Read part 1 of our interview with Gabriel Kasper.
“What’s Next for Philanthropy?” asks the Monitor Institute, in a report subtitled “Acting Bigger and Adapting Better in a Networked World.” The report identifies ten “next practices” that can help funders have a bigger impact in this crazy, changing world. We spoke recently with co-author Gabriel Kasper, (bio) who will address members of the Washington Regional Association of Grantmakers at our 2010 Annual Meeting.
What has grantmaker reaction to the report been like so far?
Very positive. People have been pleased. In some ways, with all the challenges out there, people are responding well to the relative simplicity of the framework: two overarching ideas—Acting Bigger and Adapting Better—and five approaches for each idea.
We’ve talked about this report as an attempt to separate the signal from the noise. Here are ways people can increase their impact in the coming decade given the way the world is changing around them, and it’s laid out in a relatively straight-forward and digestible way. Now, that means we can’t capture every trend, but we’ve hit the high points for how people can work differently and more effectively.
The next step is—if these are the sorts of practices funders need to adopt, what does it look like in practice? The toolkit [the last link on this page] is an attempt to help people sit down within their organizations, with their partners, and figure out how to do these “next practices” in concrete ways.
How much of acting bigger and adapting better is dependent on being comfortable with new technologies?
Not necessarily at all. Technology can help facilitate all of it, but the principles and ideas are not technology driven. You can act in a networked way without ever touching a computer. You can build partnerships, leverage your resources—all of that can be done without any technology. But at the same time, it would be silly to do this work without taking advantage of new tools that makes it easier to share information, find partners, and work together in all sorts of ways.
There’s a tendency to think that you either do things or you don’t—either zero or 100 percent. I always emphasize that there’s a lot to be said for baby steps. If people think they have to share everything they do or say, they won’t share anything at all. But if they, say, open up to one partner, or share one type of thing, they get more comfortable. And that’s a way forward.
Posted by nick geisinger 
Tomorrow (Wednesday) 9am: 
