May 2, 2011

By Steve Backman

The recent acknowledgement by database giant Epsilon that information regarding millions of its clients' customers had been breached is an eye-opener to anyone who trusts someone else with their data. And these days, the concept of cloud computing, or being able to access data from anywhere at any time, is being talked about everywhere.

Here's how cloud environments work. Systems increasingly popular with nonprofits such as Amazon S3, Salesforce, and Microsoft Azure all enable centralized treatment of data. Every week there are new threats to computer systems. These threats could potentially affect cloud systems, but the difference is, it is cloud vendor's job to make the patches, and when they do, they do it in one play for all customers. Everywhere else you have to have some concern when patches will be applied, who will do it, and whether it will affect your customizations. Cloud vendors focus on pre-announced major upgrade cycles annually and roll them out in organized fashion, while making security patches regularly. 

A different security issue concerns how much can you trust a cloud vendor to maintain the confidentiality and privacy of data. This is a consideration with any software any used these days. We live in an era of WikiLeaks, apparent semi-official Chinese theft of Google and Adobe data, Israeli attacks on Iranian nuclear power system networks, and newly intrusive data mining by U.S. authorities.

With 44 as the average age of people beginning to create an estate plan, Jay Steenhuysen, partner of Covenant Calls and David P. Whitehead, senior vice president and development officer of the AARP and AARP Foundation, discussed the best ways to reach seniors to encourage bequest giving during a session “Reaching Seniors: Building Relationships through Bequests and Estate Planning” during Association of Fundraising Professional's (AFP) International Conference in Chicago.

When approaching prospects to include your nonprofit in their estate planning, the speakers advocated avoiding discussing death. Estate planning should about life, not death. Framing the issue as an attempt of the senior to control their money when they cannot and taking care of the organizations they care can be a successful tactic in getting your organization include in their estate planning.

In addition, when preparing materials to send out to potential donors, make sure you focus on the goals, not tasks of their estate planning process. Breaking the process in parts by organizing data, by including resources seniors can look to and focusing on what you want to accomplish.

Also, many times these people haven't had professional help in outlining their estate planning. By bringing in attorneys and financial advisors, seniors can feel much more at ease in their financial planning for the future.

Finance ...
Using modern financial and business techniques

Nonprofits looking to bolster their gift plans need to incorporate modern financial and business techniques according to William D. Samers, vice president of planned giving and endowments and Elizabeth Fisher, director of operations at the UJA-Federation of New York, during a session called “Increasing Your Campaign: How to Create Gift Plans Using Modern Financial and Business Techniques” during a planned giving conference.

One example, Samers provided was for “virtual endowments.” Liking it to a balloon loan or “bullet loan,” a virtual endowment allows donors to provide contributions equivalent to the annual cost of a specific project, funding the endowment with a future gift. Enabling the donor to feel the impact from a donation during their lifetime, this payment option also ensures the fiscal buoyancy of the program for the future.

In addition to this option, Samers and Fisher spoke about a “Limited Time Project.” Similar to leasing a car, a limited time project allows a donor to fund a larger project for a limited time. This is popular among donors who want to see an immediate impact from a donation, but are not so much concerned in a permanent naming opportunity.

By viewing modern for-profit business techniques through a nonprofit lens, nonprofit organizations are able to have more opportunities to fundraise creatively.

In ensuring the long-term fiscal health and flexibility of nonprofits, a session during the Association of Fundraising Professionals (AFP) International Conference in Chicago, “Fundraising Strategies to Build a Sustainable Organization,” by Steven D. Zimmerman, principal of the Milwaukee, Wisc.-based Spectrum Nonprofit Services, addressed solutions to make nonprofits more sustainable.

Managers need to realize sustainability just doesn't refer to being sustainable in terms of the environment but making sure that your organization can weather the storm of future challenges. The nonprofit business model differs from traditional for-profit businesses because as according to Zimmerman, the nonprofit business model encompasses both mission impact and financial profitability.

By graphing your organization on a matrix, you can better understand if it has a high impact, high profitability, or has low impact, low profitability. After graphing your organization based on this information, you should compile an “impact statement” representing how effective you are in achieving objectives. Some examples of values to evaluate are alignment with core mission, excellence in execution, the scale or value of your programs, depth, filling an important gap, community building and leverage.

By mapping out this data, you can find out where your nonprofit can improve in ensuring your organizational health and programs are sustainable for years to come.