Background

Bader Philanthropies, Inc., a Jewish Funders Network member, invests in people and their communities, in Milwaukee, across Wisconsin, and in places throughout the world. The Foundation continues the legacy of Helen Daniels Bader’s passion for people, while furthering Isabel and Alfred Bader’s shared interests. Bader Philanthropies Inc.’s community partners represent a collage of diverse organizations. Since its founding in 1992, Bader Philanthropies has committed more than $300 million in grants and program related investments (PRIs) in a variety of issue areas that improve the quality of life of people – young and old. Areas of interest include: Alzheimers & Aging, Employment Community Matters, Neighborhood Engagement, Social Equality , The Arts, Urban and Jewish Education, and Youth Development.

The Challenge

Bader Philanthropies has a long history of surveying its grantees about how the grantees are doing. The decision to participate in the Center for Effective Philanthropy (CEP) Grantee Perception Survey in 2017 was an opportunity to take that dialogue a step further. The foundation had never invited candid feedback on its own systems and processes before. According to Maria Vento, Vice President for Grants and Impact Investments, “We had always surveyed our grantees to have them tell us how they were doing, but in this case we wanted to flip the tables and really put ourselves out there and have them tell us how we are doing.”For Bader Philanthropies, the opportunity to participate in the CEP process coincided with the opening of new foundation offices in the Harambee neighborhood of Milwaukee. The move sparked a period of reflection and a feeling among the foundation staff that this was an opportunity for a fresh start. Ben Callif, Research and Mindset Director stated: “The survey was just one of many ways that the foundation as a whole was taking time to reflect on the way it did business and interacted with its partners and grantees.”

The Approach

The survey launched in 2017 and took a full year to complete. All foundation grantees, local and international were invited to participate in the anonymous 50-question survey. The survey probed grantee experiences with the foundation’s selection process, relationship with the foundation, and perceptions of the foundation’s impact on organizational, community and field level. Questions were for the most part multiple choice or scaled responses with a few open-ended response questions. Among the questions: “How aware is the Foundation of the challenges that your organization is facing?" or "To what extent was the Foundation's reporting process straightforward?"

CEP administered the survey to a list of grantees provided by Bader Philanthropies. Two hundred and ninety grantees were invited to participate, and 182 actually participated (63% response rate). CEP synthesized the data and supported an internal team from the foundation (composed of senior program officers, a grant manager, and the Research and Mindset Director) in the data analysis. CEP was able to help Bader Philanthropies compare their results to the larger data pool that has been collected by CEP.

The Findings

The survey findings were mixed, with the foundation earning higher scores in some areas of its work and lower scores in others. While some findings were expected, others were more surprising. For the most part, the team was not surprised by the areas in which it received lower scores, some of which were areas the team did not see as important. In other cases, it got a medium score where the team had expected a higher score. It was some of those dimensions where the foundation was doing “fine” but not “excellent” where it decided to invest in improvements. The team was pleased by the positive feedback received. In particular, they were relieved to learn that the foundation’s rapid response system (the capacity to make grants quickly in an emergency) was viewed very positively by grantees and that it received high scores on “Community Impact”. This aligned with the team’s own understanding of the foundation’s strengths.

Lessons Learned

Among the survey findings, two areas for improvement stood out: 1) communication with grantees, and 2) grantee interactions with the grant reporting system. The lowest overall score that Bader Philanthropies received on the assessment was around the grant selection process. Prospects complained that they did not understand how they were being assessed during the application process. Grantees noted that they submitted reports, but did not receive any feedback on them. Both grantees and prospects felt they had to be cautious about sharing challenges , obstacles, or failures in their work.

The foundation leadership had long wanted to align their process for grantmaking with their vision of relationship building, specifically their view that relationships with small grantees are just as important as relationships with bigger, more established entities, and they wanted those relationships to be authentic, not bureaucratic. The Grantee Perception Report convinced the Bader team that the processes they had set up were getting in the way of relationship building. As a result, Maria Vento said, “We completely overhauled our entire grant selection process. We just started from scratch.”

Changes Made as a Result of the Process

The team decided to focus on revamping the foundation’s website, which serves as the platform for grant applications, reporting, and ongoing communication. They also focused on restructuring the application process itself, so that applicants had more opportunities to interact with staff and ask questions. Other things that the foundation changed as a result of what it learned through the grantee perception survey:

• Made it easier for applicants to submit a preliminary application and share ideas with the grants staff.
• Streamlined the overall process from LOI (Letter of Intent) through reporting to make it more consistent and user friendly.
• Invited grant applicants to meet with staff earlier in the process to discuss metrics. Enabling applicants and staff to have these conversations early in the process helped to align expectations and get a head start on a core element of the proposal (measurable outcomes).
• Added in a six-month check-in (in addition to an annual report) conducted through the portal. As part of this check-in, grantees automatically get feedback on what they submit in the form of a note from their program officer.
• Simplified report form, requiring less narrative.
• Gave permission for grantees to connect with program officers outside of regular check-ins to share ideas, give informal updates, think out loud.

As a result of the changes, the staff at the foundation feels more connected to the grantees and prospective grantees, and more involved in their work. The staff’s original goal in responding to the survey feedback was to address issues with the website, but what they learned was that the real issues were around relationship-building. Previously staff had not encouraged prospects and grantees to be in conversation with them; now the staff initiate a conversation early in the relationship and encourage frequent communication. As Maria noted, important conversations are happening earlier: “For example, we are talking about metrics early in the process and really getting into detail on what the organization is going to measure instead of waiting to receive a full proposal and then tearing that apart.”

Staff report that, as a result of these changes, they spend more time on the phone with grantees, but that time spent in conversation is reducing the amount of time spent reviewing applications of groups that are not a good fit, problem solving with organizations in crisis, etc. Ben observed, “At foundations we are often reluctant to start a conversation because it might not end in a grant. How much time are you going to put into those early conversations where you don’t yet know if it is the right fit? What we learned is that those early conversations teach us a lot about the fit.” The staff have also found that connecting frequently with prospects and grantees enables them to report more effectively to the foundation’s board. They are better able to see trends in the field and share those observations with the board.

Looking Ahead

So far the feedback from grantees and prospects about the changes made in response to the report findings has been overwhelmingly positive. Grantees appreciate the increased frequency of contact and find the new reporting forms to be easier and quicker than the old ones. According to Ben, “We have increased the frequency of reporting which you would think would be awful for grantees, but paradoxically everybody loves it;the reports are easier and quicker.” Maria added that increased reporting works because it is coupled with more responsiveness from the grants staff: “The worst thing about our previous system was that people would put time and hard work into writing something, and they would hear crickets. Now, when they submit a report every six months, we send them a little love note.”

Bader Philanthropies plans to do another grantee perception survey again in the future. It has been phasing in the new reporting system, and it does not make sense to run another survey until all grantees have been on the new system for a full cycle. The foundation leadership believes that grantee perception surveys are a critical tool for delivering on mission.