Today marks the relaunch of the website and the official launch of the new Success Grant initiative. 

For those of you who don’t know about what the Success Grant is, here’s a quick overview: 

The Success Grant program is a unique way to reward our not for profit partners to focus on planning and achievement of success based outcomes. We’ve worked over the past year with each organization to best understand what would constitute true success for their programs and those they seek to serve. They have come back to us with a list of goals that they’ve set for themselves. We’ve committed to grant each of these organizations $10,000 of DurhamCares money if and when they attain these goals, and have provided a platform for you to join alongside us as well to increase that number - a number that we’ll all be able to grant at the end of the year ONLY upon successful attainment of THEIR goals. We hope that you’ll read each program’s goals and pledge generously to this innovative program that rewards, planning, outcomes, and success. 

We’re hopeful that this concept will change the way that charities think about planning and focusing on outcomes and that it will change the way that donors think about giving. 

In addition, we’re after significantly moving the needle with the state of giving in Durham. We’ll be providing a full report on this in a later blog, but we recently commissioned a survey with FGI Research (thank you by the way to the entire staff there who gave of their time to this exercise) of 425 households to learn about the current condition of giving. We found that households making more than $100,000 in Durham give LESS than 1% away to local charities (of those who are church members, 2.4% went to tithing….of a Biblically based 10%). We think that there are two opportunities to make a major change in that number. 

First, there is a great opportunity for pastors to talk about Christ’s commands to take care of the least of these (Mt 25:40) and for us as their congregants and parishioners to heed the lessons of our pastors and the commands of Scripture. Aside from that, which might seem more or less obvious, we think that there is an opportunity, maybe even an obligation, for charities to make it easier for donors to give to their organizations. We think that they might accomplish this by talking the language of their audience. 

Take this example: A businessman/doctor/attorney/professional sits in on an investment opportunity meeting in the morning and throughout a 2 hour presentation is presented with an overview of how he might make money. He/she’s presented with information on the addressable market, the competitive landscape, the background of the principals in charge of the investment, forecasts based on past performance and a summation on what his/her return on the ivestment might be. They write a check for $50,000. 

This same individual then goes to a fundraising luncheon at the invitation of a friend. The Executive Director talks about the organization, shows some slides of their programs and has a number of testimonies of those that have been helped by the organization. A member of the Board of Directors then closes things out with “an ask”. The presentation moved the individual. They write a check for $250. 

I’m convinced that this example happens in real life all the time in Durham. How do I know this? This person most likely makes more than $100,000 and the aforementioned survey says that they’ll give less than 1% of that to local charities. What’s the difference between the “ask” that got the check for the $50,000 and the one that got the check for $250?? Almost everything, but it didn’t need to be. By and large the person who makes that sum of money thinks with their head about an opportunity as much as they think with their heart. The first presentation spoke to their intelligence, their mind. It answered their questions about the opportunity that allowed them to understand what their return on investment was. The first presentation spoke to their “love language” if you will. 

One might say, return on investment doesn’t apply to the world of charities. Those people are partially right. A widget is not a kid. But, all charities can and do focus on outcomes. The impact of their work can be measured across the homeless, kids, students, those in need of job skills, etc. When charities and not-for-profits focus on these outcomes and look to communicate them effectively to the public through the Success Grant program or on their website, we think that they’ll be much more effective at showing the return on their investment and getting a much bigger share of the Durham’s citizens wallet. 

It’s our hope that you, the citizen and donor in Durham, will resonate with this message. That you’ll participate in our success grant program. That you’ll endeavor to understand the impact that these (and other….this doesn’t need to be just about DurhamCares charities but all charities that you give to) charities in Durham and reward excellence when it’s planned for and realized. And yes, we hope that as these charities learn to talk your language that you’ll reward them, and us all, by giving more of your income….....because now, maybe for the first time, you’ll better understand the return that these great organizations can get with your investment. Yes, not your donation, but your investment.

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