Institutional Partnerships: Strategic Foundations and Public Funding
Multi-year partnerships with major foundations, federated and government funding at scale, and diversifying past any single institution. The executive's relationships with the funders that can change the organization, and the plan for the day they stop.
Through the Faith-Based lens
True multi-year partnerships are less common at the parish level, but they show up at the diocesan or ministry-network level: a major religious foundation's multi-year capacity-building commitment, or a denomination's own internal funding relationship with a struggling parish, carries the same shape this module names, shared goals, leadership-level relationships, mutual obligation, an exit written at the start, even when the language is pastoral rather than corporate. A large religious funder's priorities can quietly start shaping which ministries get emphasized, which is worth a pastor's or executive director's direct attention, since the drift can happen without anyone deciding it should.
Continuing education
1.00 points
Leadership and Management · Securing the Gift
Learning objectives
- Distinguish a grant from a partnership, and describe what a multi-year institutional partnership asks of the executive, the funder, and the organization.
- Structure multi-year foundation partnerships and manage government and federated funding at scale, including the relationships at the leadership level that grants staff cannot hold.
- Draft a partnership memorandum that states shared goals, mutual obligations, and the exit, and a diversification plan for the funding the institution most depends on.
- Analyze an organization's move away from a government funding majority and identify what made it possible.
Designed for CFRE continuing education. Not yet accepted; no CFRE points can be claimed.
Lessons
- 18 min
Video lesson
From grants to partnerships
II See · Leadership and Management
- 20 min
Field guide· PDF
Multi-year foundation partnerships and public funding at scale
IV Invite · Securing the Gift
- 18 min
Template· DOCX
The partnership memorandum and the diversification plan
VI Accompany · Leadership and Management
- 16 min
Case study· PDF
Case study: diversifying past a government majority
VI Accompany · Leadership and Management
This is members-only material.
Members get every lesson, template, and worksheet in all eight tracks, plus the support to put them to work in your shop.
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