The Shortest Distance Between Generosity and Impact

One of my favorite Sunday morning rituals is reading. I usually spend some time catching up on articles I've bookmarked during the week, and every now and then I come across one that sticks with me long after I've finished reading it.

This morning, it was Ashley Fairbanks' Giving Can Be Simple (And During a Crisis, It Must Be) in the Stanford Social Innovation Review. The article chronicles the creation of Stand With Minnesota, an initiative that helped direct more than $40 million to mutual aid organizations and community-led efforts during a period of profound crisis. It's well worth reading, not because it offers a step-by-step blueprint for philanthropy, but because it asks some uncomfortable questions about how we distribute resources, who gets to make decisions, and what happens when we simply trust communities to know what they need.

One of the central ideas in the piece is that institutions often complicate generosity. Fairbanks argues that when people want to help, the best thing we can do is make it as easy as possible for them to do so. During moments of crisis, lengthy applications, multiple approval layers, and extensive reporting requirements can become barriers rather than safeguards. There is a great deal of truth in that observation, and I think most nonprofit professionals have experienced it from one side of the table or the other.

The nonprofit sector has spent years talking about trust-based philanthropy, and while we've certainly made progress, we're still asking many organizations, especially small and midsized nonprofits, to navigate processes that consume an extraordinary amount of time and energy. Grant proposals can take dozens of hours to prepare. Reports can require detailed metrics, narratives, financial documentation, and supporting materials, often for relatively modest awards. Accountability matters, and anyone entrusted with charitable dollars has a responsibility to steward them wisely. At the same time, every hour spent completing paperwork is an hour that isn't being spent serving a community.

That doesn't mean the answer is to abandon structure altogether. In fact, I think that's where this conversation becomes more interesting.

Mutual aid and nonprofit organizations serve different, but complementary, purposes. Mutual aid is often at its best when communities need an immediate response. It can move quickly because decisions are made by the people closest to the need. There is very little bureaucracy between a donation and its impact. Nonprofits, on the other hand, exist to do work that extends well beyond the immediate crisis. They build programs that last for years, advocate for systemic change, preserve institutional knowledge, employ professionals with specialized expertise, and create continuity that outlives any single emergency.

We don't have to choose between those two models. Healthy communities benefit from both.

What I do think the article challenges us to consider is whether our institutions have become more complicated than they need to be. Every policy, every approval step, every reporting requirement, and every additional form probably began with a good reason. Over time, though, those individual decisions accumulate until we've built systems that are sometimes more difficult to navigate than the problems they were intended to solve.

That question isn't just for foundations. It's one nonprofit leaders should be asking ourselves as well.

How easy is it to volunteer with our organization? How difficult is it to enroll in our programs? How many hoops do donors have to jump through before making a gift? How quickly do we respond when someone reaches out for help? Have we unintentionally created barriers in the name of good administration?

Those are uncomfortable questions, but they're worthwhile ones.

The article also reminded me of something I've been thinking about for a while: donors increasingly want to see the connection between their generosity and its impact. They appreciate stories, but they also appreciate clarity. They want to know who benefited, what changed, and why their gift mattered. That's one reason crowdfunding campaigns, giving days, and focused fundraising initiatives have become so successful. They reduce the distance between the donor and the outcome. The transaction becomes less about supporting an institution and more about investing in a specific change.

As fundraisers, that's an important lesson. People don't just give because our organizations need money. They give because they want to solve problems, improve lives, and strengthen their communities. The easier we make it for them to understand that connection, the more likely they are to become long-term supporters.

Perhaps my biggest takeaway from this morning's reading is that simplicity and accountability aren't opposites. We often talk as though we have to choose one or the other, but I don't think that's true. We can design grant programs that are responsible without being burdensome. We can build fundraising campaigns that are transparent without overwhelming donors with information. We can trust our nonprofit partners while still ensuring that charitable dollars are used effectively.

The challenge isn't deciding whether accountability matters. It absolutely does. The challenge is making sure our systems don't become so complicated that they stand between generous people and the communities they're trying to support.

Resources

Ashley Fairbanks, "Giving Can Be Simple (And During a Crisis, It Must Be)", Stanford Social Innovation Review

https://ssir.org/articles/entry/minneapolis-giving-can-be-simple