Does this Scare You?

I keep adding links to a section of my web library showing challenges facing non profits. Since so much responsibility is heaped upon them, this should scare anyone. I attended the Breaking IT! Down Conference last Friday at UIC, and the mid day panel focused on challenges facing non profits, as well as ideas proposed by Dan Pallotta in his TED talk. I wrote about that here.

During the noon panel John Rodgers of Arial Capital talked about how leaders of hedge funds and private equity funds were making over $500 billion dollars at the height of the financial crisis and that much of this income came from managing the funds of philanthropic foundations.

Carlos Tortolero, Executive Director of the National Museum of Mexican Art, summed up the feeling of many non profit leaders when he said "We have to talk about survival. We can't talk about growth."

So what will it take for some of those hedge fund managers to devote 20-30% of their annual income to supporting youth tutoring, mentoring, jobs and college access programs, as well as the infrastructure that helps each program operate more effectively, and at a lower cost per program?

That's a scary thought. I'll write more about my ideas tomorrow.