2023 Grantee Perception Report Results

Realizing Glick Philanthropies’ mission – to build community and create opportunities so every person can reach their full potential – cannot happen without outstanding nonprofit partners. As our Glick Philanthropies team plans for the future, we know that to have the greatest impact, we must listen to our partners' feedback, needs, and goals.

In 2023, we partnered with the Center for Effective Philanthropy (CEP) to conduct a Grantee Perception Report (GPR). Thank you to everyone who took the time to complete the survey; we appreciate your insights.

What We Learned

We surveyed 124 grantee partners and received 90 responses (a 73% response rate).

• Overall, grantees report positive perceptions of Glick Philanthropies across many key survey themes. In written comments, grantees describe Glick as a “thoughtful [and] dynamic” funder that serves as “a tremendous resource,” and overall, “is truly making an impact.”
• In particular, grantees’ feedback highlights their strong perceptions of Glick’s impact on and leadership in their fields, communities, and organizations, as well as its commitment and approach to diversity, equity, and inclusion.
• In suggestions for improvement, grantees indicate opportunities for even clearer communication about Glick’s funding goals and strategies, increased interaction with staff, and more streamlined aspects of processes.

Notable Impact on and Leadership in Grantees’ Local Communities

Grantees’ ratings place Glick Philanthropies in the top five percent of CEP’s dataset for its impact on and understanding of grantees’ local communities. In addition to positive perceptions of Glick’s impact on grantees’ local communities and fields, grantees often note Glick’s leadership role as a strength in their written comments. For example, grantees share that Glick is “a leader on issues such as affordable housing and education” and “has a positive reputation in the Indianapolis community and… the philanthropic community.”

Still, grantees’ feedback indicates that there may be an opportunity for Glick to play an even greater leadership role in facilitating convenings and collaboration. In a custom question, grantees indicate that it is most important for Glick in the future to create collaboration with and convene stakeholders across the nonprofit, public, and private sectors and connect people and organizations doing similar or complementary work.

Supporting Beyond the Grant

Another way in which Glick strengthens grantees’ organizations is through its provision of non-monetary support, or assistance beyond the grant. About 40 percent of grantees report receiving non-monetary support from Glick, most often in the form of program-related, fundraising and development, and communications assistance. These grantees who receive non-monetary support rate significantly higher than those who don’t on many measures in the report, including Glick’s understanding of grantees’ communities, fields, organizations, and its awareness of grantees’ challenges. As Glick considers additional ways to support beyond the grant, grantees indicate that they would be most likely to utilize collaboration with other nonprofit organizations, leadership training, and support for policy/advocacy as resources offered through Glick.

Strengthening Funder-Grantee Relationships

Grantees hold Glick staff in high regard, describing them as “approachable,” “helpful,” “friendly,” and overall, “feel very much in partnership” with Glick. Reflecting these sentiments, grantees provide higher than typical ratings for the extent to which Glick is open to ideas from grantees about its strategy and exhibits compassion for those affected by their work, and typical ratings for their comfort approaching Glick and the extent to which Glick exhibits respectful interaction and trust.

In contrast, ratings are lower than typical and below the median funder in Glick’s custom cohort for the responsiveness of staff and/or representatives. More than one-quarter of grantees report having a recent change in their primary contact at Glick and/or Central Indiana Community Foundation (CICF). These grantees who have experienced a recent contact change rate the responsiveness of staff significantly lower than those who have had a consistent contact.

Taken together, grantees’ written suggestions indicate an opportunity for Glick to further strengthen aspects of its relationships with its grantees. The largest proportion of all suggestions (one-third) relate to funder-grantee relationships, with grantees most often asking for “clearer communication about overall goals” and “funding priorities,” “a site visit at… programs,” and for greater consistency in working with staff.

Efficient Processes with Opportunity to Streamline

Glick’s processes are efficient, requiring at the median only 16 hours over the lifetime of the grant, a lower amount than most other funders in CEP’s dataset. Grantees’ suggestions also indicate an opportunity for Glick to refine its processes even further. The second-largest proportion of all grantees’ suggestions (23 percent) relate to Glick’s processes, where grantees ask that Glick “make the application process less burdensome,” provide “a clear description on what is and what is not funded,” and “streamline the reporting process.”

What We’re Doing

Guided by this input, the Glick Philanthropies team is studying the trust-based philanthropy movement and considering where we can apply the six practices of trust-based grantmaking in 2024 and beyond. Here are some of the steps we’re planning to take.

Give Multi-Year Unrestricted Funding
We are working towards a goal of 50 percent of all funding being distributed through a partner portfolio strategy, where we identify highly mission aligned nonprofit partners to receive multi-year unrestricted funding.

Do the Homework
We will do our research on the front-end so your time completing an application and meeting with us can be spent on more strategic and innovative items (rather than telling us things we can learn from your website).

Simplify & Streamline Paperwork
We will revise the grant application to ensure the questions we ask are the right ones so you can make the most of your valuable time. We will also right-size the reporting process based on the grant size. We realize that the greatest learnings come from ongoing relationships and transparent conversations, not a highly structured mid-cycle and end of grant written report.

Be Transparent & Responsive
We will communicate clear information about Glick’s grantmaking priorities and process, including our unique funding strategies within each focus area. This, along with other helpful information, will be available to you online whenever you need it.

Solicit & Act on Feedback
We heard that you would like for us to facilitate convenings and collaborations. We will host at least two peer convenings for our partners in 2024 to promote best practices sharing, networking, and collaboration in a supportive, non-competitive environment.

Offer Support Beyond the Check
We will develop a menu of “beyond the check” supports available to partners, such as professional development, communications training, letters of support, connections to other funding partners, and more.

The Glick Philanthropies team is excited to continue doing what’s helpful to you and the community, stop doing what’s not, and testing new ways to continuously improve the process. We look forward to sharing more as we begin to bring these tactics to life over the next year.

Thank you to everyone who completed the survey. A presentation of report findings from CEP is available here. We also would like to thank our colleagues at the Central Indiana Community Foundation for their stewardship, community leadership, and partnership.