Diana R. Sieger is the president of the Grand Rapids Commmunity Foundation. For more information, visit Diana's President's pages or view her biography.
Contact Diana at:
RSS
feed sourceRecent Posts
- 08/13/08 - Spirit of GR - Part 2.5!!!
- 08/13/08 - The Spirit of Grand Rapids - Part 2!
- 07/28/08 - The Spirit of Grand Rapids - What's the Future - from 1989 to 2008!
- 06/30/08 - Deja vu all over again!
- 06/23/08 - "Cushy" - "retiring" - hardly!
- Archived Posts
Other Blogs of Note
- Philanthropy 2173
- Tactical Philanthropy
- Singh around the World
- Stanford Social Innovation Review
- White Courtesy Telephone
- Chronicle of Philanthropy: Give & Take
- Open Hands
Tag cloud
- Blandford Nature Center and Mixed Greens
- charitable giving
- charity
- community development
- community foundation
- community foundations
- community leadership
- Council on Foundations
- Cultural competency
- diversity
- economic development
- education
- female leadership
- financing nonprofit sector
- food systems
- foundations
- grants
- impact
- Johnson Center's Community Research Institute
- leadership
- marketing
- next gen
- philanthropy
- public education
- public relations
- regional approach
- scholarships
- social sectors
- state government
- Wilmer Shield Rich Awards
- youth
President's Point of View: Community Leadership
September 28, 2006
The conference was abuzz! Did you know that “so and so” is doing this? And that “so and so” is really doing something exciting?
Many of us just returned from the Council on Foundations’ National Conference for Community Foundations that was held in Boston. What a great city! Many of our staff led, designed and participated in conference sessions. Joseph Medcalf our student trustee from July 1, 2005 to June 30, 2006 was a featured speaker for a session encouraging foundations to have youth on their boards. Thanks Joseph - you continue to inspire and influence us! He is a freshman at Western Michigan University this fall and watch for his leadership - he is destined to make a mark on this world I’m sure of it!
As in all industries and associations, there seems to be a theme or strand of activity that is highlighted for the moment. For community foundations it is a return to our roots - a “welcome back” if you will or as I like to say “Back to the Future”! Our roots? Well it is about community change and being a part of it or leading it! Reflective in our four key strategies, we are about affecting change efforts. Here are our four key strategies again:
* Lead significant social change;
* Grow current and future philanthropic resources;
* Engage donors to take action to make a difference;
* Deliver organizational excellence.
After the boom of the late ’90s and the sobering effects of the down market in the first half of this decade, community foundations have moved from wanting to reflect the financial services’ industry and compete with the commercial gift funds to being the leaders that they are and can be in their communities and indeed around the country. This is our difference - our value added element for our communities. I trust it will not become the fad of the 2000’s and that we realize that we have returned to our home - our roots once again!
