An Interview with Anna Bruni Sabhaney
Shifting power dynamics to create more equity in the funder-grantee relationship.
I love the grounded, nature imagery around how I met Anna: Brad at Rootstock connected me to Anna at The Confluencers. Indeed, two rivers joining forces! (And it really brings me back to my roots in conservation fundraising.) I also love the way Anna’s work focuses on challenging grantmakers’ resistance to long-term unrestricted funding that can pay for, well, the basics. Like staff salaries.
As Anna sees it, more general operating support focuses on reducing risk through:
Sharing compelling impact narratives.
Creating continuous honest conversation with funders.
Accepting that some funders will still misunderstand, and it’s OK to steer clear of those.
Communicating not only the money that’s needed, but also the terms needed for a nonprofit to succeed.
Anna believes this happens because nonprofits are being undervalued, so she teaches nonprofit CEOs to know their worth, how to communicate it, and how to set boundaries. Here’s what else I learned from Anna.
What is your philanthropy role and how long have you done this work?
I see myself as an advocate and champion for smaller and local organizations. I am also a civil engineer who’s consulted to international think tanks and governments, helping them explain complex projects to get funding. Sounds a lot like philanthropy – and my work helping nonprofits leverage their knowledge and secret sauce to get long-term funding.
A big part of my work is shifting power dynamics to create more equity in the funder-grantee relationship. Knowledge of your customer is common practice everywhere in the business world, but with nonprofits there is a lot of behavior around giving away expertise for free. This is how I see it:
impact + relationships = long term funding
Tell us about something funny, crazy or unexpected that happened in your world of Doing Good.
Unexpected: I worked with a nonprofit client and we managed to get grant approval from a large philanthropic fund in just 3 days!
Crazy: We wrote a grant application for a client and the funder’s gatekeeper said how much they loved the proposal, “but, but, but...” there was a long list of people who still needed to review it. She said that, if we didn’t jump through these hoops, our project wouldn’t happen. I answered that the project would happen – with or without them. (Of course, they weren’t our only funders.)
And two lovely stories … I worked with an executive director, a young Indigenous leader, who was getting a lot of pressure from trustees to apply for a bunch of grants. I coached him to say, “We’re not applying to these. They are not a good fit at this time.” So simple and so powerful.
Another client was invited to talk with a potential funder. Instead of answering their interview questions, the nonprofit flipped it, asking them: “What are you doing in this space?”
It seems fair. Funders have the power of money to take their own actions to solve a problem, and not just expect their grantees to do all the heavy lifting. Penny Wilson, from GettingOnBoard.org outlines some great questions that inclusive boards ask themselves to truly honor diverse experience.
If you could change one thing in the process of fundraising, what would it be?
Grants. I would change everything.
Get rid of written proposals, or keep it to a page or two. Offer a variety of ways to communicate. Some nonprofits find site visits the easiest way to tell their story. Others may prefer pitch decks or videos. Writing can be much harder.
Have the funder dedicate staff who are charged with finding ways to gather information – with minimum time required from the grantee.
Pay the nonprofit’s staff time for anything that requires more than a day to prepare. (Funders are reluctant to support operating expense, but isn’t that what pays for grant administration?)
Provide feedback on reasons for rejection. A few bullet points could be hugely beneficial for the applicants – and could improve the process for everyone.
Find space for innovation at the intersection between nonprofits and funders. Is there a role for speed dating? Or AI? Let’s get creative about how we connect over shared issues.
Think of your favorite funder or nonprofit. What makes them great?
I’m thinking of a small nonprofit I know. What I love about them is that their staff is willing to do the work. They have the courage and patience to ask, “Is what we’re doing serving our goals?” This is hard. Especially when you have invested money and time to set up a new process – and then find something that’s not working and needs to be fixed. They look at their own work critically but with optimism, and their impact is powerful.
What is one thing you’d like all donors to know about a nonprofit’s world? What is a common misconception?
The expectation that everyone communicates knowledge in the same way is just not true. There’s so much that nonprofits know, but it can be hard to put in writing. Sometimes the more you know, the harder it is to explain it in a way others who know less can understand. Things like unexpected risks or something going wrong are harder to communicate. Nonprofits tend to talk about actions and solutions – they’re more exciting than talking about problems.
Funders risk undervaluing a solution – or an organization’s work – because they don’t fully understand the problem or what it really takes to solve it. And funders’ exploratory time takes up a nonprofit’s operating time. “If your foundation job as a program officer is to learn about a specific area of work, why are you asking me [the nonprofit] to provide that information to you for free? Educate yourself or pay us for our time and expertise. Don’t assume that, just because you can spend time on this exchange, we can too.”
I love it when nonprofits stand up for themselves!
See more about Anna’s work with global nonprofits at theconfluencers.com or book a call with her directly.
Funder Follies was inspired by the unintended consequences of Doing Good. If you like what you read:
Contact Melanie with your own experiences in this sometimes crazy world of philanthropy.
Check out our archives for A Real(ly Long) Grant Application (Folly #13), Painful Grant Applications (Folly #3), or Painful Grant Reports (Folly #2). They all give real world examples that illustrate these power dynamics in funder relationships.