An organizational chart is somewhat like a designer’s blueprint: it tells you how leaders expect information, authority, and people to flow. It doesn’t tell you how information, authority, or people actually do move around the system. An organizational chart also focuses on the personnel who keep a system running day-to-day. It doesn’t include the people in […]
Investing in imagination
Whatever our philosophy on money, however much we give or save, and regardless of how we rationalize, we’re still left with some basic practical realities. No matter how lofty your spiritual ideals may be, no matter how many powerful affirmations you can speak by rote, you still have to pay your bills.” —Eric Butterworth, Spiritual Economics We still have […]
The gift of presence
This week, I’m in a class on philosophies of philanthropy and reading Eric Butterworth’s Spiritual Economics and Lynne Twist’s The Soul of Money. Butterworth’s book was first written the year I was born (some of the content shows that), but Twist’s book combines her reflections from a career in non-profit development, fundraising, and work on tough […]
Enough
This coming week includes an annual educational intensive on the campus of the congregation I work for. It also includes me sitting in a class on the philosophy of prosperity. Ever since I began learning about fundraising, I’ve noticed the way that handling money and resources triggers people’s latent scripts about finances, value, and lessons about abundance and […]
Three ways to preserve the innocence of giving
Ever received a hand-made card from a child? The drawing might be bright and the handwriting might be inscrutable, but neither of those things are why we display children’s notes on our fridges or treasure the gifts they make. There’s an innocence in the act of open-hearted giving and receiving, and that innocence is worth […]
Philanthropy, Misanthropy, and Outrage
If there were a stock for outrage, conventional media, 501(c)3 and 501(c)4 non-profit and lobbying groups, and fundraising platforms would be mutual investors. Outrage is hot right now, and it’s making some people hundreds of thousands of dollars. Earlier this month I shared an Indiegogo campaign that closed having raised over $17,000 for a Chicago youth homelessness […]
