Greenlights hosted a “Town Hall Meeting” yesterday focused on the economic downturn – specifically, what nonprofits should be thinking about and ways they can respond proactively so as not to just survive but thrive through potentially trying times. It was well-received with about 160 attending, including foundation executives, nonprofit directors and staff, consultants who work with nonprofits and social entrepreneurs, and even the head of our local United Way!
We had a panel of four speakers who provided different perspectives on the topic:
- Jon Hockenyos – President, TXP
- James Landrum – Senior Financial Consultant, Comerica Securities
- Jackie Mata – COO, KDK-Harman Foundation
- Margo Weisz – Executive Director, PeopleFund.
Check out Nell Edgington’s blog for a summary of the discussion. The presentation can also be downloaded from our web site; and an audio recording will be up on our home page in a few days.
I was tweeting (posting thoughts on Twitter) from the session using hashtag #glth, only to discover later that @NAFund (a Greenlights’ counterpart in Minneapolis) was re-tweeting them and adding the hashtag #npecon in order to include them in a broader Twitter dialogue about the impact of the economy on nonprofits. If you are on Twitter, you might check out the #npecon hashtag to see the wide variety of tools, reports and advice that is available. (And if you are not on Twitter, check out the list on twemes.com).
Finally, Lucy Bernholz has also been blogging and engaging in online dialogue about what the downturn will mean for philanthropy.
I’m sure many others are discussing this topic as well. If you are aware of great posts, research or tools, please let us know by commenting!
Kim Wilson
Development & Marketing Director
Filed under: Economy, Philanthropy/Fundraising | Tagged: downturn, Economy, nonprofit performance
Greenlights
Tara Kirkland
Ann Starr
Kim Wilson
Tara Levy
Matt Kouri
Taylor Overstreet
Haila Yates
Thanks for tweeting the session, you shared a lot of great advice for nonprofits trying to navigate this challenging time. At Nonprofits Assistance Fund, we are also working to gather and share strategies and resources to help nonprofits strengthen their finances and position themselves for a sustainable future.
In addition to tweeting from @NAFund and using the hashtags #npecon for links and resources on the economy and #npfin for more general financial management tips, we are also using our blog and delicious account for this work.
You can visit http://www.nonprofitsassistancefund.org/blog/ to read Balancing the Mission Checkbook, where our Executive Director shares her thoughts on issues and trends in nonprofit finance and management. The Economy category has all the blog posts on this topic.
Our delicious account (which is new) can be found at http://delicious.com/NonprofitsAssistanceFund. We are using the tags economy, npfinance, and npmanagement, among others. We welcome others to join our network or use these tags so we can all work together to gather and disseminate resources at this crucial and challenging time.
Thanks again for your work in sharing these valuable resources.
Best,
Ashley