Giving Compass' Take:

• E.C. Pollick Byrnes at Foundant highlights three clients of theirs who share their experiences with the company and with grantmaking. 

• From recognizing and sharing power to embedding learning in an organization’s culture, there are many tactics here that every grantmaker would find useful in developing an impact plan.

• Here's a perspective on grantmaking from the next-gen. 

I have now been with Foundant about nine months after working six years in the philanthropic community. When people ask how I like it, there’s only one answer: I love it. Even though I’ve made my exodus from the nonprofit world, I am so lucky to have more than two thousand Foundant clients (over 100 on my personal CSM roster!) to keep me connected to the sector I love. A few months ago, I wrote about my experience with organizational evaluation and learning . . . that continual improvement process to make sure we’re getting to the highest impact as grantmakers. A few months after that article was published, I had the pleasure of organizing a client panel at our biannual users’ Summit to ask a couple of Foundant clients what evaluation and learning mean to them. The panel blew me away. They were gracious enough to allow me to share how their organizations view evaluation and learning!

  • Meet Amy Nossaman from the Ottumwa Regional Legacy Foundation. Amy, with her self-described “analytical” mind, saw the need for a new grant management system and a new way to pull data from applicants and grantees.
  • Next up was Kristen Summers from Saint Luke’s Foundation. I first met Kristen in my grantmaker days when we both did a Foundant education webinar called “The Funder’s Role in Collecting, Tracking, and Using Data.” She was great in the webinar and she was equally great in the client panel!
  • Linsey Sauer from The Russell Family Foundation wrapped up the end of our panel. For Linsey and The Russell Family Foundation, they stress having better relationships with grantees, so much of their evaluation and learning comes from bettering the applicant experience.

Read the full article about these clients from Foundant by E.C. Pollick Byrnes at PEAK Grantmaking.