Monday Morning Checklist:
What Am I Accountable For?
The questions posed on this website aren’t the kind you ask, and answer, once and for all. On the contrary, the odds are that you’ll find yourself coming back to one or more of them at various points (and in various combinations) throughout your philanthropic journey. And yet, you can’t ask questions forever; sooner or later you must make decisions. So how can you tell whether you’ve wrestled with a question sufficiently to move on? In our experience, each of these questions has some relatively clear indicators of progress. If you can check many of these markers off your Monday morning to-do list, then you’re probably well on your way to giving smart!
- You’ve been explicit with yourself and others about how much money, time, and influence you’re prepared to commit to a specific initiative.
- Impartial but knowledgeable observers would say that the resources you intend to contribute are proportional to your strategy and the success you aspire to achieve.
- You’ve explicitly considered and accepted the risks (strategic, secondary, and personal) associated with your strategy.
- You’ve been crystal clear about what you are not doing.
- Other people describe you as a donor who “walks the talk” and honors commitments: you hold yourself accountable.
Sources Used For This Article:
Thomas J. Tierney and Joel L. Fleishman, Give Smart: Philanthropy That Gets Results, (Public Affairs, 2011).