were two phases to the challenge. The first was a letter of intent. From that pool, ELI narrowed the pool to 19, which gave time for those communities to formulate plans and build local partnerships before submitting final proposals. In January, ELI awarded $1.4 million to 13 organizations that will add nearly 1,000 high-quality seats for child care across the state by the end of the year.

Montgomery County Community Foundation was one of the awardees. Although they have many other partners, the funds had to be awarded to a nonprofit. The IBRC study ranked the county among the 10 lowest for child care seats, with only 2 percent of the county’s children under the age of 5 enrolled in high-quality programs. The $100,000 grant will help two local providers add 80 seats by the end of the year.

But that’s not all the grant competition did. Not only will it increase availability in these 13 communities, it elevated the conversations in the community.

As the Montgomery County Community Foundation’s executive director, Kelly Taylor had seen an uptick for early learning and child care grant requests over the past five years. In fact, the foundation had granted nearly $150,000 to child care nonprofits. She said the child care deserts’ study only confirmed what they were hearing. But the competition coalesced the community’s efforts.

“I think what we saw come out of this competition in our community was it rallied diverse groups to work together. We wanted to represent our community well and increase the number of child care seats and have them be of quality level. It really spurred people to action,” Taylor said.

“We know there is still a lot of work to be done, but we think having that success brought a lot of attention to the value of early learning throughout our whole community. We could not have done it on our own. We were able to talk about that data and about what this $100,000 award will do in our community. That has really captured the attention of people in our community and will help us to again continue to move forward,” said Taylor. “We had this early success and we want to build on this. I think it keeps the momentum moving forward.”

Currently, the community is formalizing its Early Childhood Coalition. As part of this effort, it reached out to seven corporate organizations that have provided financial support for the efforts. Part of the plan is to start a resource fund to help providers with training and credentials. In addition, the community foundation and city came together to understand the issue in their community. They engaged a local consulting company to do a community-wide needs assessment. Through surveys, focus groups and a bus tour of existing child care facilities, they understood what is being offered. They did video conferences with other Indiana coalitions to learn what was working.

“We started in August and finished our strategic plan in January. We were meeting constantly during that time, gathering data, analyzing data and putting together a five-year strategic plan. We have a plan to move forward now and really focus on this issue in our community,” said Taylor.

Weber has seen other changes, too.

“When I started in this role nearly two years ago, we were still having conversations about ‘Why this matters. What’s the value? What’s the importance for economic development?’ I have very few of those conversations any more. It’s much more a conversation about what do we do to address the fundamentals. How can we help?” said Weber.

“What we were trying to do was to really elevate the conversation and get people talking from a variety of different perspectives. I really felt like we did broaden the top of the funnel in the number of people that we are reaching,” she said.

Mar 02

Term limits: Expert advice on practical application

By Sponsor Insight

By Jan Breiner Frazer, managing member, Planningplus, LLC

Planningplus+ LLC partners with our clients to strategically achieve tangible results, meaningful impact, and a dynamic corporate culture for current and future success. Our core competencies include strategic and operational planning, board development and committee alignment, leadership development, and building the HR infrastructure. As a result of 30+ years of experience, we have developed a number of our own and unique approaches to working with clients.

Here is an idea for you to consider: Are board-term limits always a good idea?

Read any books or articles on board governance and the issue of term limits is always addressed. Best practices mix indicate that board members should have 3-year term limits, allow a year or two off the board, and then they can apply for another term. But is that always a good idea?

In our years of consulting with nonprofit boards, we consistently find that the most significant challenge for the organization is (and always has been) money – keeping the bottom line profitable to be able to serve more in need, recruit and retain employees, upgrade old facilities, add technology, etc., etc., etc. While the executive director is typically the chief fundraiser, along with a chief development officer, boards generally have some type of committees to support those efforts, such as resource development, marketing, public relations.

But from a board member’s perspective, knowing you have only signed on for three years how much long-sustaining work can you really get done?

Yet who better to role model active support during campaigns, fundraisers, and other revenue opportunities than board members who have consistently shown passion for and commitment to the organization over time? Those longer-term board members have lived the ups and downs, challenges and frustrations, and have significant institutional knowledge about the organization. Is it in the best interest of the board to require them to step off the board?

There are both pros and cons for term limits. Establishing term limits ensures the organization can periodically bring on new perspectives, new energy, new passions and new ideas. Oftentimes these fledgling board members can be the ones who ask “why” and challenge thinking. You need them.

You can also reduce the “we tried it and it didn’t work” mantras. Perhaps most important, it is an easy out for board members who sporadically attend board meetings, avoid committee assignments, don’t show up and support events or who just got burned out over time.

On the flip side, there are always board members who have made significant contributions to the organization, both in time and money and want to continue serving. During capital campaigns, critical funding initiatives, and/or turnaround times these board members have already shown the passion for the mission and with their institutional knowledge of the agency can make a case for support.

As an example, one of our long-term clients, Big Brothers Big Sisters, demonstrated the benefits of retaining long-term, active board members during its capital campaign for a new building. According to Darcey Palmer-Schultz, CEO, it was many of those board members, their contacts, and their time commitments that had a direct impact on the outcome of the campaign. Palmer-Schultz believes that long-term board membership is one of the most common threads in the nonprofit’s major donor base, and she cannot imagine achieving the same level of success without them.

Many boards designate an “emeritus” status for high-dollar donors who don’t want to have to attend board meetings but want to be connected. This is often found in fairly large boards. Our recommendation, however, goes a step farther – to designate a class of board members who best understand the organization and its history, who have participated in the tough lessons learned, and who can mentor new board members coming on board. They are active members of the board, attend and participate in board and committee meetings, and otherwise fulfill all the duties of a responsible board member. On an annual basis these members can choose to continue to serve on a year-by-year basis, and could constitute one-third or one-half of the board, dependent on the size of the board. When working with boards we often refer to this group as the leadership council.

Traditional board members are those elected for the three-year term. More often than not, they have done a great job but after serving a regular term are ready to step back and simply volunteer and/or financially support the organization. After a year or two off the board, they are welcome to again serve for a three-year term (assuming they fulfilled all the responsibilities of board members).

Whichever way you go, our point is that enforced term limits may not be in your organization’s best interests. Consider balancing long-term passion and institutional knowledge with the influx of new ideas and perspectives when it comes time for this year’s elections.

Utilizing our history in board development, committee structure, and board/CEO relationships, we can help.

Jan Breiner Frazier, managing member of Planning Plus, has been a consulting professional since 1987. She has designed and facilitated strategic, annual, and operational planning sessions for a multitude of organizations, often bringing together diverse philosophies, opinions, and perspectives to help groups collectively meet stated objectives. Often, her planning projects have resulted in assisting with organizational design and process improvement initiatives. Her work with nonprofit boards and associations has ranged from strategic planning, board development and committee structure to identifying organizational competencies. Prior to her consulting work, she was the personnel/marketing director for a multi-state wholesale/retail organization, with additional experience in administrative management in public accounting, law and utility construction. She can be reached at jfrazier@planningplusllc.com.