Sector Effectiveness

What would it take for a group of nonprofit leaders to be honest, open, and trusting enough with a funder to really share their wisdom—even their critiques of strategy and of how philanthropy works? For Barr, the answer was a happy accident of another challenge we were trying to address.

Written by Pat Brandes

Since “Networking a City”—a case study on the Barr Fellowship—appeared in the Summer 2012 issue of the Stanford Social Innovation Review, we’ve been doing some more writing and guest-blogging about the Fellowship and what we have been learning from it.

By way of a quick round up…

For the most part, these have focused—and rightly so—on the ways the Fellowship has impacted Fellows themselves and on the unlikely and powerful collaborations that are beginning to emerge from their network. What has been less of a focus, however, is something that has proved incredibly vital to me and to Barr. Call it a happy accident or unintended consequence—this effort to celebrate, rejuvenate, and connect extraordinary social-change leaders has proved a remarkable gift back to us at Barr. It has enabled authentic relationships, honesty, openness, and real dialogue that I have never before experienced in all my years in philanthropy. This reflection recalled to mind for me an interview I did several years ago for Grantmakers for Effective Organizations as part of its Engage for Results video series.

The video of my chapter (#4) on the Fellowship is below.

authors and contributors:

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