Category Archives: Effective giving

The popular fetish of the small

The Economist this week has an article and data showing the folly of the popular affection for small companies. It shows that productivity* per employee is markedly higher in large companies than small ones for two reasons: employees in large … Continue reading

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It Ain’t What You Give, It’s The Way That You Give It

It Ain’t What You Give, It’s The Way That You Give It: launches March 27th 2012 ‘The Freakonomics of the charity world – but with better cartoons’ – Martin Houghton-Brown, Chief Executive, Missing People ‘Great advice: inspiring, entertaining and much-needed’ – James … Continue reading

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Forget business: philanthropy needs to learn from tons of other disciplines

Philanthrocapitalism, social return, social investment, Absolute Return for Kids… Business is the analogy most commonly used for philanthropic activity. Though that’s not wrong, it’s dangerously narrow for solving what Warren Buffett calls ‘problems which have already resisted great intellects and great … Continue reading

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Giving a goat (or similar) this Christmas? Get an extra half a goat for free

Oxfam Unwrapped is a kind of gift catalogue from which you can ‘buy a goat’ or various other items as a gift. A goat costs £25: you give Oxfam £25, which it uses to provide a goat to somebody in a … Continue reading

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Why Eurostar’s charity partnership with the Ashden Awards is a very good idea*

Partnering to create value  Interested in fostering innovation, Eurostar has teamed up with the Ashden Awards for Sustainable Energy to create a new prize for local sustainable transport initiatives. In principle, Eurostar could have created an infrastructure of its own – … Continue reading

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Prince Harry: gives charity what he does best

Prince Harry goes to the Arctic: of course the press  go too. Smart guy. He’s doing what great donors do best: bringing to his charitable passions the most valuable and most unusual resources he can access. Raising the profile and … Continue reading

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Let’s inspire better giving, by… celebrating failure!

When did you last hear of a charity that was rubbish? By some estimates, fully 60% of donations are made with no research into the charity’s performance. Whereas about 0% of commercial investments are made with no research into the … Continue reading

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Of course we don’t discuss charitable giving: there’s no decent term for it

Language shapes how we think. No clear language: no clear thinking What is this thing that we do? “Deploying money, time and other resources to achieve positive social and environmental change”. A snappy phrase, don’t you think?? I’ve been talking … Continue reading

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