Weekend Link Roundup (March 23-24, 2019)

A weekly roundup of noteworthy items from and about the social sector. For more links to great content, follow us on Twitter at @pndblog....

Communications/Marketing

On the Communications Network blog, Katie Smith Milway, principal at Milway Media and a senior advisor at the Bridgespan Group, and Rick Moyers, director of communications at the Fund for Shared Insight, explore four lessons in effective storytelling they have learned while shepherding a campaign to encourage client feedback as a measurement norm.

Current Affairs

"Thirty years from now, a majority of Americans believe that the U.S. will be less globally important. They believe that the inequality gap between rich and poor will have widened. And they expect that there will be even more political polarization. That future sounds pretty bleak, especially given the fact that nearly 9 out of 10 Americans are at least fairly worried that current politicians aren’t capable of changing it." Fast Company's Ben Paynter talks to Brookings' David Wessel about what can be done to shape a brighter future for all Americans.

Health

On the Robert Wood Johnson's Culture of Health blog, Dwayne Proctor, a senior advisor to the foundation's president, speaks with Yolo Akili Robinson, a 2018 Award for Health Equity winner, about how the stress of being black in America leads to physiological responses that raise the risk of heart disease, stroke, and diabetes.

Nonprofits

Nonprofit Chronicles blogger Marc Gunther continues his series on workplace problems at the Humane Society of the U.S. and concludes that the organization's efforts to hold itself accountable for the actions of its former leader, Wayne Pacelle, are "unsatisfying."

Yes, the doubling of the standard deduction poses real challenges for nonprofits. But the challenge s also an opportunity, writes Social Velocity's Nell Edgington, to embrace — truly embrace — change. 

Can Marie Kondo help you "tidy up" your organization? Definitely, says Nonprofit AF's Vu Le, who then shares ten lessons derived Kondo's method guaranteed to make you more joyful at work.

Good post by Andrew Shulman being shared across Candid's field office blogs about the pros, and cons, of separating from your fiscal sponsor.

Beth Kanter has a nice post on her blog about the importance of rituals in building workplace resilience.

Philanthropy

In a post on the Center for Effective blog adapted from his forthcoming book, Giving Done Right: Effective Philanthropy and Making Every Dollar Count, CEP president Phil Buchanan argues that "there is no formula — no 'plug and play' analogy [from the for-profit world] to be adopted by the world of giving. There are many choices and many ways to be an effective giver, but none are simple." 

In a post that originally appeared on Global Fund for Community Foundations blog, Jan Jaffe, the founder of GrantCraft and now a senior partner at The Giving Practice, a consulting group at Philanthropy Northwest, shares some thoughts about how reflective practice — an approach that has been incorporated into professional development and onboarding programs as a way to help practitioners learn to navigate challenges that arise in challenging experiences on-the-job — reflects on how approach can be used to help shift the power in philanthropy.

Science/Technology

Marielle Velander, research manager at Reboot, a Brooklyn-based nonprofit that works with change agents in government, civil society, and philanthropy to achieve their social missions, shares a set of best practices the organization has developed through a collaboration with the Ford Foundation's Office of Strategy and Learning for bringing public interest technologists into an organization.

Women/Girls

To celebrate Women's History Month, the team at CRE talked to three inspirational nonprofit women leaders who have all been through a CRE Leadership Development Program. Here, Dianne Morales, executive director of Phipps Neighborhoods, New York City nonprofit that provides children, youth and families in low-income neighborhoods with services and the opportunities they need to thrive, about the challenges and rewards of being a woman leader in the nonprofit sector. 

(Photo credit: CQ-Roll Call via Getty Images, FILE)

That's it for this week. Got something you'd like to share? Drop us a note at mfn@foundationcenter.org