Navigating funding access and equity in the philanthropic ecosystem

Abstract

While all non-profits struggle to secure and keep funding for their mission-driven organizations, reports show that non-profits led by people of color are at an even greater disadvantage when it comes to securing resources, according to Burton and Barnes. For this reason, many leaders are taking it upon themselves to experiment with different strategies that allow them to diversify the resources available to them, build better networks, and constantly keep the relevance of what their organizations offer at the forefront. Traditionally when we speak about underserved populations and grassroots organizations that serve them grappling with inequity, we tend to use words like "tenacity" and "resilience" to describe how these organizations press on against adversity and manage to succeed in the end. If we consider the concept of access as it relates to the non-profit ecosystem - that collection of organizations and networks that directly or indirectly impacts the systems within it - we can envision a three-part cycle that includes building and sustaining partnerships, access and social capital, and credibility and connections. All three entry points in the cycle are necessary, and all three are able to be enhanced or blocked by the actors within the greater ecosystem. This multidimensional view of the problem required a multidimensional analysis, hence the choice to employ complexity leadership theory (CLT). Uh-Bien and Arena describe CLT as: "...necessarily enmeshed within a bureaucratic superstructure of planning, organizing, and missions. CLT seeks to understand how enabling leaders can interact with the administrative superstructure to both coordinate complex dynamics (i.e. adaptive leadership) and enhance the overall flexibility of the organization. By changing their complexity, Complex Adaptive Systems (CAS) enhance their ability to process data, solve problems, learn and change creatively." Data collected during this narrative study, leveraging CLT as its theoretical framework, was analyzed with the CAS model in mind, searching for patterns in events and circumstances that led to adaptive shifts in practices. The advantage of the CAS model is it allows for specific categories of measurable and replicable activities that each present their own type of strategy for actual impact toward solving the problem. The ways in which various stakeholders' practices and recommendations for improvements were integrated into the overall decision-making processes of the participant organizations were also examined in the context of understanding what the participants - leaders within the education-based non-profit sector - had to say about their experiences launching, funding, and sustaining their organizations. The resulting study provided insights into not only understanding and quantifying the impact of inequitable practices within the philanthropic ecosystem but tangible, practice-focused, strategies for improving the sector's equity by intentionally focusing on the implementation of more collaborative and inclusive practices. Keywords: agency, ecosystem, sustainability, complexity leadership theory, Complex Adaptive Systems, reparations, fee-for-service, social entrepreneurship, liberatory programming, tribal sovereignty, youth-led programming, financial vulnerability, racial wealth gap