Whether your experience is similar to the story to the right or not, we all face tough dilemmas in our personal and professional lives. We can help you think through these difficult decisions and come to moral resolutions. |
When is an exception worth giving?
Are all résumé typos accidental?
When a family foundation grows from private business, where is the demarcating line drawn?
In need of funding to continue their research, a group of scientists must decide to accept substantial funding that comes with a stipulation.
What do you do when a worthy cause falls outside of established giving guidelines?
The LBZ Foundation was established and began making grants five years ago. Still in the building stage, the foundation endowment is now approximately $3 million.
The grant-making process is influenced by the foundation's recent birth and by the small size of its endowment and staff. These influences are felt most specifically in reference to grant size. In the context of the LBZ Foundation, larger gifts are in the $70,000 to $100, 000 range; smaller gifts fall within a $5,000 to $10,000 range.
LBZ Foundation staff members are experiencing a dilemma in deciding whether to give larger grants to fewer organizations or smaller grants to many organizations. They feel it would be more manageable to make and then monitor fewer (larger) grants each year. Smaller grants, however, could fund several innovative programs or less experienced but worthy organizations.
What policy should foundation staff follow?Read more dilemmas: Philanthropy Dilemmas
Note: This and other dilemmas on this site come to you without their real-life resolutions. We encourage you to think for yourself about how you might resolve them, since the nature of each dilemma is highly individualistic. In sharing these dilemmas, we do not endorse them in any way, but rather offer them for your consideration.
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