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Richard Marsh
- Wednesday, August 26, 2009
Well, it was worth a try.
A couple of months ago I arrived at Intelligent Giving as Interim Director. The brief? To address a chronic lack of financial resources.
We weren’t credit crunched, the problem goes back much further than that and relates to the challenges faced by analysts in the sector to fund their work.
We may not have been able to save IG as an independent charity, but the good news is that the IG brand, website and methodology are being taken over by our colleagues at New Philanthropy Capital.
Before the icy waters of indifference close over our heads let’s bank what IG has achieved and make sure that those responsible get some kudos. At its heart, IG has been about the charity profiles and a carefully honed and tested method of making sure that these are fair and consistent. These profiles may not be what IG is remembered for, but I have no doubt that it’s our best work.
We’ll be remembered for royal spats with charities and, in particular, fundraisers, as we tried to make the point that donors matter and they are intelligent enough to be trusted to make informed, searching, decisions about the way they spend their own money on the causes they want to support and the difference they want to make. You will now never enjoy our campaign to have the equivalent of the Mail or Telephone Preference Services for households who don’t want Door to Door Fundraisers to call!
So, farewell then! And thanks to the interns, the noble lead researchers, the people who kept the website together and tried to make the books balance, the trustees and other donors who dug deep in their pockets. Farewell to our sparring partners and our colleagues in the world of charity analysis.
Above all, farewell to the thousands of donors who have used IG to help them make decisions about their giving – we did this for you. Valete!
and thank you for all your hard work...
I see that New Philanthropy Capital (it's not a catchy name!) have a blog - http://newphilanthropycapital.blogspot.com/
And are using Blogger - a lazy and ineffective choice; let's hope their investment advice is better...
Richard, What a shame you didn't get a chance at making IG work. The tone of this piece is a indication of what might have been.
I loved IG when it first launched and defended it against its vocal critics.
But I soon decided to ignore the site because of the tabloid style kicking it routinely gave fundraisers trying to do a good job. On occasions I let my guard down and became a 'sparring partner'.
For me, the irony of IG running out of money is that, while continually criticising fundraisers trying to do a difficult job, IG itself failed to raise the money it needed. Now you can say that this is because analysts will always have problems in trying to fund their work... but poor fundraising might have played a part.
I made a small donation to IG once. Other than an automated email receipt, I never got a thank you. (the kind of behaviour charities were routinely criticised for) And the charity never invited me to give again.
But then what would you expect from a charity that on one memorable occasion, railed against £2/month requests because the whole strategy was predicated on the charity asking the donor for further donations, in the future. I just couldn't believe the naiivity.
In truth, I believe there are so many charities chasing the donor's pound that fundraisers will often have to push the boundaries of public acceptability. To get noticed. To get a response. To raise the money they desperately need to deliver their missions. If IG had taken a more intelligent and engaging tone, it could have been the focus of a much needed debate on where we draw our lines and how we should improve.
But you don't go to the tabloids for intelligent, problem-solving, discussion. And likewise, we never found that here at IG. It's a shame that such a good idea as IG failed because of this approach.
Best of luck to you, personally, on whatever lies ahead.
Thanks for all the hard work! I have found this blog and Intelligent Giving's work to be educational and they have inspired me to think about working in the charity sector and to want to fulfill those goals of accountability, transparency and well thought out professional work. Good luck in your new home with NPC!
Hi Anon2,
Don't worry - we're still here!
We have been pretty quiet recently while we've been thinking about how to develop the website. But we'll be back soon, blogging about our plans and how they're going.
If you have any idea/comments about what you think IG should look like in the future, get in touch - we'd love to hear your views.
Sarah, Intelligent Giving