What I Learned at the Council of Foundations 2008 Philanthropy Summit

I know you dear readers are just DYING know my big take away from the biggest, baddest philanthropy summit in the land, so here it is: Foundations have the SAME intergenerational issues as nonprofits. Yep, that's right. We're all in this together, and no one quite has all the answers for supporting the next generation of leaders in foundations or nonprofits. I attended a session on Multi-Generational Philanthropy, the panel pictured above. Jason Franklin (sitting right in the middle) of the Franklin-Weinberg Fund moderated it, and also spoke of his clashes with his older family members regarding their grantmaking that got him voted off the board. Said he was too pushy with his young self. And then you see the junior Buffett there on the left. Too bad I wasn't fast enough to catch ol' Howie B. He dipped out on his Blackberry before this blogger could blink an eye!

Rusty Stahl, executive director of Emerging Practitioners in Philanthropy (EPIP), moderated a session on Generational Issues for Foundations. We talked about the fact that all organizations need to have a "talent mentality". Russ Finklestein was there from Idealist.org sharing some interesting data about where nonprofit staff come from: graduate degree programs, service learning programs, Peace Corps/Teach for America/AmeriCorps, mid-career transitioners, and sector-switchers. He also talked about what drives people away from nonprofits: they don't feel valued, they have no opportunity to be creative, they have no control over projects, and they don't think there's a viable career plan for them. Hmm...we sound a little like the corporate world, here don't we? Yet, some foundations actually had some good leadership development practices to share. For example, one foundation drastically improved its retention rates by allowing junior employees to "job-shadow" senior leaders to learn the ropes and by encouraging "stretch assignments" within their culture. They rewarded all this effort with promotions from within because they wanted to keep the good people they already had.

I don't remember who said it, but I wholeheartedly agree, that overcoming generational issues is really about the cultures & values inherent in our sector, not about creating new leadership programs to address it with a band-aid.

But I saved the best for last. The quote of the freakin' day came right at the closing of the session, when Rick Moyers from the Meyer Foundation shut it down with this:

"Nonprofits need to stop treating employees as the cheap gas that fuels our sector." And that, dear readers, was a wrap.

If you want to find out more about what the next generation is doing in philanthropy, check these folks out. All of them were involved in planning the Next Gen Summit events.

• Resource Generation
• 21/64
• Emerging Practitioners in Philanthropy (EPIP)

More coverage of the Summit is over at New Voices of Philanthropy and the EPIP blog. And if you didn't catch us on the air last night, go now and check out my latest show on BlogTalkRadio: How to Get a Job in Philanthropy. I had a great discussion with 3 emerging leaders in philanthropy: Melissa Johnson at the National Committee for Responsive Philanthropy, Trista Harris at the Saint Paul Foundation, and Faith Bynoe, most recently at the Bush-Clinton Katrina Fund. All 3 ladies are also leaders of EPIP. We discussed how they all landed jobs at foundations and what the grantmaking experience is like.

Trista Harris: "It takes a really long time to get into a foundation."
Melissa Johnson: "Philanthropy is a big word for a big field."
Faith Bynoe: "I'd like to see philanthropy become more transparent, strategic, inclusive, and multi-cultural."