Aggregated External News

The Starkey Hearing Foundation celebrated its annual Hear The World Awards Gala late last month.

President Bill Clinton, Forest Whitaker, Kristi Yamaguchi, Mel B., Lou Ferrigno, Bill Rancic, Greg Jennings, Tony Hawk, Shannon Elizabeth, Kevin Sorbo, Evander Holyfield, Lennox Lewis, Verne Troyer and many more gathered together to celebrate the incredible humanitarian accomplishments of Sir Richard Branson, Ashton Kutcher, Barbara Bush, Chunli Zhao “Angel,” Jimmy Walker and Dennis and Leslie Hansen.

This was a record-breaking year, raising $8 million to help Starkey Hearing Foundation open up the world of sound for thousands around the globe.

More: http://www.looktothestars.org/news/10617-stars-help-starkey-hearing-foundation-celebrate-annual-gala

Via Marketing Profs, here is some loyalty advice from the commercial space. “Keep the spark alive” says this article … Brand Love for the Long Haul. I mean, if you can inspire ‘brand love’ for Brillo soap pads (100 years old this year), why not for Oxfam or the San Diego Zoo? Here are the five tips (with examples) offered for “keeping a fiery connection”. [Wait, is this Marketing Profs or Cosmopolitan?] Spend quality time together. The Agitator translation: spend time really getting to know and experience your organization from the donor’s perspective. Think Undercover Boss!

I want to start this week with a blatant plug for a job I'm recruiting for. I'm looking for a talented, ambitious and hard working Direct Marketing Exec to join my team. The deadline is Monday, but I can take late applications for outstanding candidates. Get in touch if you'd like to know more.

Plug  over and on to this week's reading round up...

There has been a lot of discussion about this article in the Daily Telegraph on charity Chief Executive pay. This response from Derek Humphries on UK Fundraising is the best response I've seen.

Pamela Grow on the Shoemaker and the elves and fundraising success.

 A couple of posts from 101 Fundraising:

• How are you managing your donor journeys?
• Giving in the name of
• 30 letters that changed the world.

 Paul shares some great links on mobile.

What do donors think of text campaigns? Kivi has the answer.

According to Amanda, the devil is in the detail.

Karen on using emotion to get action.

Veritus Group on head and heart messaging.

Good Works: how well do you thank your donors?

Future Fundraising Now have a great guest post on winning the overhead battle.

Can you give your donors an occasional miracle?

Over at the Agitator, I loved this use of the telephone to keep donors informed.

Lucy with seven tips to be a brilliant fundraiser.

The Fundraising Coach with fifteen mistakes that have already been made for you.

On a related theme, Clarification blog on the Old Macdonald theory of outstanding fundraising qualities.

This made me smile: A fundraising letter from Prince Leia via Agents of Good, Rory Green and Fundraising Yoda. Also contains some great direct mail tips!

HowardLake posted a photo:

NGO executives berated for their 'fat cat' salaries have bills to pay too – and work for much less than the market rate

It's impossible for anyone working for an aid charity to comment on the current silly season skirmish on salaries without sounding defensive and/or self-serving. But the alternative – keep your head down until it goes away – leaves the field open to the aid bashers, whether of the crass Godfrey Bloom or more intelligent (and non-racist) persuasion. And bashing aid is what this is about. The critics don't want value for money, they want less money to be spent on aid. I work for Oxfam and think aid and the work of charities is too important to let them have free rein, so although I realise I am on a hiding to nothing, here goes.

What's the charge? That our bosses are fat cats, trousering donations that supporters and donor governments fondly think are going to relieve poverty. Cue pics of NGO execs in suits and (horror!) smiling (they clearly don't care about the poor).

And the defence? As former Oxfam CEO Barbara Stocking pointed out on Radio 4 when the story broke, her successor (and my current boss), Mark Goldring, has a big job by any standards: multitasking between running a 700-shop retail chain, managing 5,000 employees and 20,000 volunteers and a £360m budget and ensuring the safety of staff in some of the riskiest places on earth. It doesn't always work, as Stocking recalled – for a start, people get killed (on her watch, in Afghanistan).

The defences usually also include lots of management blah about salary reviews and benchmarking, and statements like: "For every £1 donated to Oxfam, 84p goes directly to emergency, development and campaigning work. Just 9p is spent on running costs," which I fear no-one reads.

The attacks touch on a pretty profound identity crisis for anyone working in aid. Is it a career or a vocation? People working for charities are not saints, but really pretty normal, mainly middle-class types. They have partners, kids, many drive cars. We go on holiday (I know, shocking isn't it?). We worry about getting old, pensions, all that stuff. There is the odd ascetic Mother Teresa type (I met some fantastic ones while working for Cafod), but by and large we don't live in convents/monasteries – which means mortgages.

But it's also a vocation, something that inspires and excites and makes you feel very lucky (and I accept, maybe in some cases, irritatingly self-righteous). We don't need the Daily Mail to tell us there is a tension there – my son recently berated me for taking a salary from Oxfam, though he didn't seem to connect this to helping get him through college. So the compromise is that our bosses need salaries, but are prepared to take less than they might otherwise. Goldring gets paid £120k and earns it (but I would say that, wouldn't I?). Although it's a lot of cash, it's way below what that level of responsibility would earn in the private sector. Stocking took a 30% salary cut to become a "fat cat" NGO boss, followed by a five-year pay freeze.

But whether career or vocation, the work has to be professional – managing these kinds of outfits takes both dedication and skill. Quite rightly, NGOs are under intense pressure to make the most of every penny, and that needs good management. And (the critics don't talk about this) what would be the alternative to paying this level of salaries? If we ran Oxfam on a volunteer basis, or had a ceiling of say £25,000? At senior management level, the reality is that if you pay peanuts, you're pretty likely to get monkeys (albeit well-meaning ones). You don't have to be a management consultant to suspect that the impact on an organisation of such size, complexity and risk could be devastating.

Which would suit the aid critics just fine of course – lots of scandals to justify taking a hatchet to the aid budget (any similarity to what's going on with the NHS is purely coincidental, I'm sure, even if many of the rock throwers are the same).

So that's my best shot. Yes we get paid. Yes we have careers. And yes we want to change the world for the better. For an organisation such as Oxfam, the challenge is to find the right balance between duty (keeping salaries relatively low in the context) and effectiveness (understanding that the external market has an effect on the likely talent you are having to attract/retain from within and, more importantly, from outside the sector). Are the bashers really saying such a balance is impossible?

• Charities
• Voluntary sector
• Executive pay and bonuses
• Aid

The rapid increase in brain cancer and brain tumor diagnoses in the MLB over the past decade is currently a major discussion topic in the world of sports news. While there is NO known link / cause for brain cancer, more and more professional athletes are lending their voice to help spread awareness in hopes of finding a cure.

Recently, New York Yankees player Curtis Granderson, Los Angeles Dodgers pitcher Chris Capuano and New York Mets outfielder, Eric Young filmed PSAs in support of Voices Against Brain Cancer, a non-profit organization dedicated to raising awareness of, and funds for, brain cancer research.

More: http://www.looktothestars.org/news/10615-baseball-players-lend-their-voices-against-brain-cancer

Celebrities from Movies, Television, Music and Sports will gather alongside national bullying activists on Saturday, August 10th in Los Angeles for the 2013 NO BULL National Education Conference and NO BULL Teen Video Awards.

The awards show will narrow down 15 nominees who wrote and directed short films and Public Service Announcements about the importance of bullying prevention and digital responsibility. Grown Up’s 2 star actor, Nadji Jeter, will host and Brett Ostro, a former producer on the Teen Choice Awards, the Cartoon Network Hall of Game Awards, and Nickelodeon Kids’ Choice Awards, will serve as the producer for the annual event. Special guest performers include #1 recording artist Ryan Beatty, Epic Records recording artist Marcus Canty and artist Allan I.

More: http://www.looktothestars.org/news/10614-nadji-jeter-to-host-anti-bullying-awards

Olympic rower Mark Hunter joins fellow athlete Kate Dennison to run the Royal Park Half Marathon for Right To Play, an international charity that uses sport and play to educate and empower children in disadvantaged communities.

Both Hunter and Dennison have been Athlete Ambassadors for Right To Play for a number of years and decided to run the 13.1 miles around London this October to show their support for the charity.

More: http://www.looktothestars.org/news/10613-athletes-to-run-half-marathon-for-right-to-play

Ryan Getzlaf, captain of the Anaheim Ducks, is hosting the third annual Getzlaf Golf Shootout on September 8 to benefit CureDuchenne, a nonprofit that raises awareness and funds research to find a cure for Duchenne muscular dystrophy.

Gold medalist and NHL All-Star Getzlaf, along with his Anaheim Ducks teammates including Corey Perry, Dustin Penner and Sauk Koivu, and other hockey players, celebrities and community leaders will participate in the golf tournament to support CureDuchenne. Scott Niedermayer, assistant coach of the Anaheim Ducks, Stanley Cup champion, Olympic gold medalist and Hockey Hall of Fame inductee, is also scheduled to participate.

This charity event will be held at the Monarch Beach Golf Links in Dana Point on Sunday, September 8. Each foursome will be teamed up with a professional athlete or celebrity for a unique and exciting day on the green. A pre-golf dinner reception will be held at Sutra in Costa Mesa on Saturday, September 7 and will include a live and silent auction.

More: http://www.looktothestars.org/news/10612-nhl-all-star-to-host-golf-shootout-for-charity

The Shakespeare Center of Los Angeles (SCLA) presents its 23rd Annual Simply Shakespeare benefit reading of “The Two Gentlemen of Verona,” September 25, 2013 at The Broad Stage, Santa Monica.

The evening will feature a star-studded cast including Sir Paul McCartney, Tom Hanks, Rita Wilson and William Shatner. Additional participants will be announced. Simply Shakespeare features a hilarious and entertaining evening of impromptu Shakespeare and song. All proceeds from the event support the SCLA and its arts based veterans employment and youth employment programs for inner-city youth and arts education in local schools.

Simply Shakespeare previous all-star casts have included Tim Allen, Annette Bening, Kenneth Branagh, Jackson Browne, Billy Crystal, Sally Field, Kelsey Grammer, Neil Patrick Harris, Faith Hill, Sir Anthony Hopkins, Kate Hudson, Helen Hunt, Lisa Kudrow, Lyle Lovett, Steve Martin, Reba McEntire, Tim McGraw, Matthew Perry, David Hyde Pierce, Jada Pinkett Smith, Keanu Reeves, Julia Roberts, Ray Romano, William Shatner, Martin Sheen, Martin Short, Will Smith, Robin Williams and Renee Zellweger.

More: http://www.looktothestars.org/news/10616-paul-mccartney-joins-star-studded-cast-for-charity-shakespeare

Stephen Fry has written an open letter to British prime minister David Cameron, calling for Russia to be banned from hosting the Winter Olympics because of its anti-gay laws.

“An absolute ban on the Russian Winter Olympics of 2014 on Sochi is simply essential,” he wrote. "Stage them elsewhere in Utah, Lillyhammer, anywhere you like. At all costs Putin cannot be seen to have the approval of the civilised world.

“He is making scapegoats of gay people, just as Hitler did Jews. He cannot be allowed to get away with it. I know whereof I speak. I have visited Russia, stood up to the political deputy who introduced the first of these laws, in his city of St Petersburg. I looked into the face of the man and, on camera, tried to reason with him, counter him, make him understand what he was doing. All I saw reflected back at me was what Hannah Arendt called, so memorably, “the banality of evil.” A stupid man, but like so many tyrants, one with an instinct of how to exploit a disaffected people by finding scapegoats. Putin may not be quite as oafish and stupid as Deputy Milonov but his instincts are the same. He may claim that the “values” of Russia are not the “values” of the West, but this is absolutely in opposition to Peter the Great’s philosophy, and against the hopes of millions of Russians, those not in the grip of that toxic mix of shaven headed thuggery and bigoted religion, those who are agonised by the rolling back of democracy and the formation of a new autocracy in the motherland that has suffered so much (and whose music, literature and drama, incidentally I love so passionately).

More: http://www.looktothestars.org/news/10610-stephen-fry-speaks-out-over-russias-anti-gay-laws

You and a guest can enjoy the ultimate Jonas Brothers experience on August 16 in Los Angeles with this fantastic celebrity charity auction.



Spend time with each of the boys when you take a tour of the stage with Nick, play a game of ping pong with Joe and sit down for coffee or tea with Kevin!



This package also includes:

More: http://www.looktothestars.org/news/10609-play-ping-pong-with-the-jonas-brothers-for-charity

At JustGiving, we’ve found a way to monetise Facebook by encouraging people to share their actions from our site with their Facebook friends. Specifically, when someone sponsors a friend who’s taking part in a fundraising event we will prompt them to share a link to their friend’s donation page on Facebook.

We recognise that some people don’t like sharing how much they give to charity, or that they give to charity at all, so we ensure our request makes it clear that sharing charitable information is a great way of helping others to raise more money.  After all, sharing is an altruistic act and not a way to show off generosity.

Whilst we promote sharing to Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn and by email, Facebook is by far the most popular option and accounts for 90% of our total shares. This is not entirely surprising given Facebook’s scale compared to the other networks and that most people use Facebook to ask their friends to sponsor them.

Redeveloping our website to encourage and highlight social sharing has had a massive impact on the number of donations made, raising an extra £1 million in eight months. For every share a donor makes to a social network, a certain percentage of their friends will see it, click on it and make another donation with JustGiving. Our data shows that this means each share to Facebook is worth on average an extra £4.50. In contrast, sharing to Twitter is worth £1.80 and LinkedIn £3.30. From September 2011 to April 2012, Facebook sharing generated over £925,000, Twitter £55,000 and LinkedIn £22,000.

What has been fascinating to observe is how the impact of sharing on Facebook changes depending on the context of who is sharing and what they’re sharing. For example, if a donor shares a message on Facebook about them donating directly to a charity, it’s worth £1 per share. And if someone shares a message about donating to a friend’s fundraising page, it’s worth around £5. But if a fundraiser (i.e. someone taking part in a fundraising event for a charity) shares a text update about their event, it is worth around £12 per share. Incredibly, if a fundraiser records and shares a video about their event, the average value per share increases to £18.

In each instance, shared content appears in a Facebook newsfeed in broadly the same way, but the motivation and interest of the messages is totally different. It may be self-evident on reflection that individuals in a social network are more likely to respond to someone doing something for charity than just donating to charity, but the way we built our product and track our data proves that this is actual behaviour. We like to summarise this as ‘the greater the effort of the individual, the greater the response from their network’.

So what does this mean for charities wanting to use Facebook to raise money? Well, it proves that encouraging people to share their charitable actions on Facebook helps to raise more money and that extra care should be taken on how people are encouraged to share.

Most non-profits will have a way of accepting donations online, but very few of those processes actively encourage people to share their donations with friends. Given that each Facebook user has an average of 130 friends, just one share could help to reach people that the charity doesn’t have access to – and messages may also be more effective coming from a friend than from the charity itself.

In addition, non-profits should also encourage people to add more content to their shares, such as why the donor gave to that charity and the story behind their donation. Encouraging donors to share their motivation will make their share on the social network much more interesting and engaging to their friends and increase the impact it has.

To summarise, whether making a donation, signing up to a newsletter or registering for an event, people should be prompted to tell their friends on social networks what they did and equally importantly, why they did it.

Watch out for Facebook fundraising part three: what next for Facebook sharing?

Following the zero-hours furore this week, we examine the charity sector's attitude to the controversial contracts

Sports Direct, McDonald's and Amazon have been at the centre of the zero hours contracts furore this week, following a Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development (CIPD) survey, which showed that one million of the UK's workforce might be on zero hours contracts.

But charities have also been criticised by commentators because such contracts are often seen as a way of shirking responsibilities to employees and cutting costs.

The CIPD results showed that 34% of charities compared with 24% of public sector employers and 17% of the private sector employ staff on zero hours contracts.

The default opinion of many commentators is that such contracts - banned in the Netherlands - are generally bad for employees because they allow little security. The CIPD says that there are workers who appreciate the flexibility but an Office of National Statistics survey last year found that people on zero hours contracts had lower levels of wellbeing and self-worth than other workers.

So what is the sector's attitude to zero hours contracts and are they on the increase, as the CIPD report has suggested?

Major health and social care Turning Point, in particular, became embroiled in the debate, after a story in The Mirror suggested the charity slashed 2,400 jobs and put staff on zero hours contracts instead.

Speaking to the Guardian, a spokeswoman for Turning Point says that its employees on zero hours contracts are better off than they would have been otherwise and have been given full employment rights.

"As part of the recent consultations with staff, all casual workers at Turning Point were moved onto zero hours contracts. No Turning Point employees on permanent contracts were moved onto zero hours contracts.

"A driver for this change was to give employees more rights than if they were casuals. We fully recognise that zero hours contracts should not replace a permanent contract as the default employment option."

She says that 12% of staff are on zero hour contracts, which means they aren't guaranteed a set number of hours. But Turning Point is giving those staff full employment rights, including access to pensions and redundancy pay.

Employers don't legally have to give full employment rights with such contracts, and critics say the agreements are often abused as a way to get cheap labour.

But NCVO, the National Council for Voluntary Organisations, says this needn't necessarily be the case and such contracts don't mean charities want to exploit people.

In a statement to the Guardian, Sir Stuart Etherington, chief executive of NCVO, comments: "Often the most important thing between employers and employees is the quality of their relationship, rather than the wording of their contract.

"All employers should be striving to nurture mutual trust and understanding with those who work for them. Zero-hours contracts are not a problem in themselves, and can allow both employers and employees valuable freedom. The crucial aspect is how they are administered."

He also says that a plan by the CIPD to create a code of good practice is welcomed as a "sensible and proportionate approach."

There will be a gradual trend towards more flexible working, including zero hours contracts, particularly among charities, according to Mark Beeston, chief economist at the CIPD.

"From what I've seen with this and other surveys, the voluntary sector is always a bigger user of different types of flexible employment," says Beeston.

But it's important to look at the alternative employment options that might have been available, in order to ascertain whether the employee is better off with a zero hours contract, he emphasises.

Beeston also points out that out of the 1000 employers interviewed in the survey, only 117 were from the voluntary sector, and that those who used zero hours contracts rarely had more than 10% of staff on such terms.

"These contracts can be better for staff than casual arrangements and can save on agency fees for employers," Beeston says.

Nick Clayton, a HR professor at CASS business school, which runs the Centre for Charity Effectiveness, makes the point that some charities will be using zero hour contracts as a way of getting people who are unlikely to get full-time employment, back into work.

He says he is generally more concerned about the effects of high pay at the top of organisations than zero hours contracts.

However, zero hours contracts shouldn't be the preferred option for charities looking to help people back into employment, he adds.

This content is brought to you by Guardian Professional. To join the voluntary sector network, click here.

• Finance
• Voluntary sector
• Charities
• Zero-hours contracts
• Work & careers
• Employment law

The latest report from Pew Research says 72% of online adults are using social network sites. But perhaps most striking, those ages 65 and older have roughly tripled their presence on social sites in the last four years — from 13% in 2009 to 43% now. That’s good news. It means there’s another channel through which to place our causes and needs in front of a segment of the public that is traditionally very attuned to bettering the world around them. But before you online fundraisers get all giddy and delirious out there, celebrating the coming convergence of seniors’

Beach Boys lead singer, Mike Love, announced today the band will be making a year-long commitment to City Year, a national education-focused organization that unites young AmeriCorps members for a year of service in high-need public schools.

Beginning in August and for one year, all Beach Boys concerts will highlight City Year through a special video tribute when performing “Be True to Your School.” Beach Boys fans will be encouraged to make a $10 donation to City Year by using their cell phones to text the word “SCHOOL” to 20222. In addition, City Year will have a booth and representatives at concerts which take place in communities where City Year serves. The Beach Boys have been selling out amphitheaters, concert venues and county fairs across the country. The current tour runs through November, but the band will be announcing new dates for 2014 in the coming weeks.

“It’s so rewarding to be in a position to help young people find their way through City Year,” said Mike Love. “When I think back on early life before the Beach Boys, I remember those special people who encouraged me to discover my passion and follow my path. Too many kids lose their way, drop out of school, and never realize their true potential. Be True to Your School was a high school anthem in the early sixties, and for me, fifty years later it’s about inspiring our youth to reach for their dream. City Year makes that possible every day, and I’m grateful to shine a spotlight on their incredible work.”

More: http://www.looktothestars.org/news/10608-beach-boys-make-commitment-to-education-organization