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explore our Knowledge center
Browse these timely, relevant resources curated by our team of experts to deepen your knowledge of best practices, data insights and more. If you have suggested resources for inclusion in the Knowledge Center please contact our team.
Sustaining Maturing Foundations
Recognizing that much of the educational material available nationally to assist foundations is designed for foundation orientations – to assist those just getting started – this resource alternatively focuses on the needs of executives, staff and board members of maturing foundations.
CMF 2023 Annual Report: Embracing Differences & Bridging Divides
In this edition of CMF’s Annual Report, you will read about how your peers in rural, urban and suburban communities are bringing people together across a spectrum of issues, perspectives and lived experiences
CMF Statewide Equity Fund: A Guide for Philanthropy on Partnerships to Equitably Shape Public Funding
The guide is intended to be a playbook for philanthropy, highlighting lessons learned from the five sites and key considerations for ensuring community voice is centered in the decision-making process for community investments.
Board Term Limits
Boards serve an essential governance role within foundations. Each board varies in terms of its policies and procedures depending on the structure required to achieve its strategic goals and organizational mission.
The NCFP Guide for Effective Family Philanthropy
Effective family philanthropy makes a collective commitment to meaningful societal change. It holds itself accountable to impact as defined by community, and to the proven practices that support it. It is adaptive, evolving with the family and the community or ecosystem within which it operates.
Making it stick: A guide for establishing effective DEI infrastructure
This how-to guide, created through the W.K. Kellogg Foundation's Expanding Equity program, has helpful tips for choosing and refining a DEI governance structure for your organization and offers supporting tools and processes (e.g., metrics, rewards and recognition) that can help make it stick.
What Boards and Executives Need to Know: Reasonable Compensation
This resource outlines recommended and required elements of this process, the details of a compensation package, special considerations in considering raises and bonuses, and much more.
Foundation-Government Liaison Offices: Why and How of Michigan Governor's Office of Foundation Liaison
This document aims to share learnings about the key considerations in starting and operating a liaison office successfully. This document is based on the multi-year evaluation of the OFL, along with interviews with its founders and of leaders of similar offices in other states and regions.
What Boards and Executives Need to Know: Self-Dealing
While private foundations have strict rules for self-dealing among disqualified persons, many of these rules are well-established best practices for other grantmakers and public charities.
What Boards and Executives Need to Know: Conflicts of Interest
This resource shares helpful information about conflicts of interest relating to the nonprofit and philanthropic sector. Conflicts of interest are of concern for both private foundations and public charities.
What Boards and Executives Need to Know: Foundations
Board members and staff of philanthropic institutions regularly reach out to CMF to learn more about the various types of grantmaking foundations.
What Boards and Executives Need to Know: Succession Planning
Board members and staff of philanthropic institutions regularly reach out to CMF to learn more about succession planning. The Ask CMF team has curated the following resources for organizations considering how to plan for a hypothetical or forthcoming transition for executive positions.