October 8, 1998 | Read Time: 6 minutes
Consulting with Nonprofits:A Practitioner’s Guide
By Carol A. Lukas
The field of consulting for non-profit organizations has “exploded” over the past 25 years, writes Ms. Lukas. She offers this book to orient people who are considering a career change to consulting, and to augment the knowledge of practicing consultants.
Ms. Lukas, program manager and senior consultant at the Amherst H. Wilder Foundation, in St. Paul, begins with an overview of the different kinds of consulting jobs available in the non-profit world. She details what is involved in the six stages of any consulting job — negotiating contracts, gathering data, planning, implementing, evaluating, and tying up loose ends — and shows how they apply to tasks specific to non-profit groups.
Ms. Lukas then explores the “artistry” of consulting work. She encourages the fledgling adviser to find a comfortable style, discusses ethical considerations, and defines pragmatic skills that consultants should employ. She advises when it’s best to be aggressive and when simply to observe.
The book’s final chapter covers practical aspects of establishing a consulting business. She covers how to market one’s services, hire staff members, establish pay rates, obtain start-up funds, and acquire technical assistance.
Ms. Lukas drew on the experiences of 30 consultants in her research, and their advice and anecdotes are scattered throughout the guide.
Appendixes include a list of resources, sample proposals and worksheets for both consultants and clients, and a reprint of the National Alliance for Nonprofit Management’s Professional Standards for Management Assistance Providers.
Publisher: Amherst H. Wilder Foundation, Publishing Center, 919 Lafond Avenue, St. Paul 55104-2198; (612) 659-6024 or (800) 274-6024; fax (612) 642-2061; e-mail books@wilder.org; 223 pages; $35 plus $4 postage and handling; I.S.B.N. 0-940069-17-2.
Guide to Greater Washington D.C. Grantmakers,Third Edition
This directory lists 1,065 foundations, corporations, and grant-making charities located in the District of Columbia and 15 surrounding counties, as well as other grant makers that support Washington-based groups and projects that benefit Washington residents.
According to the Foundation Center, those organizations held combined assets of approximately $21-billion and gave $695-million in the last year for which information is available, which differs from group to group.
Each entry lists an address, contact person, assets, expenditures, and principal donors. Most listings also note the organization’s giving philosophy and fields of interest and enumerate sample grants made by institutions whose annual giving totaled at least $50,000.
Entries are indexed four ways: alphabetically; by donors, officers, and trustees; by giving interests; and by types of support provided. Tables rank the top 50 regional grant makers by both assets and total giving. The Howard Hughes Medical Institute, in Chevy Chase, Md., tops both tables, with assets of almost $13-billion and annual grant making of nearly $88-million.
The directory is a joint project of the Foundation Center and the Washington Regional Association of Grantmakers. The directory includes a copy of the association’s guidelines for common grant applications and budget formats.
Publisher: Foundation Center, 79 Fifth Avenue, Dept. FI, New York 10003-3076; (212) 807-3690 or (800) 424-9836; fax (212) 807-3677; World-Wide Web http://fdncenter.org; 256 pages; $60 plus $4.50 postage and handling; I.S.B.N. 0-87954-803-7.
To Profit or Not to Profit: The Commercial Transformation of the Nonprofit Sector
Edited by Burton A. Weisbrod
As more charities form links with businesses in order to increase funds and exposure, they must be mindful of the potential compromises and embarrassments that sometimes follow such deals, writes Mr. Weisbrod, a professor of economics at Northwestern University.
“Non-profit organizations confront a dilemma, as does public policy toward them: how to balance pursuit of their social missions with financial constraints when additional resources may be available from sources that might distort mission,” he says.
Mr. Weisbrod gives examples of such distortions.
He notes that in 1997, a pharmaceutical company that supported research at the University of California at San Francisco pressured the university to suppress medical information that could have curtailed the company’s profits; and, also last year, the American Medical Association agreed to lend its logo to products manufactured by the Sunbeam Corporation, but backed out of the deal after heavy criticism. The A.M.A. was then stung by a breach-of-contract suit brought by the home-appliance company, which wound up getting $9.9-million from the association in a settlement in July of this year.
More conflicts and problems that arise from forays into private enterprise are examined in 14 essays written by 16 authors. The majority of the contributors have backgrounds in economics, non-profit management, or public policy.
The book’s first section focuses on basic issues surrounding non-profit organizations’ commercial ventures. Chapters cover user fees imposed by some charities, tax considerations, the financial conditions that might tilt a charity toward commercial activity, the changes that charities undergo when revenue from business ventures increases, and the conversion of non-profit institutions into for-profit businesses.
The second section examines the implications of commercial alliances for select types of non-profit groups: hospitals, public-television stations, social-services groups, universities, and zoos and aquariums.
The book’s final section discusses the role that increased commercial activity might play in determining public-policy directions. As commercial revenue increasingly supplants private donations, writes Mr. Weisbrod, governments are faced with the task of re-examining tax breaks for charities, as well as reassessing the holdings of non-profit groups that convert to businesses.
The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation, in New York, financed the research and the conferences that led to this book.
Publisher: Cambridge U. Press, 110 Midland Avenue, Port Chester, N.Y. 10573-4930; (914) 937-9600 or (800) 872-7423; fax (914) 937-4712; World-Wide Web http://www.cup.org; 340 pages; $69.95; I.S.B.N. 0-521-63180-7.
OTHER PUBLICATIONS
The Directory of Public Policy Organizations, 1998-1999, edited by Thomas C. Atwood and Thomas W. Mead, contains listings of more than 300 think tanks, advocacy groups, and other institutions that conduct research on public-policy issues or work to advance a political ideology. Each entry includes the organization’s address and the name of its chief executive; phone and fax numbers; e-mail and World-Wide Web addresses, where available; a summary of its mission; the programs, ideas, and causes it supports; and its status as a tax-exempt organization. Most of the groups fall under Section 501!#*copyrt(3) of the Internal Revenue Code. The organizations are listed alphabetically, by state, and by seven categories: groups that conduct national research, national groups with state networks, organizations that deal only with state policies, groups that deal only with municipal issues, groups devoted to family-related issues, groups that conduct or support litigation, and advocacy organizations. The directory is available on the Internet as a searchable data base at http://www.heritage.org or http://www.policyexperts.org. Publisher: Heritage Foundation, 214 Massachusetts Avenue, N.E., Washington 20002; (202) 608-6263 or (800) 544-4843; fax (202) 543-9647; e-mail insider@heritage.org; 236 pages; $14.95; I.S.B.N. 0-89195-073-7.
Investment Strategy and Policy for Nonprofit Organizations, by Kent Shamblin, explains to managers of non-profit organizations how to implement basic investment principles, understand investment risk, allocate assets, and diversify investments. Other chapters examine the roles of board and staff members in shaping investment policies, explain how to forecast cash flows, and summarize the basics of establishing internal financial controls. Publisher: Center for Nonprofit Management, Graduate School of Business, University of St. Thomas, 1000 LaSalle, 25H, Minneapolis 55403; (612) 962-4300; 29 pages; $5.
