Giving Tips: Start planning your 2020 year-end giving now
In 2019, U.S. giving to charity totaled nearly $450 billion. Historically, nearly one-third of that amount takes place in December, with 12% of all giving occurring in the last three days of the year.
December and last-minute giving is often rushed, not well-planned, nor strategic. In order to maximize the impact of your giving, whether personal or in your business, start planning your approach to year-end donations now to causes that matter to you most. There are a number of steps One Valley Community Foundation can help you can take to ensure your donations have a lasting and significant impact in Gallatin County.
1. Engage your family members in conversations about what issues and causes are most important to them. Especially in this year of a pandemic, climate change impact, voting rights challenges, racial justice efforts, income and health disparities, and economic uncertainty (for nonprofits, too), meaningful conversations between and among generations about how a family wants to make the greatest impact are essential.
How One Valley Can Help: Sometimes it can be hard to make time for these conversations. Our team has the expertise and tools to facilitate a fun and engaging conversation with your loved ones to find focus in your giving. To streamline your family’s giving, consider setting up a donor advised fund that allows the whole family to participate in giving.
2. Giving through your business? Engage your stakeholders, especially your employees, about not only what issues and causes matter most to them, but how to more effectively involve them in volunteering and giving programs. If your company already has a matching gift program, or sponsors paid volunteer opportunities, take steps to make sure your employees are utilizing them. Unfortunately, the median employee participation rate for matching gift programs is only nine per cent, leaving an estimated $6 to $10 billion of unclaimed matching funds each year! Company volunteer programs also tend to have relatively low participation.
How One Valley Can Help: The Community Foundation specializes in helping businesses like yours align your values with your giving. Through values workshops with your company to tools like our Corporate Advised Funds, One Valley can help your company receive great tax incentives for giving while ensuring a streamlined process for your giving and volunteerism.
3. Look through two lenses, by asking two critical questions in either a business or family setting:
1. What difference do we want to make in our communities?
2. What difference do we want to make for our family or business?
Both questions are important in creating an effective strategy to achieve both internal and external goals through philanthropy. Donors who neglect one or both of these questions miss the opportunity not only to “make a difference,” but also to fully engage family members or business stakeholders in meaningful communication about values, goals, priorities and lessons learned.
How One Valley Can Help: Let’s grab coffee. We spend a lot of time with community members like you helping them be more strategic in giving of their time, talents, treasures and ties or connections. Often those cups of coffee start with these two questions above to help you really drill down into your giving goals. From there, our team can help you and your family created an actionable giving plan that can outline your philanthropic mission, vision and measurable goals.
4. Go deep, not wide, by focusing on a smaller number of carefully selected key issues, causes or organizations. Many donors adopt the “peanut butter” approach to giving — spreading their giving thinly across a wide variety of nonprofits. Donors and nonprofit organizations alike benefit when giving is focused more narrowly, moving philanthropy from merely transactional to actually transformational.
How One Valley Can Help: As we start to get to know you, we can help you and your family focus your giving to a few organizations you care about, rather than giving broadly. We can vet organizations for you to help you understand which organizations best align with your values and your giving goals for a deeper, longer-term impact.
5. Give to smaller, local organizations. 2020 has been the most challenging year for nonprofit organizations in memory. Increased demands for services and decreased revenue, combined with remote workplaces and other COVID-19 restrictions, have put many on the brink of survival. It is estimated that up to one-third of nonprofits – mostly smaller and local – will not survive the pandemic and recession double whammy. Unlike bigger organizations, such as universities and hospitals, very few local or smaller nonprofits have sizable endowments to help them weather the current storms.
How One Valley Can Help: Many large organizations have the staffing and marketing resources to be top-of-mind in your giving at year-end. While these large organizations do critical work in our region, 42% of all charitable nonprofits in Montana operate with a budget of less than $500 (Montana Nonprofit Association). Many nonprofits in our region are small and are doing important, often behind-the-scenes work, that might not be as visible as more resourced organizations. The Community Foundation can connect you with organizations that are small but mighty and are doing work that aligns with your values.
“42% of all charitable nonprofits in Montana operate with a budget of less than $500.”
6. Do your research to find those organizations that are having an impact where it matters most to you. Don’t only rely on friends’ recommendations, glossy mailings or fancy websites to decide which nonprofits are making the difference you want to make. Reading impact reports, examining nonprofits’ publicly available 990 tax returns, speaking with staff and board members, and volunteering are ways to dig deeper, learn more and find better partners to achieve your philanthropic goals.
How One Valley Can Help: Sometimes you simply don’t have the time to do the important research needed to ensure that your gift is making the biggest impact to achieve your goals. Let us help. By setting up a donor advised fund with us, we can do this nonprofit research on your behalf to give you peace of mind that your giving dollars are making the most impact.
7. Give boldly and take risks with your giving. Many donors can afford to donate more than they already give, and this year, the need to “dig deep” is critical. And, because it seeks to solve seemingly intractable problems, philanthropy can be seen as the ultimate “risk capital.” Taking calculated risks with grant making may be the only way to find new solutions to old problems.
How One Valley Can Help: In the for-profit world, taking calculated risks when investing in people and ideas is the norm. Rarely do nonprofits get the opportunity to partner with a donor to try out a new and innovative idea to solve a long-standing community challenge. Consider stepping out of your comfort zone this year and investing in a nonprofit leader and their vision for change.
8. Ask for help from financial, tax, legal and philanthropic advisors to guide your decision-making, learn “best practices” and maximize both the joy and impact of your charitable efforts.
2020 has been extremely challenging for most Americans, and it’s not over yet. We know, however, that philanthropy is inherently optimistic — especially in divisive and disheartening times — by expressing the belief that we can have a positive impact on our own lives, on the lives of others and on vital societal issues. It also serves as a line of defense to protect core democratic values like equality, opportunity, fairness, inclusiveness and freedom of speech and thought. The issues and needs in our communities are great – don’t wait until December to get started.
How One Valley Can Help: Are you ready to start planning? We’re here to help. Think of us as another member of your team. You might have a wealth advisor, CPA, or estate planning attorney. You can think of us as your philanthropic advisor to add to your team. We’re here to work with your other advisors to maximize your giving impact that aligns with your values and financial goals. Give us a call at 406-587-6262 or shoot us an email. We’d love to meet you.
*Adapted from a great article by the DeBroskey Group